Leading Digital: Turning Technology into Business Transformation

Research Scientist at MIT and author (Westerman), Sr VP at Capgemini Consulting (Bonnet), Co-Director of MIT's Initiative on the Digital Economy and author (McAfee): 1) define digital mastery as a combination of digital and leadership capability; 2) discuss how to build digital (part I) and leadership (part II) capabilities, and 3) outline a leader's playbook for digital transformation (part III). Each chapter ends with a checklist of key concepts.Personal takeaways: A straight-forward framework for companies and board directors to build digital and leadership capabilities, and lead digital transformation. Strongly recommend purchasing this guide.Key takeaways, by chapter:1) Defining digital master and where in the 'grid' of digital and leadership capability the organization falls, and key strategies to transform: customer experience, exploiting core operations and reinventing business modelsPart I: Building Digital2) Create compelling customer experience - digital tools, evolving culture, customer data at the center3) Exploit core ops - use 6 levers: standardize vs. empower, control vs. innovate, orchestrate vs. unleash4) Reinvent business models - monitor symptoms (Porter forces), consider reinvention / transformation, replace product/service, create digital business, reconfigure delivery, rethink value proposition, experiment & iteratePart II: Build Leadership5) Craft digital vision - set goal, frame vision6) Engage organization at scale - co-create, share ideas, reverse mentor, crowdsource7) Govern the transformation - board, leadership, digital unit and culture, IT innovation, committees and liaisons8) Building IT leadership - design where going, determine if need new people and systems, learning culturePart III: Leader's Playbook for Digital Transformation9) Framing the digital challenge - build awareness, create vision (p. 188 table)10) Focus investment - translate vision to action, fund transformation, build governance model11) Mobilize organization - signal ambitions, earn the right to engage, set new behaviors and evolve culture12) Sustain digital transformation - build foundational skills, align reward structures, measure-monitor-iterate with KPIs, scorecards, reviews

Leading Digital represents the culmination of a multi-year study of digital technologies impact on the organization. This makes Leading Digital different, in the sense that other books on the subject either concentrate on technology hype, product innovation or disruption. By focusing on the organizational impact of digital, Westerman, Bonnet and McAfee, create a simple, clear and compelling framework for categorizing companies and their attitudes toward digital technology.Characterizing an entire company as either a Beginner, Conservative, Fashionista or Digital Master provides an executive short hand that appears highly effective on the surface, but quickly leads one to ask, ok but what do I do? The advices provided in the book borders not the self evident, i.e.: beginners are slow to adapt and have the basic digital capabilities while fashionistas are buying every new digital bauble.That is one of the points holding this book back from a five star review, is that it presumes a monolytic attitude toward digital in order to simplify its messages. This treatment is appropriate for a book intended to drive client conversations for a consulting company.The books chapters encompass the range of organizational and leadership topics related to digital transformation. The section titles reflect this:Part 1 - building digital capabilities covers the customer experience, their link to core operations (aka legacy) and the business model.Part 2 -- focuses internally on the vision, organizational engagement, governance and technology leadership.Part 3 -- concentrates on digital transformation from strategic framing through mobilization and sustaining a change program.Taken at this level, the book is rather complete in its topical treatment but the book treats each of these topics somewhat superficially. The case studies read like a who's who of digital transformation but they are mostly stories of success, descriptions of what worked and not a deeper examination of challenges with strategies to over come them. Reading the case studies, of which there are many and a good thing, provides little meat for the reader to chew on.The case studies, clear and simple framework and clearly written prose are among the strengths of this book. Among its challenges are the observation that many organizations have already moved beyond an organizational characterization into transformative action so the advice is a little dated in places. It was revolutionary when these materials first came out almost two years ago. The clarity of the frameworks also tends toward clear but overly simply advice and actions. Take the 12 steps to being a digital master:Build AwarenessDefine Your Starting PointCreate a Shared VisionTranslate Your Vision into ActionBuild your GovernanceFund the TransformationSignal your AmbitionsEarn the Right to EngageSet New Behaviors and Evolve CultureBuild Foundation SkillsAlign Incentives and RewardsMeasure, Monitor and IterateThese 12 points apply to any transformation not just digital. You could say the same for implementing ERP, post merger integration or any other significant change. This undercuts an understanding of digital's potential and its disruptive impact. These technologies are fundamentally different than the IT technologies that came before, but its hard to tell that from this book or from the approaches it suggests.Readers who have digital scars will benefit from the reminders that this book provides. People new to digital can easily be lulled into a false sense of security or alarm as it seems so much like what has come before or that we all must become digital masters tomorrow. Knowing that difference and the nuance it contains is the reason for the length of this review. By focusing on the organization, Westerman, Bonnet and McAfee have created something very accessible, but they have also accepted some limitations on explaining the reality of digital transformation.

Very practical and engaging book that lays out key elements of managing digital transformations in business, grounded in extensive empirical research of close to 400 firms. The building blocks of vision, engagement, governance and technology leadership hang together well in working through the book.The authors also run an on-line MIT learning course focus on the Internet of Things, which applies this framework. For those wishing an applied/structured approach in applying the book, this is recommended. This also introduced some updated case studies over the 2014 edition.My own focus is supporting public sector digital transformations in developing countries. While the book does not directly speak to these, the focus on the book on larger corporations is helpful, especially give the challenges of silos and inertia seem amplified there!