Digital transformation starts with the adoption of digital tools

Digital transformation starts with the adoption of digital tools. In this second installment of Digital Transformation Process: A Key Guide to Success, we explore the historical evolution of digital tools and their impact, changes in the post-COVID-19 workplace, and the impact of the proliferation of remote work on digital transformation (DX, DT, Industry 4.0). Learn how small changes that start with the adoption of digital tools can lead to big workplace efficiencies.

Historical changes in digital tools and their impact

There are many factors that have influenced the productivity of office workers over the years. If we had to pick one tool that has had the biggest impact, especially in the last 30 years, we’d have to say digital tools.

Let’s go back to the late 1980s and early 1990s. As PCs began to be utilized in corporate offices, documentation that had been done by hand or on typewriters went digital. Then came Microsoft’s Excel and PowerPoint, which not only changed productivity but also changed the way we work. We spent less time looking for information. Calculation errors were reduced as numbers were managed in Excel.

How communication has changed since the 2000s

The 2000s brought the internet. The change in communication represented by email was revolutionary: before, people used to communicate via landline phones or, if necessary, by mailing paper documents back and forth. But now, email is at the center of it all. Today, we are constantly sending and receiving emails.

The rise of mobile and workplace productivity

The proliferation of mobile environments in the 2010s also brought about a major shift. The shift from wired internet on desktops and laptops to mobile devices on smartphones has led to another boost in productivity. For example, email communication, which was once limited to wired environments, is now possible anytime, anywhere in the mobile era. There was a time when BlackBerry was the dominant smartphone in North America before iPhones and Android phones took over the market. The BlackBerry’s core feature was real-time messaging. Many office workers flocked to BlackBerrys because of their ability to communicate in real time. Now, mobile-based messengers, cloud services, and more have evolved the workplace.

COVID-19 and rapid changes in the workplace

The COVID-19 pandemic that swept the globe in 2020 changed the way we work even more rapidly. Conference calls and video conferencing, which were once only possible with expensive, dedicated equipment like Polycom and Cisco, have given way to mobile services like Zoom, Microsoft Teams, and Google Meet that are accessible to everyone. At the same time, telecommuting and remote work have become accepted as part of the workplace.

The rise of remote work and the importance of digital tools

We’ve been hearing a lot of talk lately from tech companies about increasing the amount of telecommuting and remote work. This is because they’ve found that employee satisfaction is high and productivity hasn’t dropped significantly, regardless of COVID-19. These changes are, in turn, driving the use of digital tools. Chat and video conferencing for communication, traditional email and calendar sharing, and cloud-optimized file sharing, document creation, and collaborative editing.

In addition, digital tools such as task management and project management tools for to-do and work management are not just being used internally, but also by partners and collaborators outside the company, and it has become difficult to work together without them. We started using Google Workspace (formerly known as G Suite) and Microsoft 365 as collaboration tools, and we started using Teams and Slack for communication.

Are these changes just a complement to remote work? They may have been triggered by remote work, but the end result is a fundamental shift in the way we work. Until now, we’ve been using digital tools on a case-by-case basis in the name of personal know-how. But after COVID-19, digitizing work became a company-wide task. Projects that used to be managed like a diary in Excel have become much more convenient and intuitive with the use of ‘project management tools’. This change has not only affected IT companies, but all companies regardless of industry.

Digital Transformation: Start Small, Make a Big Difference

DX doesn’t have to be intimidating. Just by digitizing the way you’ve been working, you can increase your productivity. Simply adopting many of the tools mentioned above can make a big difference. When a new employee joins your team, should they start by going through an orientation and being handed a bundle of shared documents by the youngest person in the department, or should they learn about the conversations, deliverables, and decisions that have gone into a project from the top down in a digital workspace like Slack?

If you’re comparing apples to apples, the answer is already clear. DX starts with changing the way people work. Changing tools changes the way they work, and everything they do leaves behind data. Another way to look at it is that it’s about increasing business continuity. As a result, you can take on bigger challenges like changing your business model. In this way, DX is about starting small, expanding items like a game journey, and dreaming of ultimate change.