End of This Tour - Q&A
Over the last 3 months I have spent quite a bit of time mentoring, advising and speaking on a range of digital and technology related topics. The interviews and panel discussions have all been fun and I’ve met some great people along the way but they have also demanded a lot of my time (most of it being my own time, outside of work hours) and given other time pressures starting to stack up at the moment that’s going to be unsustainable. So it’s time for a break.
I will still be working with some specific groups on key initiatives but please don’t be offended if the response to your request to speak at your next event is ‘no’ - nothing about you or you event, there are just too many conflicting demands on my time.
I thought I’d capture some of the common or re-occurring questions (and my answers) from panel discussion and interview as a blog post, hopefully providing you with some useful insights & experiences (from my perspective - as always I reserve the right to be wrong or to change my mind).
So with that said, let’s get into it.
What is a “digital culture”?
In my experience digital culture is many things to different people and is applicable to multiple topics — but it all boils down to one thing: the relationship between humans & technology and how that shapes our everyday lives. It’s about how technology, and the access to information (internet), shapes the way we think, interact, behave and communicate. In most organisations digital culture manifests itself as increased agility, a closer connection with the customer, the willingness to take more calculated risks and to adjust course based on the data collected along the way.
What’s the cost to organisations of pursuing a digital cultural change?
Today almost every industry & sector is being disrupted by technology and so I think pursuing a digital culture is no longer a choice most organisations can afford not to make. In a digital world, one of the biggest risks is not taking risks. Developments in things like artificial intelligence and machine learning will undoubtedly change our everyday lives, our society and the economy yet no one can foresee (with too much certainty) exactly how things will change. Having a digital culture will allow you and your organisation to navigate these times of uncertainty & capitalise on the opportunities they bring rather than pulling the blanket over you head & hoping it passes.
Organisations often count the cost of pursuing digital change in terms of cannibalizing exist revenue streams - instead they should focus on the opportunity to remake and grow those revenue streams in a digital world.
How do you measure the success of the digital cultural change and when does the journey end?
Culture change is not an activity with a clearly defined beginning and end - the reality is that the journey never ends but it gets more interesting and impactful with time.
I have previous measured digital culture change along 4 key metrics:
1. People Measures - this is largely about self assessment. How do people that work at your company feel - do they buy into the vision, can they relate it to their role and what do they say about the organisation in non work circles?
2. Customer Measures - how do customers and the community experience your products and services? What are you doing well that you should continue doing, what could you be doing better and what should you stop doing all together?
3. Business Indicators - how does what you’re doing around culture link to your vision and link with your business imperatives? This is the realm of business efficiency powered by cultural change. Business indicators usually fall into two categories: tangible and intangible; both of which are important.
4. Financial Measures - in my experience if you take care of your people, customers and business then the money takes care of itself. The aim is usually to increase revenue, avoid cost and take risk out of the equation as much as possible.
In an organisation who is responsible for driving the change to the current culture?
I think the answer is everyone, but it needs to be led from the top. The most successful change initiatives I’ve been part of have been based on cross-functional teams demonstrating a range of transformations and building the rationale and momentum for change. Never underestimate the squeaky wheel as a catalyst for change.
I’ve always maintained that the culture of an organisation is the behaviour of it’s leadership. Consciously or unconsciously leaders model what is expected - and accepted - in the so doing set out the culture of the organisation.
Change requires space - it’s very hard for people to participate in change initiatives if they are working flat out all day. The key is to allow people the time, space and license to figure out what a digital culture means to them.You can support that through coaching, mentoring, education workshops and setting out some time ring-fenced for change & innovation.
What are the benefits and potential challenges which an organisation might face when embedding a digital culture?
Each organisation is different and working out what embedding a digital culture might mean for your organisation can take some time. Benefits I’ve seen realised relate to improved efficiency, faster decision making, improved customer experience, being able to reach new markets and of course improving profitability/service delivery.
The main challenges I’ve seen have included resistance to change, lack of understanding of the need for change (these two often go hand in hand), not having the right people around the table, not collecting the right data to inform decisions as you go and the cost & complexity of integrating with legacy systems & processes.
Sometimes organisations are presented with so many different options that they simply don’t know where to start. In that case starting with the squeaky wheel and building some momentum is a good place to look first.
What strategies are available to change/challenge the existing culture within an organisation?
In my experience the most successful strategy for change is based on leadership - selling the vision of the future and helping people to see themselves in that future. It’s about creating enthusiasm and energy for change - seeing the opportunity and embracing uncertainty. That way everyone takes a stake and ownership in the change and rallies towards a common goal(s).
The second approach is centred around management; redefining roles, measures and control systems creates a way for people to make the transition from today to the future in a relative ‘safe’ and easy to understand way.
The last - and least effective - approach is around control. Using coercion and disincentives as a last resort, if the first two approaches fail. In my experience the control approach is really a stop gap and often is simply an off ramp for people who don’t want to or can’t make the change with the organisation.
Will we all be replaced by machines?
Machines have been replacing humans for decades - you only need to walk through a car manufacturing plant to see how many robots already carry out tasks previously done by factory workers. It’s not a case of whether this trend will continue but rather how rapidly it will accelerate in the coming decade, enabled by machine learning, algorithms and artificial intelligence.
To date the focus for machines has been around increased efficiency and decreasing error or defect rates, the next stage is for machines to move into jobs that require more than just precision automation and repetition.
Machines will definitely change the nature of many jobs but I think in many cases they will augment - rather than replace - them. The usage of machines will create the opportunity for workers to focus on different, potentially more valuable, activities. For example, ATMs have been around for about 50 years but during that time the number of bank tellers has actually risen slightly - the nature of what they did changed when ATMs were introduced.
I think the introduction of more and more machines will change how we think about jobs and what a job in the future will look like.
Which technology do you think will make the biggest difference, why and how?
That’s a really tough one to call. I think my top three would be autonomous vehicles, artificial intelligence and wearables. I think all three will significantly change the way we live our lives within the next 5 years but different industries and geographies will adopt the technology differently.
For me the major disruptor continues to be Moore’s Law. The relentless improvement in price, performance, size and power utilization of computing power that Gordon Moore predicted back in the 1960’s is in my mind still the uber disruptor. Who knows what is just around the corner as a result of this relentless march of technology progress.
Digital culture is about being able to adopt and leverage technology developments are they become available and maximise their value to your customers and organisation.
What’s the secret to successful high performing teams?
What is the ideal team makeup in terms of roles and size?
I’m an advocate of product teams that fit the ‘two pizza’ rule - the permanent team size should be no bigger than you can feed with 2 pizzas. The team should include cross-functional team members who can take a product or service from inception to production - albeit sometimes they might need some external help or input. If possible each team should publish a clear set of interfaces/APIs so that other teams can integrate with their product easily.
Team members should all align behind a shared vision and set of goals.and in my experience visual management tools such as Scrum, Kanban or similar work really well in this type of team dynamic.
That’s the desired state - it’s not always possible to start out that way (especially if you have legacy systems) - and it may be a matter of working progressively towards that team structure.
Inter-team communication is vital - frequent information sharing sessions and demonstrations keep teams connected and foster innovation/fresh thinking.
Hopefully you found this an interesting read - if you have any burning question then fire them at me and I’ll do my best to answer them based on experiences.