Define a clear digital vision and agile strategy
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Digital leaders have a clear vision that’s shared and understood across the entire organization. When done right, digital is baked into every part of the business, not a discrete line item in a plan.
Every department and stakeholder of the vision should see the potential ROI of digital and understand how they can come together to contribute to the process.
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Continuously ship loveable products and experiences to customers
“If you build it, they will come” no longer applies in a market of competition, high expectations, and low tolerance for friction.
Today’s reality is: if you build it, your customers will love it or quickly leave it. That’s why digital leaders take a product vs. project mindset. It’s less about budgeting and planning and more about continuous improvement and refinement to achieve goals and add value every day until the product or experience sunsets.
Build secure,
flexible platforms
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To digital leaders, technology infrastructure isn’t a cost center—it’s an asset to drive growth and deliver speed to value.
Customer-focused platforms are built to be safe, secure and scalable. That’s foundational. Then digital companies make sure they have the right tools and technology to bring new products or enhancements to market fast. That’s the edge.
Mine data and insights for optimization
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True digital leaders have a permanent work-in-progress mindset and inspire an environment of experimentation and iteration across their organization. They aren’t beholden to any process or product if a new one can add more customer or organizational value.
Digital leaders make sure that data isn’t captured just to be dormant. Data is only as good as the insights it provides and the actions it inspires.
In digital companies, data, insight, and action are a critical part of every level within the organization. From the C-Suite to product and sales teams, leaders have clean and accurate data and are using it to make all decisions within the organization.
They are open to and actively seek data or customer feedback that challenges their assumptions. And critically, they can pivot or change course quickly based on a new insight, market change or emerging opportunity.
Adapt at the speed of digital
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Digital leaders don’t just hope for this agile mindset, they ensure it’s built into the fabric of the organization—organizing cross-functional product teams, incentivizing toward results, not completion, and continuously upskilling talent to improve products and experiences.
Digital organizations can set a long-term vision while being clear that their strategy to achieve that vision may evolve quarter to quarter based on market and customer
trends. Every department and stakeholder of the vision should see the potential ROI of digital and understand how they can come together to contribute to the process.
