WBSP100: Grow Your Business by Learning the Nuances of Building a Digital Team w/ Six Amazing Women in Digital Transformation

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When I was planning for this episode, I had a conversation with a friend that I could never forget. She was planning to resign from her company. So I inquired why she was planning to resign. To give you a little background, she was very well established in her career, spent roughly 20 years, and held an executive position at her current company. Her company had experienced massive growth. And there was a high chance that she could get promoted to a much higher position. It didn't make a ton of sense why she wanted to resign as she will have to build her credibility from scratch in the new company. 

I asked if she wasn't happy with the compensation. She responded with a resounding no. Then I thought maybe it was probably the role or responsibilities with which she might not be happy. But that wasn't the case either. Then I asked. Do you not like your current team or co-workers? She said that she loved her team. Huh? I was clueless as to why she would want to move out.

After several more questions, she said my biggest problem is that I am never allowed to go to the board room for meetings even though I am an executive. So I thought, how come meetings could be such a big deal and a potential reason for dissatisfaction at the workplace. I was reflecting on why anyone would lose their life savings for a bunch of meetings. So I asked her why these meetings were so important to her. And what was the primary reason to leave the organization?

She said, "to be able to perform my job effectively. I need to be in those meetings." She continued, "I am OK even if they don't let me speak there. Even just listening to them would help." So I asked if she ever tried to approach her superiors and shared her concerns. She said, "she tried numerous times, but the conversation didn't go anywhere." 

They always brushed her off by saying that you don't want to be in that room with those men. Personally, since I always worked in fairly inclusive workplaces, that didn't make a ton of sense to me. Sure, there would always be minor issues here and there. But I never thought that you would not be allowed into the board room just because you were a female. That got me thinking that although we might be in 2021, we are not over the issues from the 1960s. By not being inclusive and not selecting your teams based on merit, you are only hurting yourself. 

This story is a reminder that we all need to do our parts of spreading education about inclusiveness in the workplace and how that could impact digital transformation initiatives and growth.

When I was planning for the 100th episode of our wildly popular podcast, I had many offers from high-profile celebrities that we could have hosted. But then, I would not be doing my part. So I decided to dedicate this episode to Six amazing women doing fantastic work to promote women in digital transformation. Each of these women has several initiatives to support and encourage women. So no one feels left behind.

In this episode, we discussed the factors that are most important to build a digital team. We also discussed several stories where keeping the information in the board room and not including key users resulted in failed digital transformations. Finally, we discussed the importance of communication and why the leaders need to immerse themselves with users to truly understand their needs and not just being lip service and promoting the culture of open and honest communication without fear.

For more information on growth strategies for SMBs using ERP and digital transformation, visit our community at wbs.rocks or elevatiq.com. To ensure that you never miss an episode of the WBS podcast, subscribe on your favorite podcasting platform.