Dive Brief:

• The majority of businesses, 60%, are optimistic about digital transformation, but cultural issues represent half of the barriers for their efforts, according to an IDG survey sponsored by Appian of more than 500 senior level IT executives. In at least the last five years, 37% of respondents say they have been undergoing digital transformation.

• Change in practices is proving the most difficult barrier for the workforce to adapt to digital transformation. Learning new technologies, followed by the pressure to evolve and cloud or security software integration were the top three issues encountered with cultural evolution. 

• In 90% of organizations CIOs or other C-suite officials are driving customer experience improvements, operational excellence, governance, risk and compliance, and cost reduction.

Dive Insight:

Having a clear vision of the possible impacts of digital transformation is an obvious, but vital first step before initiating change.

IT leaders have to take into consideration how new tools and processes will impact employees that don't have a technically-inclined mind. To support employees in their evolution of skills and adoption of disruptive tech, training is required.

Moving to a digital culture to accommodate digital transformation is difficult, especially when the cloud receives most of the organizational resistance. To foster a more welcoming workforce, leaders need to have realistic expectations of goals and to not overburden employees with too much change too quickly.

When employees are pushed beyond reasonable expectations, low morale is unintentionally cultivated. Even when leaders want to pursue tools meant to aide employees, too many tools can frustrate employees.

Following the natural flow of the workplace technologies hype cycle can support the journey to digital dexterity. Companies that avoid the rush to push a tool quickly to the mainstream while incrementally experimenting with changes are more likely to find success.