Advertorial: Dark Fibre Africa
Dark Fibre Africa – our digital-transformation journey At the beginning of 2020, many business leaders will have no doubt taken time to reflect on the past year. In line with Gartner’s recent finding that digital transformation is a priority in more than 90% of organisations globally, it will have certainly been one of the key focus areas for many organisations. The McKinsey Global Survey on digital transformation found the success rates of transformation to be alarmingly low – just 26% amongst high-tech, media and telecoms companies, and as low as 4% in other industries. These low figures belie the immense potential benefits of successful transformations, which include significant improvement to customer experience and employee engagement as well as overall business improvement resulting in increased revenues. The low success also raises the question of why such an important step in businesses’ evolution presents such a big hurdle. ‘The key to defining success is having a clear picture of what it looks like in the context of both medium- and long-term business objectives. Having established this, developing a clear road map towards achieving it, along with measurable milestones, is critical,’ say Vino Govender, Executive for Strategy at Dark Fibre Africa (DFA). Govender believes that the picture of success should be a clear but realistic one and should consider a number of factors. He points out that what can be considered as success will differ based on geographical location, availability of skills, and overall organisational culture. ‘For example, in countries with high levels of digital literacy, you would expect to see greater levels of transformation; transformation in a medium-sized company with young leadership and staff will go a lot quicker than in a large corporate with long-established systems and processes and long-serving employees,’ he explains.
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It’s commonly understood that digital transformation is not about technology but about people – from putting the customer at the centre of our transformation to taking our employees and other stakeholders along for the journey – emphasising people empowerment and people-centred leadership.
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Vino Govender – Executive: Strategy, Mergers and Acquisitions, and Innovation.
sabusinessintegrator.co.za
ADVERTORIALS_SABI Vol11 Mar-Aug20.indd 38
2020/02/27 1:24 PM
