David Rogers, a leading expert on digital transformation and Columbia Business School faculty member, shares his insights on navigating change in organizations. He explains why many digital transformations fail, emphasizing that focusing too much on technology can overlook critical organizational challenges. Rogers advocates for a shared vision and highlights the human aspect of leadership. He stresses the need for effective measurement, team engagement, and cultivating vision at all levels, empowering organizations to thrive amid continuous change.
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insights INSIGHT
Digital Transformation Focus
Digital transformation is about strategy, leadership, and new ways of thinking, not just technology.
It must start and end with people, focusing on customer value and the people driving change.
volunteer_activism ADVICE
Balance Urgency
While acknowledging problems (negative urgency) is important, successful change leaders also embrace positive urgency.
Focus on the potential value, growth, and positive impact of the change.
question_answer ANECDOTE
Ford's Positive Urgency
Bill Ford, chairman of Ford Motor, successfully uses positive urgency.
He focuses on the company's history and mission to solve mobility and environmental sustainability needs.
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The Digital Transformation Playbook provides a strategic framework for businesses to adapt to the digital age. It emphasizes the need to rethink assumptions in five key domains: customers, competition, data, innovation, and value. The book offers practical tools and real-world case studies to help businesses integrate digital strategies into their existing operations.
The Digital Transformation Roadmap
Rebuild Your Organization for Continuous Change
David Rogers
The Digital Transformation Roadmap provides a blueprint for organizational change, highlighting the five biggest barriers to digital transformation: vision, priorities, experimentation, governance, and capabilities. It offers real-world case studies and step-by-step planning tools to help businesses evolve in a rapidly changing technological landscape.
Blue Ocean Strategy
Renee Mauborgne
W. Chan Kim
Blue Ocean Strategy challenges traditional competitive strategies by advocating for the creation of new, uncontested market spaces. The authors, W. Chan Kim and Renée Mauborgne, argue that companies should focus on innovation to create 'blue oceans' of new demand, rather than competing in 'red oceans' of existing markets. The book provides a systematic approach and tools for successfully formulating and executing blue ocean strategies, including the strategy canvas and the six principles of blue ocean strategy. It highlights successful examples such as Cirque du Soleil and low-cost airlines, and offers guidance on overcoming organizational hurdles and aligning value, profit, and people propositions.
David Rogers: The Digital Transformation Roadmap
David Rogers is the world’s leading expert on digital transformation, a member of the faculty at Columbia Business School, and the author of five books. His previous landmark bestseller, The Digital Transformation Playbook, was the first book on digital transformation and put the topic on the map.
David has helped companies around the world transform their business for the digital age, working with senior leaders at many of the largest corporations and he's been featured in The New York Times, The Financial Times, The Wall Street Journal, and The Economist. In his newest book, The Digital Transformation Roadmap*, David tackles the barriers behind the 70% of businesses that fail in their own digital efforts and offers a five-step roadmap to rebuild any organization for continuous digital change.
Most of us have heard that leading change requires highlighting a problem, deciding on a clear vision, and then cascading that vision down. In this conversation, David and I discuss how those actions alone often result failed outcomes. Instead, we highlight what a shared vision really is and how we can do a better job of helping the entire organization respond better to change.
Key Points
Most digital transformations fail because they focus too much on technology and not enough on the actual organizational challenges.
Selling a problem is negative urgency. It’s important as a component of change, but insufficient alone. Successful change leaders also embrace positive urgency.
A north star helps leaders and their organizations get clear on the “why” instead of simply the “what.” Once defined, thoughtful debate on measurement brings alignment and empowerment.
It’s a mistake for vision to only come from the top. Vision should exist at every level.
Avoid thinking about vision as cascading down. If anything, vision should be cascade up. How conversation happens at each juncture will define how well this works — or doesn’t.
Resources Mentioned
The Digital Transformation Roadmap* by David Rogers
The Digital Transformation Playbook* by David Rogers
David Rogers on Digital newsletter
Interview Notes
Download my interview notes in PDF format (free membership required).
Related Episodes
How to Pivot Quickly, with Steve Blank (episode 476)
Engaging People Through Change, with Cassandra Worthy (episode 571)
Doing Better Than Zero Sum-Thinking, with Renée Mauborgne (episode 641)
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