Digital Transformation: Essential Roles for a Successful Programme

All digital transformation programmes are different. They vary according to goals, size and scope.

But, whether you are implementing a cloud migration programme, digitising sales and ecommerce or transitioning away from legacy systems, there are key roles that you need to have in place to steer your organisation through the process.

If you’re about to unleash a digital transformation process on your business, here are the people you’ll need to steer you through to achieve success.

The Leadership team

No major programme can hope to be successful unless it is fully supported at the very top. The Board or Senior Leadership Team have a crucial role to play in sharing the overall vision and mission.

Key here is the ability to align the goals of the digital transformation programme with the business strategy. How is the digital transformation supporting revenue growth? Or providing competitive advantage? Is it improving customer experience? Or automating processes?

Whatever that mission is, the leadership team will articulate the ambition and set out the objectives.

If there are skill sets missing from the leadership team, such as a CTO or CDO, then bringing in someone at the project outset is essential. It could be an interim, someone with a raft of successful programmes under their belt. Or, a permanent hire who can continue to drive future digital initiatives.

Regardless, this needs to be right. A bad hire here could jeopardise the success of the project from the get-go.

Technology leaders

So, the Board are fully behind the programme. But, they are looking at the bigger picture, not the detail. It’s the IT Directors and IT Managers who will plan and deliver the programme.

The job of these IT leaders is to ensure the right foundations are in place and able to support the programme. They are responsible for ensuring the right technology infrastructure and digital tools are in place, stable and able to scale.

They will determine the size and structure of the workforce, planning ahead and recruiting to fill any gaps. Often, consultants, interims or contractors work best, allowing the business to progress at pace.

The IT Directors and Managers will have ownership of the budget, engage with suppliers and manage key teams of people involved in the delivery of the programme.  And, they’ll report to the Leadership team on progress throughout.

Business Analysis

The ambition is there, the objectives have been defined. Now, the roadmap needs to be developed that will enable the organisation to transition.

Business Analysts are needed to assess the current situation, identify and document the needs of each stakeholder team, map out current capabilities and assess what’s needed to get to the end result.

who can extract information from non-technical people and translate them into meaningful goals, actions and deliverables for the delivery teams.

Depending on the size and scale of the transformation, business analysts can be senior leadership figures, guiding and educating stakeholders, or teams of specialist analysts working in specific areas.

Development and engineering

Practically all digital transformation programmes will involve the creation, implementation or integration of systems. And that means hiring Software Engineers and Software Developers to write the code.

Whether the team will be working on new products, helping to improve outdated legacy systems or developing tools for automation, the programme simply can’t happen without the skills of software engineers.

DevOps has seen huge growth within digital transformation in recent years. It brings together the programming expertise of software engineers and developers with a collaborative, people-oriented approach in order to get better results, faster.

Project management

The roadmap is complete, but who is going to make sure the milestones are met, resources are available and budgets are controlled. The Project Manager.

Depending on the type of delivery outputs and pace of the project, the project manager will follow a specific methodology. Agile, for example, will employ Scrum Masters to deliver various strands of a project in tandem.

Without a good project management team on board, the transformation project risks deadlines slipping. And that usually means unnecessary cost increases, as well as the negative impact of late delivery, such as a delayed new product launch or innovation set to increase competitive advantage.

User experience and design

No new digital system or product is going to elevate and push a business forward unless it has the user at its core. User Experience and User Interface (UX and UI) designers will be able to translate the requirements into a simple, seamless digital experience. The most successful digital products are intuitive, easy to navigate, good to look at and fast.

Along with great design, the customer journey and experience needs to flow seamlessly across all digital touchpoints. Customer Experience (CX) designers will work with customers, internal as well as external, understanding how they move through the process, making each stage clear, simple and user friendly.

Data & analytics

Data is a constant theme running through any digital transformation.

In the digital era, organisations find themselves with data from literally hundreds, if not thousands, of data points. This data can shed light on everything from customer buying behaviour to operational efficiency, external competition to prediction of future trends. If only you can make sense of it.

This is where Data Scientists and Data Analysts come in.

Harnessing complex and disorganised data sets, manipulating and turning it into insights will enable data-driven decision making. Data experts can help to extract maximum value from data, resulting in better decisions which in turn will drive efficiency, save money and speed up growth.

Security, data protection and risk management

With all this valuable data around, legislation such as GDPR and the increased threat of malicious activity, it’s imperative that any digital transformation project follows regulations and best practice when it comes to security.

Depending on the type of business you’re in, responsibility for information security can be represented at board level, with the appointment of a Chief Information Security Officer (CISO).

Whatever the level they’re at, Cyber Security teams are essential to ensure that your data, technology and people are safe. There have been a number of high profile security breaches involving companies with stringent protocols already in place.

And, your Data Protection team needs to be fully informed about the latest legislation designed to protect personal and company data, keeping employees safe as well as company data.

Change management

Arguably, this is one of the most crucial roles in the digital transformation process. What’s the point in creating a beautifully designed new digital experience if internal teams mistrust, misunderstand or misuse it?

However good the end product is, without embedding it fully into the working practices and culture of an organisation, there is just no point.

To achieve those end goals and strategic objectives that were outlined at the beginning, the business needs to go on the journey, embrace the changes, accept and adapt in order to move the dial.

This doesn’t just happen. Change Managers and Training Managers need to work together to help the business move forwards. Stakeholders from across the business have to get on board and champion the change, continually making the case for why by pointing to the benefits. Internal communications helps secure buy-in by keeping people engaged and providing regular communications so they knows what’s happening, why and when.

It’s not easy, but successfully managing change across the business is fundamental to achieving the best results possible.

Continuous improvement

Whether it’s optimising processes, driving new innovations or gathering feedback, Quality Assurance, Process Improvement and Continuous Improvement Managers will make sure the programme doesn’t just stop, but keeps improving.

To be successful, any digital transformation programme will carry on evolving after it has officially been implemented. Tweaks, adjustments, additions, spin-off projects, training and development will need to continue in order to generate maximum return on the project. Otherwise, you risk the project becoming outdated, benefits and financial return will diminish.

Behind all good technology there are great people

We think all of these are essential roles, and more besides – we haven’t mentioned legal, compliance or procurement for example.

As we said at the beginning, each programme is different.

But, if we were to pick one area that will make or break the success of any project, we’d choose change management.

Without taking your workforce on the journey, involving them, consulting with them, empowering them and listening to them, the programme is set up to fail.

Digital transformation is not about the technology, it’s about the people.

Talent Identified are experts in recruitment across the whole spectrum of digital transformation.

To talk to us about hiring exceptional interim, permanent or contractors in any of the roles we’ve mentioned above, get in touch.