There is no rulebook for the world we now live in. Experience still matters but defaulting to the way things have been done before won’t cut it in this world of continual change. Leaders need to break through legacy constraints and get better at using digital to rapidly learn and adapt at speed.

Uncertainty creates opportunities to grow faster than competitors if leaders and their organizations build the digital maturity to repeatedly renew and grow. To help you get a head start in your industry, Avanade has identified three questions you need to ask now to rethink what it means to be agile, resilient, and put people and their experiences first in our new hybrid world.

1. How can I wisely prioritize innovation and accelerate value from digital to solve problems and adapt at speed?

No longer a nice-to-have, agility is the baseline for how business gets done in a world of continual change. Digital is the most effective enabler of agility, both of organizations and people. For example, the Microsoft cloud gives your employees access to innovative data-driven technologies like artificial intelligence (AI), automation, and the Internet of Things (IoT), empowering them to gain relevant insights faster, so they can identify and prioritize next best actions at speed. Consider also how Agile methods can facilitate rapid learning from digital experiments and innovate new operating models that further enhance your organization’s readiness to sense and respond to changes in the market.

2. How can I bring together people, processes and partnerships to create human-centered digital experiences?

Digital has accelerated long-overdue process and experience improvements. In our hybrid world, your employees, customers and partners now expect to have choice in how they engage. Yet, there’s the potential for continual change to trigger fear and fatigue. It’s critical to remain focused on delivering digital experiences that inspire employees, customers, and partners, but also that improve well-being. To limit fear and fatigue, look for opportunities to exploit digital to amplify the capabilities and emotions that uniquely make us human, such as creativity and innovation. For example, global engineering firm Wood has used to data science and machine learning to reduce manual design processes by up to 70%, freeing its people to use their creativity for design activities. As trust becomes ever more valuable, proactively using digital to make a positive human impact and establishing a shared culture of transparency, ethics, and integrity will also differentiate your organization with target employees, customers and partners.

3. How can I use digital to diversify revenue streams and help my organization be a more inclusive, responsible and sustainable business?

Organizations need to embrace continual change, rather than fear it. A new resilience is needed – both in terms of business models and people. To effectively meet the changing expectations of employees, customers and partners will require your organization to become more inclusive, responsible, and sustainable. Advances in digital mean that what’s better for people and the planet, is now also better for profitability. For example, transitioning to the Microsoft cloud can be up to 93% more energy efficient than operating an on-premises datacenter. With the cloud, your organization can also more nimbly innovate new business models and diversify revenue streams across multiple ecosystems securely. As you evaluate opportunities to use digital to keep your business resilient through continual change, the resilience of your people and the planet must be equally prioritized to enable your organization to repeatedly renew and grow.

To build, manage and evolve the digital maturity of your organization through continual change requires a new leadership approach. Connect with us today to explore how we can help you in this journey.

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