You can order transportation with the click of a button, your bank account alerts you of a charge within seconds, and you probably have a notification that your flight has been delayed before the airline announces it over the loudspeaker. These examples of everyday digital transformation showcase the benefit they have to direct consumers, but the same innovation applies to your business. Digital innovation should be aligned to your business’s strategic goals to remain competitive. Silverline’s recommendation is that cloud technology like CRM is an important element of a successful digital transformation agenda.
A successful journey towards digital transformation will be ongoing and sometimes it can be confusing with an abundance of moving parts. Silverline has achieved over 1,100 implementations and from those we’ve seen these 10 key drivers which, from our perspective, are delineators for success. The difference between adopting and not adopting these drivers comes down to building a more or less successful CRM initiative.
The Need for Transformation
The importance of digital transformation goes beyond your business and is a mainstream industry requirement in order to remain competitive and meet customer expectations. Once seen as innovation, digital transformation has continued to become status quo while still being a major hurdle to tackle for your business. Likewise, the path to implementing CRM is essential in order to achieve such a large business objective.
In order to be successful, you can’t view adopting CRM as a single-phase implementation that can be deployed and then left as is. Digital transformation is complex, but necessary, and the possibilities grow as your business does. Big, complex, and critical means it needs to be done right. The risks of investment and politics of change mean it’s crucial for you to be successful out of the gate. However, it’s important to keep in mind that high risk means high payoff — now more than ever.
These 10 influential drivers of success are what we, at Silverline, have seen to be the most impactful. Pay attention to these drivers and you’re much more likely to be successful.
A Broader Perspective
When you think of these 10 success factors, it is important to understand how they work together and how they differ. We see success drivers during the digital transformation journey as a cycle where drivers come into play at different times with varying degrees of importance. You must think beyond each driver as a perfect relationship to the next because their value increases and decreases at different times. For example,Vision Led is critical at the beginning as you are starting your journey to digital transformation. While others, such as Continuously Delivered, can only come into play following the initial phase of implementation. Meanwhile, Intentionally Innovative as a driver should propel you along the cycle.
These drivers are not linear. Keep in mind, your digital transformation journey shouldn’t come to an end once you’ve completed your first cycle. Your Salesforce instance should be evolving through continuous cycles to achieve digital transformation. As your vision changes, you may modify drivers and go through the cycle again. Lastly, drivers like Adoption Driven should remain important within your cycle during every stage: beginning, middle, and end. This is the nature of a successful cycle of digital transformation.
The Necessity of Success Drivers
You may be questioning whether all 10 drivers are critical to overall success. These drivers should all be present as you strive towards digital transformation, however, emphasis on each may change through different parts of the cycle. Assess the degree to which they are present and what is lagging to identify gaps to ensure a steady focus.
For example, as you start a Salesforce initiative or make enhancements to an existing one, you need strong agile capabilities that continue to evolve over time. Digital transformation requires a unique mindset that is crucial to your approach. You may not have all the capabilities, such as Agility Biased, to execute these 10 drivers within your organization. Know that it’s okay to outsource resources to fill in the gaps. Expertise for these functions can be developed over time.
Once you have your cycle identified and have begun executing on the drivers within your cycle, you must continually assess your strategy to identify where you are and how you are measuring up to your goals. Struggling to maintain Intentional Innovation? That’s a great place within the cycle to bring in a partner to help you. If you aren’t continually assessing your maturity, you won’t be as effective as possible.
How Do You Measure Up?
From the beginning, it is important to have strong competencies, such as technology architecture, in place. If you don’t have them, it is crucial that you outsource to lay an effective foundation for future growth. In the early stages of planning, you need to be thinking of how to be effective now as well as later to achieve a high degree of quality. Great CRM governance? Yes, you need to have it. The more complex your CRM becomes the more sophisticated it needs to be. Plan for it!
Whether you’re new to digital transformation or you need to jumpstart your existing journey map, Silverline has best practices to help you navigate your route. Subscribe to the Silverline blog as we dive into each of the 10 keys to successful digital transformation on the Salesforce platform.
The 10 Key Drivers to Success
Vision Led – Develop a compelling vision that drives planning and prioritization across all business units and functional areas. Articulate a strategy and plan for each division to support efforts up and down the hierarchy. Click here to learn more about the Vision Led key driver.
Value Focused – Strategically outline goals and outcomes that define your program’s success metrics. Communicate accountability throughout your organization to achieve these metrics in order to monitor and act upon their results. Click here to learn more about the Value Focused key driver.
Human Centered – Map your customer journeys to identify engagement points that can be improved. A focus on user experience will prepare your program for future resistance against planned changes by ensuring your focus on either customer or user is at the center of your strategy. Click here to learn more about the Human Centered key driver.
Data Obsessed – Prepare your data to be moved, shared, consumed, and analyzed. Include a strategy for accountability for managing data architecture, hygiene, and stewardship. Establish a “single source of truth” for key data elements. Click here to learn more about the Data Obsessed key driver.
Adoption Driven – Hold your users and managers accountable for proper platform utilization. Adoption measurement and improvement should be included in program governance to ensure new processes and technology are improving performance. Click here to learn more about the Adoption Driven key driver.
Governance Based – Proper program governance should be established with representation across all levels of your organization. Communication channels need to be in place to drive expectation, alignment, and progress. Identify your decision-making processes, empower decision-makers, and establish checks and balances for efficacy and compliance. Click here to learn more about the Governance Based key driver.
Quality Built – Develop strategy and processes for ensuring data quality and integrity by including the use of architecture, testing, and delivery standards. Ensure your strategy includes guidance and management for multiple environments and platform orgs. Include an effective method for monitoring and managing platform health. Click here to learn more about the Quality Built key driver.
Agility Based – Adopt agile methodology for your delivery team and prepare them for the scope of your planned program. Monitor your program execution to ensure release schedules operate at the speed of your business. Click here to learn more about the Agility Based key driver.
Continuously Delivered – Develop a plan to respond to end user needs and manage requests. Track, resolve, and monitor issues to ensure you are adequately keeping pace with business changes and use scale. Establish a process to uncover ongoing requirements and translate into regular enhancement releases. Click here to learn more about the Continuously Delivered key driver.
Intentionally Innovative – Continually encourage new ideas for your program. Reset priorities based on lessons learned and customer behavior and revise plans based on experience and data. Ensure your program roadmap is tied to changes in business strategy to quickly realign resources and adjust funding as necessary. Click here to learn more about the Intentionally Innovative key driver.
