Vector Shift No. 03

Why Is Digital Transformation So Hard?

Executives absolutely want their best and brightest involved in transformation projects. The problem is that those people are already fully loaded. They are running plants, delivering product, and putting out fires. They simply do not have the capacity to give real attention to a multi-year change effort.

On top of that, we often fail to quantify why we are doing this in the first place. What is broken today, and what is the cost of leaving it broken for another year?

Digital transformation should start at the base of operations. If leadership does not understand the pain points on the shop floor, in engineering change, in quality, and in supply chain, they cannot understand the effort and commitment required to fix them. 

Ask ten people what digital transformation means and you will get ten different answers: 

• An integrated ecosystem 
• Everything paperless 
• A full digital thread 
• New dashboards and analytics 

“Digital transformation” has become so vague that teams leading these efforts often lack a simple, concrete definition of success. Without clear direction, it is almost impossible to set priorities, define scope, or measure progress.

Is success reducing the time to implement an engineering change by 30 percent? Cutting quality escapes in half? Eliminating three manual handoffs in a critical process? Those are measurable. “Be more digital” is not. 

Digital transformation is not about buying a new system and feeding it data. Nor is it a new set of reports with nicer charts.

Real transformation means answering a harder question: How will we actually work differently as an organization? 

That can mean: 

• Overhauling procedures 
• Rethinking approvals and sign offs 
• Redesigning how information flows between teams 
• Changing what “good” looks like for day-to-day execution 

At its core, digital transformation is less about data and more about people - asking your workforce to change how they operate, decide, and collaborate. 

“Systems” in this context are not limited to software, but includes: 

• Processes 
• Operational procedures 
• Human workarounds and band aids 
• Places where information gets retyped, rechecked, or reinterpreted 

This takes time, due diligence, and scrutiny from people who know how the work really gets done (the hidden factory).

It also requires senior leadership to sit up and listen - really listen - to what is causing performance failures. That means putting assumptions aside and recognizing the real cost of doing business in the current state. 

Once you understand what is broken, you can start defining: 

• What can be modified or transitioned 
• Where you can get early wins 
• Which success criteria matter most 

Most organizations try to do too much at once. Even a one to three percent improvement on a high impact process can move the needle significantly - improving margins, operational efficiency, quality, or customer satisfaction.

What’s more, while digital transformation is a journey that can last several months or over a year, it cannot be endless.

A program that drifts for more than two years without tangible results is likely to fail as people change roles, priorities shift, and world events reshape the business.

Being realistic about scope and timelines - and delivering visible wins along the way - is what keeps momentum alive. 

Data Point: According to McKinsey, about 74% of companies report being stuck at pilot stage for digital manufacturing initiatives.

This might be the most critical element, and the one most often missing.

Organizational change management can't be side work for someone who already owns five other major responsibilities.  

Here’s what’s really needed: 

• A person or team with the right education and experience in change 
• Enough authority to challenge the status quo 
• Backing from senior leadership when tough decisions need to be made 

True change management is about helping people appreciate: 

• How they will work differently in the future 
• That working differently is expected and supported 
• How the change connects to the company’s mission and goals 

We talk a lot about “top down” or “bottom up” approaches. In practice, digital transformation is an everyone approach. Alignment is needed from leadership to line workers to stick.