By Allison Dew, Chief Marketing Officer, Dell Technologies
During the past year, Dell Technologies’ Global Marketing team has spearheaded the largest study on transformation. We surveyed 4,600 of my peers and asked them to lay bare their level of confidence in their respective organization’s ability to transform and compete in the hyper-digital world.
With such a large global sample of C-suite to director respondents, they were bound to be fascinating. It turns out they are, but for all the wrong reasons.
In 2016, our first Digital Transformation Index (DT Index) revealed that the status of transformation around the world was too slow. Because of digital disruption, almost half of business leaders feared their organization would be obsolete in a few years.
We know digital disruption has continued unabated since then. So what’s the situation today?
Behind the curve
Essentially, there’s still a major lag in transformation around the world. Just 5% of businesses have been categorized as business leaders – the same as 2016. While it’s true there’s been some improvement across other benchmark groups, we’ve found it’s not to the degree that one would expect at this point in the digital journey.
In fact, 78% of respondents admit that digital transformation should be more widespread throughout their organization. Leaders also are still fearful for the future, with one in three worrying their organization will be left behind. More than half (51%) believe their business won’t meet customer demands in five years’ time.
So, what’s holding them back? Findings suggest that the vast majority (91%) are held back by persistent barriers—the most common being data privacy and security, budget and resources and an in-house skills gap.
The time to transform is now
Redefining transformation isn’t easy. Emerging technologies are transforming our world at blistering speeds and have ushered in huge opportunities, as well as their fair share of challenges.
With so much at stake, I invite you to read the full results and glean advice from your peers on how they intend to transform, with a lens on their top IT, security and workforce investments. Join us on your transformation journey, and consider this: Where does your organization sit on the curve?