Digital Transformation — A Culture Quandary?

A 202X business example-how to avoid a costly culture bypass...

In my last article I promised a specific, illustrative example. Here it is :

For ~3 years, they made “steady but slow” progress towards a full digital transformation. Despite high engagement scores and reported “high confidence” in the leadership team… the SLT was growing more frustrated and confused by how much faster competitors were making the same digital shift. “What’s wrong with our culture — why can’t we go faster?”

During that three year time period, a substantial amount of effort and money was invested in operating model “fixes” (e.g., agile, lean startup, digital skills training, scenario planning, creative work spaces, tech replacements and a complete or restructure) to overcome organizational level quality and external adaptability outcome issues. The organization was well equipped but nothing seemed to reduce friction or increase transformation velocity to help meet the expectations of their customers let alone the board. They concluded that “our people are resistant to change; they lack the courage to try new things; they lack vision and scenario planning skills; they are just unwilling to make decisions and accept accountability in the face of uncertainty.”

This seems to be a familiar storyline for misdiagnosis; this is in fact, not an inexplicable culture quandary — this is a textbook culture bypass.

When they finally engaged in a culture strategy that looked beyond their version of the culture bypass (i.e., just measuring engagement/climate), they were able to see with much greater precision what behavioral norms were at play — and what they should try next, to drive more constructive behavior norms (BLUE below).

It wasn’t that their people were cowards or didn’t know how to do scenario planning well…their people believed (learned together, over time) that their boss…