I was recently joined for a lively discussion on digital transformation by Shivani Govil, CCC Intelligent Solutions, and moderator Greg Lindsay for Fast Company’s Innovation 360 Festival.
We had a great conversation about:
Insurtech and business model reinvention
Lessons from the pandemic about the possibility of transformation
I’m happy to have been able to contribute to this important white paper from Harvard Business Review Analytics on the topic of “Aligning Your Organization Around the Customer.”
The paper spotlights the stories of 5 global businesses and their own digital transformations: HSBC, Virgin Voyages, Bed Bath & Beyond, CTC Digital, and Seera Group, thanks to executives Michael Spiteri, Mariana Fonseca Medina, Rafeh Masood, John Koryl, and Ronnie Varghese.
Along with myself, other authors shared exceptional insights: Didier Bonnet, Amy Edmondson, Rob Cross, Alia Crocker, and Heidi K. Gardner.
Many thanks to Charlie Slack for including me in the research behind this white paper, which was sponsored by Quantum Metric.
Congratulations to the amazing graduates of our 5th cohort of my Columbia Business School’s Digital Business Leadership Program! It was such a pleasure to complete our 6-month journey back on campus, teaching in-person to all who could make it, and virtually to our amazing group of “streamers”!
Tremendous thanks to Bob Dorf for guiding our Lean Startup journey, to Jeremy Kagan for accelerating our startups with tremendous coaching, and to all the rest of our faculty and guest speakers throughout the program.
Exceptional thank you’s to Stephanie Boyd and Olivia Wiles for going waaaaay “above and beyond” to navigate every imaginable hurdle to make this happen: the first on-campus program of Columbia Business School Executive Education since Covid began. So glad that we could blaze this path together!
Congrats on joining the alumni of Columbia Business School!
Join me for my NEW “live virtual” program on Leading Digital Transformation, from Columbia Business School Executive Education.
This 18-hour program is designed for executives driving organizational change in their own businesses. You’ll leave with a set of practical frameworks, case studies from legacy businesses, and a first draft of your own roadmap for change.
One of the amazing speakers we’ve had for Columbia Business School’s Digital Business Leadership Program was Dan Siroker. Dan co-founded Optimizely, a company I’ve been teaching about for years, as they have helped so many businesses become more data- and experimentation-driven.
Dan spoke to us about his new startup, Scribe AI, whose mission is to use technology to improve human memory. As an experienced entrepreneur, Dan knows the importance of tying a grand vision to a focused product that can ship soon and iterate quickly.
As we talked, Dan demonstrated in real-time Scribe’s first product: a transcription tool that plugs into Zoom and MS Teams (Google Meet soon), and allows you to create a searchable transcript-plus-video of your meeting. Scribe frees you up to engage with your fellow humans and not have to take notes (unless you really want to).
Thank you to Dan for sharing his keen insights on:
Focusing your team on solving problems, not building products
Why customer empathy trumps cool technology
The danger of waiting years to build your first MVP
Why voice recognition is no longer a tech race
Hiring for culture fit
“The main thing is the main thing” (focus!)
Why data should inform your decisions, not make them for you
I’m thrilled to announce that my latest book, “The Digital Transformation Playbook: Rethink Your Business for the Digital Age” is now published in 12 languages: Spanish, Portuguese, Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Vietnamese, German, Russian, Serbian, Turkish, Persian, … and English (the original). It’s also available in audiobook in English, Portuguese, and Vietnamese.
Please share this page with anyone you think would benefit from an edition in their language!
ENGLISH
The Digital Transformation Playbook: Rethink Your Business for the Digital Age
I’ve spent the last decade advising businesses leaders on the challenge of digital transformation: how should an organization started before the internet evolve, in order to grow in the digital economy? In many cases, this started with persuasion—getting the board and others aligned on the signature importance of digital to their own future. Today, that conversation is decidedly different. In the new normal, digital is no longer a question of “if,” but “how fast?”
Digital has been the big winner in the COVID era. Our new reality has forced a pivot to digital operating models in industries as diverse as healthcare, retail, education, automotive, banking, and more. But transforming any large and complex organization for this era is an immense leadership challenge. It encompasses new strategy and business models, but also profound shifts in organizational process and culture.
In order to lead the kind of agile, customer-focused, bottom-up organization demanded by today’s rapid pace of change, leaders need to invest in the right technology and business architecture. In this research study, we bring together the insights of business leaders from four continents and dozens of industries—who shed light on the leadership road ahead for all of us.