Every Business Is a Digital Business Technology is changing the game Enterprises have spent the last 25 years working to peel away the nonessential pieces of their businesses; focus on the core, outsource the rest. But in this push to simplify, many companies have relegated IT to “keeping the lights on.” Without information and technology, a business is blind in today’s digital world. You must change the way you think about IT to map a clear path forward. Every business is now a digital business. The world has already changed around us, and IT is driving much of the transformation. IT is a minimum standard for how we effectively run our enterprise, but it’s gone further than that. IT has become a driving force, in many situations the driving force, for how we effectively grow our companies. Every industry is now software driven; as such, every company must adopt IT as one of its core competencies. By this we mean that software is absolutely integral to how we currently run our businesses as well as how we reimagine our businesses as the world continues to change—how we redesign and produce things, how we create and manage new commercial transactions, how we begin to collaborate at unprecedented levels internally and with customers and suppliers. In the new world, our digital efforts will be the key to how we innovate and expand our business. There is a higher order of thinking—a digital mindset—that will, we believe, separate tomorrow’s most able organizations from their lesser rivals. Accenture observes that increasing numbers of farsighted organizations are recognizing IT as a strategic asset with which they can renew vital aspects of their operations—optimizing at least and innovating at best. As such, they are investing in the digital tools, the capabilities, and the skills to more easily identify useful data, evaluate it, excerpt it, analyze it, derive insights from it, share it, manage it, comment on it, report on it, and, most importantly, act on it. We no longer have to look far for examples. Here is Nike using wireless sensors and Web technology to create a performance-tracking system that allows it to create new services to monitor, and to improve and create new training routines for athletes. There is Ford, using sensor data to monitor both how a car operates and the driver’s behavior, and seeking to apply analytics to improve the experience for the next generation.i These companies, and many more like them, clearly see digital as a strategic imperative—a tool of competitive intent. They aren’t waiting for new technologies to be developed or to mature before they act. Nor should you. The obligation for action is all the more pressing because the technologies to transform your business are here and now. They are already good enough. Mobile, cloud, social, virtualization, big data—many of the items continuously listed as “hot trends”—are quickly becoming part of the current generation of technology; they are well past the point where they should be areas of exploration and experimentation and are quickly becoming the tools with which companies can craft fast, cost-effective solutions to some of their toughest problems—and greatest opportunities. As it has always done—as is its charter—our Technology Vision looks over the horizon at the emerging developments in technology that should be added to the list of technologies the enterprise should be prepared to take advantage of, from data visualization solutions and software-defined networks to moving-target-defense security systems. Just as importantly, though, this year’s report communicates why every organization has to adopt a digital mindset. At the very least, it is necessary in order to anticipate and respond to ongoing technology- driven disruptions. Amazon has disrupted retail sectors far beyond books and changed the whole discussion about who “owns” IT. Similarly, Airbnb is sparking a transformation in the traditional hotel business. But ideally, a digital mindset will enable enterprises to launch preemptive strikes of their own. It is incumbent upon the executive leadership team to be stewards of this new mindset. They must recognize that it’s no longer possible to separate “the technology” from “the business”; the two are too tightly intertwined. IT helps redesign the company’s products and supports its processes; it drives its supply chains; it becomes part of the products themselves and creates new ones; it allows access to new consumers; it provides the frameworks to create net new services. An organization cannot be the best in its sector unless it excels at understanding and using technology. Your stakeholders may not yet be probing into how your top team views IT. But it won’t be long before they do.
Posted on: Mon, 12 Aug 2013 19:49:21 +0000
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