Greg Kihlström advises on CX, Marketing Technology, and Digital Transformation at GK5A, and hosts The Agile Brand Podcast.
getty
By now, you’ve probably heard the term “digital transformation” more times than you can count. But didn’t it sound kind of exciting the first time you heard it? It promises big changes that should improve the lives of customers and employees, all while making the company a lot more money.
In reality, however, the results can be mixed. If you Google “success rate of digital transformations,” you may see results that vary from a 30% failure rate to over 80% that fail to meet their expectations.
This can affect many things adversely, both inside and outside the company, including employee engagement, which is critical to your long-term success. In this article, I’m going to talk about how to maintain team morale before, during and after a digital transformation.
Before
Before a big project is undertaken, such as a digital transformation, there may be some positive excitement about the possibilities. But just as often there is anxiety about what exactly those big changes may bring. This typically includes uncertainty about if roles in the company will stay the same or even exist at all once the transformation is complete.
This anxiety and uncertainty can take many forms—from less engagement to outright refusal to cooperate. It is incumbent on leaders to make sure everyone on their team can see the bigger picture and understand how the initiative will make each of their work lives better. Additionally, it is important for leaders to be realistic about goals, timelines and the impact that large-scale change will have on their teams.
While digital transformation takes the ideas and work of many members of your team in order to be successful, leaders play a special role and are critical to these initiatives staying on course.
During
While a company is undergoing a transformation initiative, it can be a rewarding experience if everything goes perfectly according to plan. Unfortunately, perfection is rarely the reality. Instead, it is best for leaders to acknowledge both the challenges as well as the successes.
Teams want leaders who are empathetic to what they are going through, even if the goals set are ambitious. This means leaders need to enable and empower their teams to adjust their approaches and processes to acknowledge a sometimes shifting reality. It also means providing support to those teams as they inevitably run into roadblocks or unforeseen challenges.
It’s not enough to have team members who are willing to roll up their sleeves and to have the best platforms to integrate with in order to enable your digital transformation. As a leader, you need to create a space in which your team can adapt their approach, make mistakes and learn from them, and be by their side as they explore uncharted territory.
After nyone who has gone through a digital transformation knows that the process rarely has a definite ending. And when the technical implementation parts are done, a whole other set of challenges arise when people start using the new processes as part of their jobs for the first time.
While it may be a relief to see a large initiative launch, the days, weeks and months after are critical to the long-term success. As a leader, you don’t just have to wait and see what happens. Have a plan for once you’re done that takes your teams’ needs and morale into account.
After all, the real work begins once the newly implemented transformation is launched. It is a critical time for your team, who may be resistant to change and skeptical that the new processes and platforms implemented are going to work better, make their jobs more satisfying and ultimately achieve their goals. As a leader, having a plan to deal with this aftermath is arguably as important as the plan you create to implement these changes in the first place.
With so many challenges facing teams undertaking digital transformation initiatives, there are many risks, including a loss of morale that may threaten the project altogether. Leaders can make a big difference by carefully tailoring their approach before, during and after the project is launched.
Forbes Agency Council is an invitation-only community for executives in successful public relations, media strategy, creative and advertising agencies. Do I qualify?
