Why is Agile the Key to Digital Transformation?

Today's business environment requires very high business standards for enterprises. For enterprises, it needs faster speed to gain a competitive advantage and maintain a leading position because the intensification of competition and the change in customer demand determine that enterprises need to achieve faster service delivery speed and improve their ability to continuous innovation.

According to a recent survey by Accenture, nearly 80% of respondents said they had felt the threat posed by competitors with advanced digital technology. At the same time, they also worry that digitization will negatively impact the whole market. In this case, implementing innovation is the only way for many enterprises to survive.

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Driven by this trend, enterprises need to carry out digital transformation in a short time. If enterprises want to change fundamentally, they must adopt agile methods for digital transformation.

How Does Agile Accelerate Digital Transformation?

1. Why Can Agile Accelerate the Digital Transformation?

Agile enables an enterprise's business processes to meet changing needs by dividing tasks into 30-day Sprints. In Sprint, companies continuously improve business processes and share the final results with users. Based on user feedback, adjustments and improvements are then made to ensure adaptability to changing needs.

On the contrary, traditional innovation methods require long-term planning and execution, resist change, and adopt traditional innovation methods will make the results irreversible.

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The four values of the Agile Manifesto emphasize individuals and interaction, responding to change, working software, and customer cooperation. Therefore, agile can perfectly deal with the change of requirements in the transformation process. Applying agile to the operation of promoting enterprise digital transformation may accelerate innovation.

2. Advantages of Agile in Digital Transformation

Why should enterprises use agile as a digital transformation method?

To cope with the increasingly fierce competition, enterprises must be open to new solutions. If new solutions fail, they will abandon them and quickly start another new project. In today's fast-paced market environment, flexibility and adaptability significantly increase the possibility of successful transformation.

Applying agile methods to enterprise digital transformation has the following advantages:

2.1 Speed

Agile is incremental. It is not a one-time delivery of end-to-end solutions but divides large tasks into small pieces and introduces and improves them step by step. For enterprises, digital transformation will not end, but agile can ensure continuous improvement in digital transformation.

2.2 Cost

Agile will first align the transformation with the business objectives during the change. It focuses on systems and processes that need improvement, so agile digital transformation can help enterprises introduce relevant and cost-effective shifts.

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2.3 Low Risk

In Sprint, continuous improvement will make the process less likely to have significant risks through constant feedback and improvement measures. The agile digital transformation method will help enterprises verify whether the planned strategy is feasible. At the same time, the shorter deployment cycle will help management point out risks and errors as soon as possible before causing severe losses to avoid any irreversible changes.

2.4 Flexibility

Agile applies to any unpredictable plan, with real-time adjustments to ensure the best results. Reform is part of the transformation process. Agile teams can actively respond to change and focus on continuous improvement.

Applying agile methods in digital transformation can enable enterprises to improve their strategies continuously. In addition, aligning business goals and incorporating real-time project feedback can help companies constantly adjust the direction of modification to adapt to the changing needs of today's market.

All enterprises will encounter problems in the process of digital transformation. The most common issues include the resistance of enterprises to change and the lack of clear vision and implementation steps. Integrating agile will significantly help these existing processes.