Digital transformation: Become like water

It is the time of the digital transformation. Everywhere you turn an organization is implementing a new tool or is going through a radical rehaul of its systems.

This climate is in part informed by the strains of the pandemic, but it is also connected to shifting employee expectations. Handling expectations has been an issue for many companies, and analytics company, Insightful’s State of Remote Work Report 2022 found that  64% of company leaders believe they don’t have the right tools to manage remote employees’ productivity.

This situation is made more worrying when there has been a 383% increase in remote and hybrid work. 

Fortunately, to tackle the issues of digital transformation UNLEASH America has hosted a discussion between Shakti Jauhar, co-founder and CEO at Mechanism Wellness, and Andrew Winnemore, general manager of HR Services and Transformation at Microsoft: where they discussed the ins and outs of a successful transformation.

Becoming liquid

The duo noted that there is a need to become a “Liquid Organization”, in digital transformation terms this means becoming, “‘fast as the wind and adaptable as water.”

However, this isn’t always a simple task for HR, Winnemore commented: “I think HR very good at talking about change, but my god, trying to adopt change in HR is a tough job.”

Jauhar added that communication, alignment, and change management is essential to create lasting change.  

Communication was a focus point over the course of the season. Both Jauhar and Winnemore highlighted the need for buy-in from the whole organization when making changes.

Before undertaking a transformation Jauhar offered a recommendation: “You have to deliver some return on the investment that you’re making. 

“You’re spending hundreds of millions of hours [on your transformation] and if you end up with no output; it is not helpful. So you have to think about how does the business actually gain traction.”

Drilling down into getting investment from C-level members of a company, Jauhar said that it is essential that after the project “we will be able to fund the transformation by the savings and the output that we create as a part of the transformation.

“That’s the first sign for the business that we are going to do something that will allow us to fund our own transformation going forward.”

The second aspect to ensure company-wide backing is making the HR department a profit center that delivers business savings.

Winnemore also highlighted the need to help the business with your HR transformation, and demonstrate how tools can help the wider organization.

Winnemore reflected that to get backing HR needs to pull levers and encourage collaboration, “not only through clarity and relationships, but also through data.”

Evidently, transformations, liquid or otherwise, need to not leave the organization high and dry. 

If you want more from UNLEASH America but can’t make it to Las Vegas, check out our website and our social media channels.