The term ’digital transformation‘ is a lot like love. It means different things depending on who you ask. IBM, a long-standing technology leader, offers this mouthful: “us AI, automation, hybrid cloud and other digital technologies to leverage data and drive intelligent workflows, faster and smarter decision-making, and real-time response to market disruptions.” Still kind of nebulous, huh?
The ways in which most businesses now operate and interact with customers is drastically different from what they were a few years ago. For example, customers can research their options, learn about other brands, and make purchases all from the comfort of their own homes. And though this has meant a lot of change and adjustment for businesses, many of those changes have been for the better. This is because digital transformation and customer experience influence each other.
Regardless of the type of business you're talking about, organizations invest in digital transformation for a myriad of different reasons. Some turn to the power of modern technology to improve efficiency - empowering employees to communicate from department to department easier than ever before. Others want to guarantee that data can flow freely across the enterprise, making sure that the critical information that people need to do their jobs is always in the right hands.
Deploying new technology can improve productivity and dramatically reduce waste, but may introduce hidden costs as well.
When the pandemic first disrupted business as usual, Zendesk was one of the earliest adopters of the new normal. “I think we were one of the very first organizations to make the decision that all of our sales were going to be 100 percent remote indefinitely,” says Monica Telles, VP of Zendesk Sell.
Even now, lots of businesses first design their website to work on laptops and desktops. Afterwards, they will also make sure those same sites function well enough on phones and tablets, almost like an afterthought. Surprisingly, that's what most people mean when they discuss responsive website design. In an era when even Google has advocated for mobile-first development, such a cart-before-the-horse approach doesn't signal digital transformation leadership.
Only three out of ten enterprises successfully achieve all of their digital transformation objectives. Learn about the six key principles that inform successful digital initiatives at the enterprise level.
To say that the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic has represented a disruption for us all is, at this point, probably a bit of an understatement. Businesses of all types and their technology leaders were already trying to keep pace with the rapidly accelerating speed of digital business transformation. Then, the pandemic began in 2020 and upended just about everything, sending industries in wild new directions that few could have predicted.
The past 18 months have taught business leaders that flexible work and collaboration environments can be the key to business continuity—whether the business is office-centric, hybrid, or distributed. The proof is in the numbers: In 2020, the collaboration software category exploded, growing five year’s worth of users in the first six months of the year alone.
