In the new era of disruptive digital transformation, successful transformations require clarity, urgency, planning, vision and the right leadership to execute it.

I feel there are five key questions that need to be addressed first before embarking on your transformational process and four areas where the biggest mistakes that companies do and prevent them from being successful happen.

In the very near future, every successful company in the new era will become an O2 concept digital type of business. But not every company making the giant leap will be successful in doing so. It’s hard to predict the winners and the companies who won’t make it, because it’s a fine line, and I’m about to point that out.

Here is a fact I want to share first: according to Harvard Business Review, 84 percent of today’s CEOs believe digital disruption is imminent, and almost half think their business model will be obsolete by 2020 – less than two-three years away. Yet most companies don’t have any plan in place to digitally transform and grow their company.

Not having a plan in place is a recipe for disaster and I want to point how to avoid the biggest mistakes your company could make in the digital transformational process, and area’s you should pay attention to.

Some of the mistakes I see in the transformation process that I strongly feel should be addressed. Then there is the question of what. What is the strategy? How do you scale? How long will it take? How do you develop leaders within your company? First, recognize this is a three- to five-year transformation, and if you do it right, it’s going to take your company to a new level of success.

First, they too often get stuck with simply optimizing their operations & relying too much on technology. They modernize only their business applications, data centers or network infrastructure — and then they stop.

Optimizing operations, technology and creating efficiency is just one of the core strategies for a successful digital roadmap – it’s not all, and it won’t take them far on their digital journey. Then you have to rethink everything from the start, the future of customer experiences, marketing, products and business models.

Second, they haven’t read too deep into their data analytics – or all key data from across the company into a single, cohesive strategy with clear goals leaving out bits and pieces of critical data. This leaves them making decisions from partial data and can lead to disastrous results.

Thirdly, and the most critical element I feel, is not establishing a digital culture that prepares for micro-disruptions & rapid experimentations by not training your teams for rapid growth. Everyone has to be onboard for the transformation to work.

Fourth, not recognizing that millennials are the future of their company and not properly mentoring them and giving them the guidance they need to grow. I did talk about the power of reverse mentoring in the transformational process in a previous article, and the positive impacts within the company culture. They will make up 75% or more of the workforce by 2020 according to Forbes.

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