Digital transformation does not start with technology
“Digital transformation doesn’t start with technology.”
“Digital transformation is not about technology, it’s about the people.”
You’ve probably heard these statements about digital transformation before. But how easy is it to explain them to your colleagues?
My bubble model may be just what you need!
The thing is, technology is one solution to a number of problems you are trying to solve. For nonprofits (and other organisations) a problem usually manifests in one or more of these areas:
user experience
staff experience
service, business model or product
In the diagram below, each has its own bubble. I use these bubbles in workshops to show that digital transformation touches all parts of an organisation. A digital transformation process will often be catalysed in one of these bubbles, and will then impact the other two bubbles.
Digital transformation happens at the intersection of all three.
Defining our terms
Before we get stuck in, let’s define our terms in the context of this article.
Audience experience is how a user interacts with and experiences a product, system or service over time. The better the experience, the more likely that people will stick around and help non-profits make a change in the world. Being audience-centric means creating digital experiences that respond to how people want to engage with your organisation. This means content, like videos and fundraising asks, which are easy to understand and engage with. And data which helps us understand what does and doesn’t work.
Staff and volunteer experience is about how it feels to work for your organisation. How friendly and efficient are your admin processes? How do staff learn and exchange information? Are your staff empowered to make their own decisions at the right level? What tools do staff have to help them do their job?
Business purpose or organisational strategy is the sum of the actions a company intends to take to achieve long-term goals. In this context, it could involve new avenues (products, audiences, or other things) opened up by the digital age – both in terms of technology and culture. Just look at how the Guardian has pivoted away from printed newspapers towards a membership model based on online products. For the first time in 20 years, it turned a profit in 2019 with 55% of income coming from digital activities. For charities the opportunity has mostly been access to international and younger, more diverse audiences.
Balancing the bubbles
I mentioned above that digital transformation in one bubble will affect the other two.
This is a balancing act.
Take, for example, a company that focuses solely on staff experience. It improves efficiencies in business processes and the exchange of information across silos. That’s a good thing, right? But if they push the efficiency too far, they’ll degrade their customer experience. Customers might complain about getting automated responses instead of tailored ones.
Balancing staff and customer experience may lead to creating new products, such as an online platform that allows customers to manage their affairs themselves (freeing up more time for customers who prefer a human touch). This online platform can then be sold to other similar companies – in turn affecting the business model by creating another revenue stream.
Now I want to talk about some real-life digital transformation success stories from our community.
Reaching the next generation
Samaritans are a UK charity providing support to people who are struggling with their mental health. Originally, their listening service was phone only. But they realised that they were not reaching the younger population who needed help, but wouldn’t pick up the phone. So Samaritans started a chat and email service.
Cue: the audience experience bubble.
Apart from commissioning and developing this technology, they had to review their policies and procedures. They also ran a massive volunteer training programme to build the skills required to use the new digital platforms. And they had to review their infrastructure to ensure that the online service could be run sustainably in their hubs across the country.
Thinking of the three bubbles, note that the initial focus was on audience experience, but it had an impact on the staff and volunteer experience, and business purpose bubbles too.
The digital transformation happened in the sweet spot in the middle.
An agile transformation
The starting point for Save the Children was in the audience experience bubble. They wanted to facilitate seamless conversation with supporters leading to better retention rates. To achieve that, the charity needed to break down silos. So they incorporated Agile methodology into their marketing and fundraising operation and restructured those teams.
Now, teams work in multi-skilled squads which means that the whole lifecycle of a project is managed and delivered by the same small team. They’re empowered to make decisions and are more efficient because there’s less time wasted on hierarchical sign-off processes. And they create better campaigns and products.
This way of working improved the staff experience and business purpose too. And has provided lessons which will be useful to other parts of the organisation in the next phase of digital transformation.
Slaying silos
350.org is a grassroots climate movement. Their digital team used to be seen as a bottleneck. Everything had to go through them: campaigns, technology, fundraising and so on. It was inefficient, and also signalled that staff in other teams lacked digital skills relevant to their job.
Cue: the staff experience bubble.
What happened next was that the digital team turned into the digital product team, giving strategic oversight and providing training to other staff. And all digital staff were redeployed to the relevant teams. So a digital campaigner was moved from the digital team to the campaigns team. Now the campaigns team could interpret their own data, write their own digital copy, and put together an effective email.
Telling better stories to supporters – the audience experience bubble – was the visible outcome of this transformation. But it started in staff experience. Things are always connected like that.
Final thoughts
Digital transformation projects are essentially organisational change projects. So it’s important to spend some time setting them up properly and explaining the process so you can keep your colleagues with you on the journey.
This is where digital transformation bubbles can help. But this is only the first step in the journey. Make sure that you also shape the path by always setting out the next steps of the change process for your colleagues.
Have you used the bubble model in your workplace? Let me know!
