On September 1 Vynyl CTO Erick Herring was the guest on episode 17 of Trailhead and Boise State Venture College’s Survive to Thrive video series. The episode focused on digital transformation, from initial conception through execution.
Erick stressed the importance of tethering your digital transformation efforts to a strategic plan, and building a team that can execute on the vision. Distilling that vision into a high-level road map is a great way to show the specific and measurable steps that the company will take to realize that vision. He warned however, that while digital transformation is about “efficiency and automation and changing processes, it's not only about that.” He noted that hiring an outside firm to work with your team can help you accelerate—with the caveat that “you can’t buy digital transformation off the shelf.”
“Done well, digital transformation opens up the possibilities for new types of innovation, for creativity.”
“You can digitally transform at many levels,” Erick notes. In addition to the CTOs and VPs who traditionally lead digital transformation, other people can kick-start the conversation. It can begin as simply as somebody saying “There must be a better way. If we don’t change something—if I don’t change something—nothing is ever going to change.”
Modernizing your processes is important to a digital transformation, but Erick cautions that “Agile tools have a time and a place, and are fit for the purpose and related to the structure of the organization you’re deploying them in.” For example, clients often rely on road maps to help teams understand their current state and to see a path that will lead them toward innovation. He stresses that “going into the cloud and turning on scrum across your organization does not digitally transform you.” For that, companies need to keep focused on the goal of creating value for their customers.
For more of Erick’s insights into digital transformation, check out the full episode on YouTube.