Only 14% of Enterprise Organizations are Digital Transformers

Framingham, MA – March 30, 2015 – Business leaders who recognize the real impact of digital technologies on their industry, customers, partners, and business practices stand to gain an advantage over their competitors in the race to the future of the digitally-enabled enterprise. To help business and IT leaders understand and cope with the challenges and opportunities that digital transformation can bring to their enterprises, International Data Corporation (IDC) has developed the “IDC MaturityScape Benchmark: Digital Transformation (DX)” (Document # 254922).

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Over the past few years, IDC has produced groundbreaking research on the 3rd Platform (mobile, social, big data/analytics, and cloud) and its impact on business strategies. The DX framework presented in this study extends that body of work to identify and clarify the specific challenges that CXO-level executives need to focus on to lead their businesses through the minefield of confusing rhetoric surrounding the topic of digital transformation.

This study presents the results of IDC’s Digital Transformation MaturityScape Benchmark Survey and should be viewed as a supplement to the “IDC MaturityScape: Digital Transformation” (Document # 254721). The IDC MaturityScape Benchmark provides objective data to help organizations uncover gaps between their own and their competitors’ DX maturity.

Key findings from the research include:

• The majority of companies surveyed have yet to establish DX capabilities and expertise at the enterprise level (i.e., repeatable maturity) and are still at the stage that IDC identifies as digital explorers (i.e., opportunistic).
• Companies that have seriously committed to DX capabilities (i.e., thrivers) identify themselves as being a full step ahead on the maturity path than those who are still cautiously exploring DX opportunities (i.e., survivors).
• IT executives are more likely to identify themselves as being ahead of their peers in DX capabilities than their business counterparts.

The IDC MaturityScape on DX consists of five stages: ad hoc, opportunistic, repeatable, managed, and optimized. To help organizations assess their current status and needs, IDC also measured maturity across the five key dimensions of the IDC MaturityScape framework. To view the opportunities and challenges more clearly as IT moves through the various stages of DX maturity, organizations need to understand the following five critical dimensions: leadership, omni-experience, worksource, operating model, and information. According to the results:

• The largest percentage of respondents fell into the repeatable stage of DX maturity. These organizations benefit from alignment of DX initiatives with short-term strategy but have significant room to improve through long-term planning.
• It was a close second place with organizations falling into the opportunistic maturity stage. These organizations offer inconsistent use of digitally-enabled products and experiences.
• 14.2% of organizations categorized themselves as being in the ad hoc stage of DX maturity. While this may seem like a small percentage, IDC notes that this is a significant portion of respondents when compared with other IDC MaturityScape Benchmarks. It speaks to the room for growth and untapped potential of digital transformation within organizations.

“We believe that DX integration across the dimensions described in this benchmark — including leadership, work sourcing, omni-experience, operating models, and information — will become the core challenge for business leaders in the next five years,” said Meredith Whalen, IDC’s Senior Vice President of IT Executive, Industry and Financial Research. “Digital transformation is a foregone conclusion for most if not all businesses. The only choice for businesses is whether to hunker down and try to weather those disruptions, develop digital transformation competencies and become a disruptor, or split the difference and become a fast follower of disruptors.”

For additional information about this report series or to arrange a one-on-one briefing with Meredith Whalen, please contact Sarah Murray at 781-378-2674 or sarah@attunecommunications.com. Reports are available to qualified members of the media. For information on purchasing reports, contact insights@idc.com; reporters should email sarah@attunecommunications.com.

About IDC MaturityScape Benchmarks

IDC MaturityScape Benchmarks aid in the discussion of IT strategy and technology investments by helping IT executives and their enterprise partners gauge where their enterprise is in relation to that of their peers and competitors, best achievers, and the least invested. By utilizing IDC benchmark data, IDC MaturityScape Benchmarks enable organizations to compare maturity against peers, pinpoint which dimensions of an initiative peer organizations are more mature in, and identify the benefits organizations achieve as they move to more mature stages.