6-minute video
“A digital transformation is this massive thing that touches every aspect of the business. So how do you break that down into bite-sized chunks to measure and show those results and hold everyone accountable for progress?”
- Andrew Rieser, President of Mountain Point
Effectively managing change is a key factor in the success of any digital transformation initiative.
In this short video, we outline practical change management strategies to help manufacturers rally their teams and establish accountability.
This episode is part of our 12-part mini-series during which we’ll talk through each of our 10 Best Practices for Digital Transformation.
Have a question you’d like answered?
Let us know in the comments below, and we’ll talk through it on a future episode!
What's the ROI? Just six months after implementing their digital transformation efforts, luxury textile manufacturer Matouk saw a 233% return on their investments.
Transcript: Practical change management tips for managing a digital transformation.
Jessica: Hi, and thanks for joining us for another Q&A Friday, a regular series where we chat about issues facing manufacturing companies in the new world of Industry 4.0. I'm Jessica Vodden, a team member here at Mountain Point, and I'm joined by Andrew Rieser, our president and co-founder. Hi, Andrew.
Andrew: Hey, good afternoon, Jess.
Jessica: So, we're continuing the conversation we've been having for the last couple of weeks on how to really dig in and manage digital transformation projects. So, for those of you who follow our blog, we have a 10-step guide to managing digital transformation, 10-best practices, and we're taking a look at each of those practices one by one and addressing the issues surrounding them and taking a look at what they really look like on the ground. And so, today, Andrew, what I'd like to talk about is how you can establish accountability and set expectations for change. I know in the past we've talked a lot about how important it is to get your team on board, to get your leadership on board, and also how scary change can be for people. So, how do you make sure that you're addressing the people side of that and making sure that everybody's moving in the same direction?
Andrew: I think that managing people is a challenge in and of itself, but being able to articulate and set expectations and lead that change and have everybody motivated to be a part of that change, that's what we see as the deciding factor, if you will, in the successful digital transformations versus the ones that fail to get off the ground. So I think this is a very important topic and change management and leadership and more importantly setting those expectations and metrics for how individuals that are contributing to this change and that are change agents, how they're gonna be measured and how the overarching organization is gonna be measured to ensure success.
Jessica: Yeah. So, what are some practical strategies, some examples of things that companies can do to communicate where they're trying to go and how to get there?
Andrew: Yeah, I think a reoccurring theme that you'll hear as a part of this series is the amount of focus and the amount of time that's required in these things. So, similar to executive leadership, setting the vision and putting the time and energy that is warranted for these types of transformations, I think that individuals and individual contributors need to also have that same level of focus and make this a priority. What we've seen, whether it's a digital transformation initiative or just leadership and management, the best practice is having one-on-one meetings. And so one-on-one meetings allows for a more frequent, agile kind of cadence around what's going on, so it allows that transparency to happen, it allows the goals to be articulated and the processes to be measured, but it also allows that kind of continuous feedback loop of what's working and what's not working so that you can continuously improve and identify areas where you're being deficient as well as areas that are making an impact so that that agile approach can continue to help with the organizational change.
Jessica: Yeah. Tell me a little bit, and I heard you used the word measurement a few times there, tell me a bit about how our conversation from last time on setting KPIs and setting directions fits into this concept of establishing accountability.
Andrew: Yeah, I think that's a great question. And in the famous words of Peter Drucker, has the statement of, "If you can't measure it, you can't improve it." So I think in any of these initiatives it's not only important to establish the baseline of where you currently are and set the goal of where you wanna be, but also creating those processes of how you wanna measure that and how you're gonna know whether what you're doing and the improvements that you're making are making a change or not.
Jessica: Absolutely. One of my favorite things that I've seen clients and customers do is structure their weekly meetings or their daily meetings or their staff meetings around a dashboard. Everybody's looking at the same metrics, everybody's looking at the same goal and seeing how far they've come from last week, and I think that really helps establish that accountability because you can see if the needle's not moving, it also helps structure the conversation so that everybody's focused on the same thing, and I think that's one very specific way that this can be incorporated but also a really effective one.
Andrew: Yeah, I agree. I think you hit on two things there. One is the consistency. So having a consistent cadence around the data that the organization and the individuals know is important being measured. It fosters better collaboration and communication around those items. And then the next piece that we just alluded to is also the data. So being able to actually look at that data and see what is being measured, it allows you to have that gage of where things are and where you need to be either investing more time or putting more energy and focus into, or areas that are improving the way that you would want to improve them so that you can start tackling the next level items that are on your priority list. So I think those are two important factors of where dashboards and reports and leveraging your data can create that consistency and get everybody on the same page talking about the same things.
Jessica: Yep, absolutely. Well, we'll continue this conversation next week and in weeks to come. Thank you so much for your time, Andrew. And for those of you out there listening, if you have a question you'd like us to answer or an issue you'd want us to tackle, please let us know. You can hit us up online on our social medial channels, via email or chatbot. We're everywhere and we'd love to hear from you, so. Thanks again, Andrew, and have a great rest of your day!
Andrew: You too, thank you, Jess.
What's the ROI? Just six months after implementing their digital transformation efforts, luxury textile manufacturer Matouk saw a 233% return on their investments.