What is Digital Acceleration?

Not exactly. Digital transition, as most businesses know it, involves transforming one digital process at a time as they have the time, the capital, or a high enough ROI to do so. It's a short-term goal as opposed to a long-term journey.

Digital acceleration is a business strategy that guides the company's future. It shifts the focus from digitizing a process to adopting the latest technologies, such as automating business processes, data visualization, ML, and AI. Instead of a final goal or endpoint, it's constantly striving to gain from the newest options and watching what is coming.

Many businesses embraced the digital transition by making significant infrastructure investments only to fall short of their goals. There are plenty of reasons why this might happen, but confounding factors are frequently the problem.

Business processes and infrastructure rely extensively on each other. A process might seem insignificant, but it can have a significant impact across the organization in practice. So, the benefits of upgrading infrastructure might not appear until after the related processes change. Digital acceleration works the opposite way for that reason.

Instead of massive changes and investments upfront, digital acceleration focuses on making a series of smaller steps that have more significant benefits overall. Why? You can see the advantages almost immediately, and any risks or costs will be insignificant. Minor changes tend to cause little interference, and together, these benefits motivate subsequent transitions.

When you start adopting a digital acceleration paradigm, you begin with minor changes. These changes rarely require an engineer or tech team to implement. You can automate business processes such as transferring data to and from CSV files, for example, through a user-friendly interface. You can set them up yourself or purchase pre-made bots.

Smaller technologies like Robotic Process Automation (RPA) have another significant advantage: Because they don't require highly skilled automation experts, almost anyone in the organization can create and deploy their bots. Your business can make several changes, in a short time, without placing all the pressure on one individual or department.

Every business has unique needs, sensitivity to change, and is impacted by technology in different ways. So, no, unfortunately, no single guide or strategy will contain all the answers. To get the most from your digital transformation efforts, look within your organization and work with everyone to create a winning digital strategy.

Examine the entire business process to identify pain points--manual, repetitive processes that require a significant amount of time. Then, arrange them into a strategy that works best for the company and the people within it. These processes and systems will relieve the most pressure, create the least amount of disruption, and have the most noticeable benefits.

C-suite professionals understand that new and emerging startups have and will continue to be a threat. Digital maturity won't keep organizations in the lead for long. The only way for traditional and digital businesses to stay ahead is to continue innovating, improving existing business processes, and seeking new opportunities.

Digital acceleration keeps businesses agile enough to adapt quickly when new threats or opportunities appear, providing the information and insights necessary for intelligent innovations. In short, technology is as much about keeping up with competitors and improving existing business practices as it is about growth and future success.

As you begin to adopt new technologies, the rest of the business will change around it. Eventually, you will have to adjust job descriptions and staffing levels. If you needed five people in strict HR roles, you might only need four in traditional HR roles. You will eventually need in-house technology experts or dedicated automation engineers to manage software upgrades, networks, and other IT-related problems.

Another change to be aware of is that your current offerings may also change. With increased digital capabilities, you might decide to offer online training, subscriptions, or another digital feature not possible before the transition. Alternatively, you might attract new customers who require different services for a superior customer experience.