Simply put, much about digital transformation is primarily about people. Unfortunately, more than 70% of enterprises fail to create any value from their digital transformation efforts, but what is interesting is that 62% of organisations cite culture as the number one hurdle to digital transformation.

And while this may come as a surprise, the reality is that at its heart, digital transformation is a people transformation. Many companies tend to focus on selecting and implementing the right digital technologies, however this strategy is not likely to lead to success.

In my first feature for Business Chief, I talk about the three pillars of digital transformation: strategic, cultural and operational, however today I want to shine a spotlight on the cultural pillar and the importance of cultural transformation. When I work with companies embarking on a digital transformation journey, I always ask them to consider if they have the right culture to adopt change?

So, what is the right culture for transformation?

Successful digital transformation requires a culture that accepts risk and tolerates failure, that supports new ways of doing things, the encouragement of innovation, and very importantly, a reverence for failing forward. The digital culture is one that is aware that digital transformation requires different thinking, it’s a culture where employees are empowered to take on new challenges, they are compensated for learning new expertise and they are incentivised to break new ground and build new models.

I think by now we all know that the best way to respond to digital disruption is by changing or adjusting the company culture to be more agile, risk-tolerant, and experimental but more than anything, it demands that we realise that digital transformation will require a change in the leadership approach and changes to organisational dynamics, which is in many ways a more complex task than technology deployment.

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This article was originally published on Business Chief APAC, a ‘Digital Community’ that connects the world’s largest brands and their most senior executives with the latest trends pivoting towards technology and digital transformation.