Accelerating digital transformation by creating dual organizations

The digital transformation of a company requires new social platforms that enable collaborative learning and collective innovation

Digital transformation as an adaptive challenge.

Most of the Enterprise Digital Transformation Programs they fail because they start from the same Wrong premise, which is none other than to think that we can approach change as a Technical problem that it must be managed, like any other operational problem starting from the top of the organizational pyramid, in cascading through the hierarchy and based on mass communication programs and change initiatives that aim to reach all corners of the organization.

The stark reality of the data, more than 70% of organizational change programs do not achieve their results, shows us that any organizational transformation or cultural shift is an adaptive challenge. In other words, its success is linked to the change of habits and behaviors that are strongly rooted in the organization.

Just as there are operational change initiatives and concrete incremental improvements to business processes are possible and can be approached through the cascade hierarchy based on “command and command”, when we want to accelerate the strategy and make really significant changes in our business model, our organizational culture, or change our approach to the customer, that is, when we are faced with adaptive challenges where people are part of the problem and the solution, the hierarchical structure is not the best way to address these changes.

Too many brakes on strategy

Moreover, there is no evidence to suggest that hierarchy allows such changes, let alone that it actually facilitates them. In fact, it is too much of a brake on accelerating strategy in a world of accelerated change: Silos, clientelism, complacency, incrementalism, day-to-day pressure, rules and procedures, overvaluation of the past, limited number of change leaders, limited number of committed people. And as if the usual “Pasion killers” were not enough: “It’s just that here we always do it like this”, “We’ve tried it before and it didn’t work.” … The reality is that today’s organizations were simply never designed to change proactively and systematically, they were built for discipline and efficiency, the price to pay for this efficiency is agility and adaptability, As a result, there is a significant gap between the pace of change that is necessary to compete in a digital and connected world, and the pace of change that most organizations are able to keep up with.

Dual organizations as an accelerator of the digital transformation of companies

That is why we advocate the need to provide our organizations with a dual system that makes it possible to execute the day to day to obtain predictable results and at the same time makes it possible to explore new opportunities and overcome the threats of a digital world of accelerated changes. The first system, the traditional hierarchy, conducts the day-to-day business of business, while the second system, the Redarchy, focuses on the opportunities and demands of the future, and acts as an agile network of dynamizers and accelerators of the necessary digital transformation.

Redarchy as a driver of change

True change in organizations is not about preaching the need for change, the importance of change, or the consequences of change, but ultimately about changing behaviors. In organizational reality there is only change, if there is a change in behaviors.

In the Age of Collaboration, the network must be the primary vehicle for driving organizational changes. As in hierarchical change, the organizational leadership sets and communicates the objectives of the change, aligns the different levels of the organization and communicates the changes in cascade massively throughout the organization. In collaborative change, the objectives of change and initial communication are set by the management, but change is created and propagated through the network based on corporate activism, social imitation and the influence of a guiding community, of individuals who carry the desirable behaviors, who act as nodes for the dissemination of the new behaviors based on their connectivity. closeness and high credibility in the organization.

Collaborative change thus integrates social media practices into organizational change management, facilitating the scalability and sustainability of changes, and removing many of the limitations and pathologies of formal hierarchy. More importantly, the changes are driven by many people at all levels of the organization, not by the small group of “business as usual,” who eventually burn out and lose credibility.

Guiding a collaborative and social change process, is neither quick nor easy, but it is possible and effective. The biggest obstacles are not technical, nor platform, but as we said at the beginning, adaptive, people and behaviors. Hence the importance of the new role of Leader as Social Architect, able to mobilize people within and outside their area of responsibility, so that they can meet challenges adaptively, creating the necessary conditions for the guiding community to thrive in the new environment. This means paying attention to the adaptive leadership, for the creation of an environment in which profound proactive change can occur at any time and anywhere in the organization.

Unlike formal leadership from a position of authority, where our power is derived from position, when we act as social architects our power is derived from authenticity, credibility, and our ability to make decisions, and proactively act as leaders based on our passion, consistency, self-confidence, and added value to the community.

The Differences Between Traditional Leadership and Collaborative Leadership

The new platform: Cooperia

If change is to be collaborative, the platform for change must be social. There is only significant change, with significant participation from a significant part of the people in the organization at all levels.

Cooperia is the social platform that facilitates the adoption of change in organizations that seek to become dual. It is designed to collaboratively manage complex changes, defining and communicating the connection between desired changes, and the new behaviors and competencies necessary for success.

The new platform responds to a collaborative change management model, focused on the development of new skills and the adoption of the new behaviors necessary to make changes a reality. New capabilities are developed based on learning units and activities that generate the new behaviors associated with each learning unit or change initiative. Change initiatives are delivered in a participatory manner, and the platform allows change managers to connect with activists willing to accelerate change at all levels of the organization, and build a guiding community whose ultimate goal is to accelerate the necessary transformations by driving the adoption of the new tools and behaviors needed to make the changes happen. Change initiatives are thus driven cooperatively, in such a way that each interaction in the guiding community enriches the whole and accelerates organizational learning. It is not only about giving the keys to the knowledge considered relevant, but also about applying those keys to acquire skills, which is, no more and no less, the foundation of real learning.

Cooperia puts at the centre of change management, the motivation and involvement of people so that they take ownership of the change process and contribute to its success, and facilitates in a flexible way the access and participation of the change promoters to the different change initiatives of their interest, to the most relevant sources of knowledge and introduces them to the most relevant conversations and communities. It is designed for projects that involve complex changes in the organization and as a platform for collaborative change it allows us to:

• Focus on the motivation and involvement of people so that they take ownership of the change process and contribute to its success.
• Encourage open and honest debate about the challenges of transformation and, in the process, develop a shared vision of the opportunity for change
• Develop the new skills needed by sharing knowledge and learning in community.
• Reduce fear of change and increase trust, facilitating collaboration and collective innovation.
• Avoid overvaluing legacy and the status quo, making it possible for new perspectives and realities to emerge that generate the energy we need for change.
• To promote the emergence of true organizational activists who defend change and act as viralizers of new behaviors and dynamizers of change.
• Collaboratively manage change based on participation, acceptance of changes and communication of success stories.
• Manage resistance to change, helping others to share, overcome one’s own resistances and show empathy with those who feel harmed by a change.
• Encourage people to take personal responsibility to initiate the change they want to see and give them the resources and tools necessary to stimulate their creativity and imagination.
• Reward participation and recognize and reward those who implement valuable changes.
• Measure and accelerate metrics for progress, engagement, and adoption of new behaviors.

The platform is marketed by ASPGems in network services mode, which guarantees the security and scalability of the solution and makes it possible to integrate internal and external content to the organization. If you are interested in making collaborative change management a reality in your organization, do not hesitate to contact us.

If your company’s digital transformation process is not working because you are encountering a problem adapting to the changes it requires, contact us

and we will be happy to help you. Are specialists in accelerating the digital transformation of companies and their organizations.