Rebuild Your Organization for Continuous Change
by David L. Rogers
Publisher: Columbia Business School Publishing
ISBN-13 978-0231196581
(Reviewed by Alex Apostolov, USA)
Today, every forward-looking person in our industry is talking about digital transformation (DX). With the acceleration of new technologies and the development and implementation of IEC 61850, every organization knows it must adapt to survive. But many businesses are failing to transform. Across industries, established companies are held back by bureaucracy, inertia, and old ways of working. How can this change?
David L. Rogers is an acclaimed expert on digital transformation, a member of the faculty at Columbia Business School, and the author of five books. His new book – The Digital Transformation Roadmap is intended to provide every leader with the answer on how to implement it.
The book is meant to be extremely practical. It is based on the author’s own work advising firms of diverse sizes and in different industries and locations-but also on the countless questions and years-long exchanges that he has had with thousands of global executives through his programs at Columbia Business School. Because digital transformation must happen at every level of the organization, the DX Roadmap is designed to zoom in or zoom out. Each step is applicable whatever one’s role is a CEO, CDO, directing digital for a business unit, leading a functional team like human resources (HR), or designing a new digital product.
After the introduction, chapter 2 examines the connection between DX and innovation and why established firms are failing to innovate at the pace demanded in the digital age. It explores the challenge of innovation under great uncertainty and the challenge of innovation beyond your core business. And it shows what we can learn from digital-era businesses and from digital-era methods such as agile, lean start-up, design thinking, and product management.
Chapters 3 through 7 lay out the five steps of the DX Roadmap in detail. Each step is illustrated with real-world case studies of businesses. The reader can find dozens of examples from a range of industries: banking, insurance, retail, consumer goods, media, telecom, technology, automotive, energy, health care, nonprofit, industrial manufacturing, and even container shipping. Each case illustrates the strategic concepts of the book with stories of individuals and their work in the real world.
The author also includes eight strategic planning tools to give the reader the practical means of applying the DX Roadmap with their own team:
- Shared Vision Map
- Problem/Opportunity Statements
- Problem/Opportunity Matrix
- Four Stages of Validation
- Rogers Growth Navigator
- Corporate Innovation Stack
- Tech and Talent Map
- Culture-Process Map
These tools are based on his experience advising and consulting. They are designed to pose the crucial questions that will guide the reader to the right answers for the particular organization. Downloadable versions of the tools, as well as additional tutorials on their application, can be found in the Tools section of the author’s website at www.davidrogers.digital.
The book’s conclusion returns to the theme of the bottom-up organization and examines the three jobs of leaders in an era of constant change. In the appendix, the reader will find visual summaries, a self-assessment tool, and directions to more resources online.
The DX Roadmap is designed to be started quickly so that the reader can learn by doing and see immediate results. It should be remembered that the real DX is iterative in nature. Once started, the five steps will repeat, overlap, and support one another. With its progress, the transformation will both deepen and broaden in scope. The main point is to get started and to learn by doing. One should not wait for a five-year plan, but start something in a couple of months. DX is not about spending months planning a multiyear process and then faithfully carrying it out. It is about starting the first steps immediately and learning as you go.
According to David Rogers, to thrive in the digital era, an organization must be built for continuous transformation. By the time it adapts to today’s massive digital shifts, it will already need to be ready for tomorrow. Like with evolution, the author states that it is not the strongest of businesses that will survive the digital era but those that are most adaptive to change.
The Digital Transformation Roadmap: Rebuild Your Organization for Continuous Change by David L. Rogers
Publisher: Columbia Business School Publishing
ISBN-13 978-0231196581
