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Digital Transformation

What platform is your organisation resting on?

I hope you’ve had a chance to read our new report Embracing digital transformation: Experiences from Australian organisations.

This new study is based on in-depth interviews with 30 organisations from across the spectrum, including small and large businesses, government agencies, sporting associations and groups that specialise in building and implementing digital technologies. The groups featured include many household names such as Aussie, Cricket Australia, Domino’s Pizza, Macquarie Group, the NSW Department of Education and Pact Group.

The report shows that Australian organisations realise digital disruption is real and accelerating, and that most are actively making changes to ensure they remain relevant and competitive. However, it also shows that most have only recently created formal digital transformation strategies and almost every organisation is starting from a different point.

That’s not surprising since the term ‘digital transformation’ can cover a lot of ground. It might include rolling out new mobile apps to customers, improving internal communications systems for your teams or shifting key parts of your technology infrastructure to the cloud. At the most extreme, and most powerfully, it can mean moving your entire business to a new platform that gives you an almost infinite capacity to expand and try new ideas.

Given these myriad options, I would encourage you to focus on the business outcomes you’re trying to achieve rather than specific technologies. As you’ll see in our report, those outcomes are likely to centre on the following fundamental areas:

  • engaging your customers
  • empowering your employees
  • optimising your operations
  • transforming your products and services.

If you start by asking what you’re trying to achieve in these areas, it becomes simpler to identify the next best steps to take on your digital transformation journey. Peter Harvey from Macquarie Group gives a great piece of advice along these lines in the report: “Start with the customers and start with your business. Understand their problems, their opportunities, and use digital as a tool to meet their needs”.

Of course, the next challenge may be finding the people and suppliers you need to realise your vision for using digital technologies effectively. To address that, I’d recommend that you actively engage with us at Microsoft or one of our many partners. The latter might include both traditional technology implementation firms, management consultancies that are playing an increasingly important role in helping organisations to set their digital strategies, and local independent software vendors that are building tools to solve specific challenges.

I hope this new report gives you a deeper insight into what digital transformation means, the potential it offers here in Australia and how your peers are moving forward. I also hope it inspires you to engage more deeply with Microsoft and our entire partner ecosystem to learn how you can achieve the business outcomes you care about.

Download the full report: Embracing digital transformation: Experiences from Australian organisations.