By Russell Less, NTT Data Business Solutions & Jessalyn Yeung, SAP Canada
Small and medium-sized businesses are the backbone of the Canadian economy, making up almost 98 percent of Canadian businesses. Large enterprises have been developing digital transformation strategies for years. Still, mid-sized organizations have hesitated to commit to larger capital IT investments, opting to focus on growing their business. This is no longer the best approach as technology has evolved such that it is the foundation for enabling the strategic vision and business outcomes mid-sized organizations are prioritizing. Midmarket organizations do not need to hold back and can quickly become intelligent midmarket enterprises, accelerating time to value.
Midmarket businesses are primed to take advantage of the opportunities that digital transformations can bring them. In fact, it is becoming a strategic differentiator for them. From the ever-changing market and world-event fluctuations over the past several years, we have learned that a digital transformation strategy which allows midmarket companies to pivot, grow and adapt quickly, is exactly what they need to accelerate achieving the business value they are striving for.
Future-proofing midmarket organizations
Digital transformation may have become a buzzword, but it is now a reality and must do. All organizations, regardless of size or industry, are currently facing countless barriers to seamless growth due to multiple factors such as market instability, supply chain issues impacting distribution across the economy, and even shifts to sustainable practices. But midmarket organizations have the upper hand, compared to the large organizations, to be more agile in adapting new technology allowing them to be more equipped with the data and skills to respond to any situation. In other words, midmarket companies are better positioned to future-proof their businesses.
Many businesses have been built with on-premise approaches, which have proven to be expensive, difficult to maintain, and no longer a viable option. Even though it has the same capabilities of cloud software, it does not have the agility and lower total cost of ownership that cloud enables. Compared to just a couple of years ago, more and more companies are looking at cloud itself as key criteria. Today, cloud transformations are no longer a separate consideration but expected as part of the digital transformation dialogue.
Adapting digital cloud strategies will impact how productive and optimized a business is and its ability to realize its vision and strategic priorities. An ability to better capture and analyze data in real-time to make in the moment decisions will set midmarket companies ahead of their large enterprise competitors.
Transforming to innovative technologies may seem daunting and expensive for smaller budgets and teams, but it is in fact, easy to transform. Doing so puts your business in a better position to reach your business outcomes faster. It helps you get closer and be more responsive to your customers, having better visibility to everything including supply chains and supplies, control over who’s servicing you, and how you are servicing your customers, not to mention the health of your team. Having access to this kind of visibility and control improves your employee experience and frees up capacity for them to focus on value-add work through having access to key value drivers in your business.
It is a journey as much as it is a mindset
As the business landscape changes, businesses need to change with it. It is up to you to define the business value you are looking to improve. This will drive the need to introduce new and modern systems to make operations run as smooth as possible. Those who adapt know that change doesn’t always come in the blink of the eye, but rather it takes time to adjust. This has become one of the strategic differentiators for midmarket companies. Once adopting modern platforms, your business will start to make changes that become unnoticeable to you or your customers, like a quick iPhone update. There will no longer be long processes that require countless resource and disturb your business operations. At the end of the day, it is about having the ability to have integrated responses that allow organization to spend more time with their customers, provide better experiences, and see market shifts coming, knowing how to adjust in the moment. Why spend all this time being surrounded by complicated systems when you can have simplified, real-time data that allows you to focus on your business and not relying on underlying fluff.
When are you ready for a digital transformation
Becoming an intelligent enterprise and undertaking a digital transformation is the only strategy for any midmarket organization. And the time is right now. Ask yourself this – are you chasing data, spending a lot of time dealing with broken processes, losing track of supply chain status, missing out on opportunities because a partner can’t deliver on time, not managing customer relationships efficiently? If you answer to any of these questions is yes, then it is time to take steps to implement or re-evaluate your digital strategy.
Deciding to change is imperative to keeping up with the rapid growth in digital business operations, as it is inexpensive and saves time. Although, it is up to you to assess what your business needs. It is important to ask those simple questions. If you feel your business runs smoothly as is, or not, you can then decide if transformation through cloud is right for you.
You can learn more about the strategies and tactics of becoming an intelligent midmarket company in this webinar series hosted by SAP Canada and NTT Data Business Solutions: The Intelligent Midmarket Enterprise, Future-Proof Your Business (on24.com)