How can digital transformation improve enterprise agility?

This year, more companies are embarking upon their digital transformation journey. As a result, the 2019 ISG Provider Lens Digital Business Transformation Global Report suggests that enterprises are becoming increasingly agile.

What is enterprise agility?

Enterprise agility encompasses how organisations can "adjust business, development and operations workstreams to survive and thrive," the report states. In an environment where competition and customer requirements are constantly changing, the speed of this adjustment is "relevant and critical for the whole enterprise value stream." It also requires organisations to "know and master multiple deployment models and methodologies."

Taking an adaptive approach to using these is a "basic requirement for real enterprise flexibility." In order to do so, enterprises must develop the freedom to use a suitable model in order to achieve their specific adjustment speed. Depending on the use case, companies should reach the speed required in order to fulfil their business requirements. This "implies changing their sourcing approaches to procure products and services that are increasingly digital transformational" for many companies. "Software defined" products and services are particularly helpful as they allow vendors to operate with independence and maximum flexibility.

How useful are digital transformation services?

In order to achieve increased levels of agility, companies are employing digital transformation services and products. As the report states, these services "combine maximum automation with autonomy, providing multi-platform compatibility." Digital services provide individual variants, despite having a high degree of automation. These include "efficiency prioritisation, dynamic response and provisioning, automated policy mapping, and high security."

However, an IDC report indicates that digital transformation could actually be putting a company's sensitive data at risk. More enterprises are beginning to adopt digital technologies and services, but many are failing to implement encryption and protection measures as they rush to digitally transform. Another report from BT and The Cloud Industry Forum found that four in five enterprises experience barriers in their digital transformation. Enterprises will therefore "require greater assistance from the vendor and channel community” in order to become more agile.

How can companies overcome barriers to digital transformation? Andrew Halliwell, Product Director at Media Business provides some invaluable insights