Traditional project management capabilities and mindsets have an important role to play in the move to digital transformation within every kind of industry. However, there are risks associated with rigidly adhering to traditional project management mindsets in evolving digital environments.
That's the view of Anand Swaminathan, author of Digital@Scale, and a McKinsey senior partner who is involved with helping companies leverage technology to transform their businesses. He was speaking to Stephen Maye, host of the US-based Project Management Institute's (PMI)Projectified with PMI podcast series.
XHead = Project management matters
According to Swaminathan, a major risk associated with digital transformation was what he called "digitals" - disciples of digital transformation - thinking that because things were now expected to move at the speed of digital, there was no longer a need for estimating, measurement or metrics along the way.
"Project management doesn't get thrown out when you think about digital transformation. Part of project management is about figuring out how to plan the work and then working the plan.
"This is still completely relevant when you think about digital transformation in organisations today. One of the biggest risks to any transformation project is forgetting to plan the work and then work the plan," he said.
That could put an entire transformation project at risk. Measurement and metrics, fundamental elements of project and programme management, had to be there for the simple reason that digital transformation was itself a project or programme.
"You need to figure out when digital transformation starts and when it finishes; you need to figure out budgets and the actual work plans and interdependencies. You need to figure out what teams you need and when you need them. And you need to figure out which measures and metrics you should actually have in place to see if you are on track," he said.
XHead = Wrong talent in the wrong place
Another key risk highlighted by Swaminathan was having the wrong talent in the wrong place within the new environment.
"Many organisations think that they don't need any new people to deal with their digitally transformed organisation. They continue to try and use same engineers and the same project managers. But these individuals often don't have the new sets of capabilities required to drive the new set-up.
"What's needed," he continued, "is finding a way to take the existing teams and infuse them with the right digital mindset, skills and talent." This would product a team with a blend of talents needed for the new way of operating and thinking.
Customer first
The final key risk to the success of a digital transformation programme was related to the concept of understanding how to serve the customer.
"A lot of projects tend to be very insular: a project manager sets out to solve a problem that he or she has been tasked with solving; or they change the way something works because that is what they have been told to do.
"But digital - be it in a B2B or B2C environment - is so customer-led that everything has to be about how best to serve that customer. Every project has to be tied back to that customer. If we depart from that understanding of what the customer really needs, and we start building something that is not aligned with what they might want, the project ultimately will be a failure," he concluded.
Listen to the podcast here:
Digital Transformation - Why It Matters
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