WHY IS THERE SUCH A HIGH FAILURE RATE IN BUSINESS TRANSFORMATION TODAY?

The true number of business transformation project failure is underreported. Depending on which research you follow, the figure is between 70% – 80% of business transformation projects end in failure. There is five (5) main causes in business transformation failure are – lack of stakeholder involvement, lack of senior stakeholder support, changing requirement, incomplete requirements and poor planning.

WHAT IS WRONG WITH EXISTING APPROACHES?

Nothing. They are good at the purpose they were designed for, except they are now used for a different purpose, and that is not the original purpose they were designed for. Look at TOGAF® (The Open Group Architecture Framework) for example – it’s a framework for managing ‘technology’ or ‘technology changes’. It is not surprising, it was written by a “technology standards company”. They know and understand technology. What is happening is, TOGAF® is being used in business transformation projects that the ‘framework’ to manage the ‘transformation’, but it only focuses one thing – technology. It doesn’t focus on anything else other than Technology (it almost completely ignores, the other two (2) important aspects of the organisation – People, and Process(es)). It also ignores how to transition the business from the current state, to its desired future state. It effectively put the Technology stakeholders in the drivers set, to dictate to the Business what they think they want and literally throw it over the fence to the Business for them to work out if first it is fit for purpose, and then how to use and implement it.

HOW DOES HOBA® SOLVE THE PROBLEM IN BUSINESS TRANSFORMATION TODAY?

HOBA® solves the 70% failure rate in business transformation problem by addressing the causes that problem in the first place – by putting the Business back into control, to take control back from Technology and into their own hands, using a structured process and framework that was developed WITH the Business, BY the Business, to be USED and OWNED by the Business, putting the control back into their own hands.

WHAT IS THE BIGGEST PROBLEM WITH BUSINESS TRANSFORMATION PROJECTS AND HOW DOES HOBA® HELP?

The biggest problem with business transformation projects is firstly the name. “Business Transformation” is incorrectly called or referred to as “Digital Transformation”. ‘Digital Transformation’ is a misnomer, it is not ‘digital’ per se that is ‘transforming’, it is the ‘Business’ that is transforming, and how it does or is doing that in this period of time is via ‘digital technologies’ (if ‘technology’ isn’t already digital, what were they before?). What this intentional confusion in the marketplace is causing, is it causes is an incorrect bias and focus on the ‘technology aspect’ only of the transformation, which by doing so completely ignores the Business aspects – that’s the Business Operations Stakeholders and their concerns, and the Processes those stakeholders carry out. HOBA® helps by putting the Business back in to control, to be very clear and structured with what is the Vision, Strategy, Objectives and Measures, what stakeholders are involved and need to be involved in the transformation and their decision making authority, the process to manage those decisions, scope and risks; what are the problems they want to address or opportunities they want to take advantage of; what benefits they want to realise from the transformation and when; what the future or Target Operating Model (TOM) needs to look like to achieve their Vision and Strategic Objectives and business benefits, and how and when will the changes be implemented. Everything and nothing more, only doing what needs to be done, to transform the business, not doing what is happening in the marketplace today and that is ‘creating reams and reams of colourful models and diagrams, that while beautiful, are in reality just “interesting but (sadly) useless”.

WHAT IS THE DESIGN PROCESS?

The Design Process is the 6-Step process used to implement HOBA® and manage the transformation from the very start, to the very end, implementation.

WHAT IS THE BIGGEST MISCONCEPTION IN THE MARKETPLACE?

The biggest misconception in the marketplace today with business transformation is that Clients are led to believe that they need ‘reams and reams’ of pretty colourful presentations to transform your business. This is a fallacy. This only creates expensive shelf-ware. What those ‘pretty presentations’ are designed for is to enable the transformation project to keep moving toward its end goal, transforming the Business. What the Clients are led to believe is those ‘pretty presentations are the actual goal of the project, and often celebrated and hang up on the project office wall with great bravado as if they were the goal of the transformation itself! What those ‘pretty presentations’ actually need to be is two (2) things – first, is they need to be understandable, and written in a language that the Business understands, so first they can understand what it and they mean, and then they can agree to it. Then second, then they need to be useful. A lot of Consultants and Consultancy’s wanting to impress their clients with great marketing, pretty presentations and long list of impressive acronyms and latest “it” words, but this just confuses the Client. What happens is the Consultants will present their ‘ideas’ (because that’s what they are, they have had one meeting with the Client, interpreted that into their own words and perspectives, and come back to them several weeks and months later, having not consulted with them through the process, thinking ‘they know their Clients business best (they don’t, the Client does!) and play back their 300+ page power-point presentation that looks impressive), they present it to the Client, the Client has no idea what it means or says (its written in a foreign language, literally), due to the time it’s taken, and the money it has cost at that point, the Client agrees to it in the room, then walks out the room, and completely ignores everything the Consultant(s) said. The transformation goes nowhere. HOBA® solves that problem, refer to the first question above.

HOBA® is trusted by the UK Government, FTSE-100 companies and start-ups to both set up, and also turnaround their failing transformations. HOBA® is used by thousands around to transform their business, and was made public for the first time in late 2018, after over 10+ years in use with private clients, published in The Business Transformation Playbook – How to Implement Your Organisations Target Operating Model (TOM) and Achieve a Zero-Percent Failure Rate Using the 6-Step Agile Framework’, reaching bestseller on Amazon in 6-categories including Project Management and Consulting, and made it onto the Best Business Strategy eBook List of All Time by BookAuthority, at no.30 (March 2021). See News for details.

CAN I READ A PREVIEW OF THE BUSINESS TRANSFORMATION PLAYBOOK?

Yes, you can download a FREE preview to The Business Transformation Playbook here.

The Four Levels Of A Business Transformator

By Heath Gascoigne
February 6, 2019
Blog Post, Business Design, Business Transformation, business transformator, Service Design
Post Views: 951

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In our previous post we’ve discussed that a Business Transformator is an individual who helps organisations implement their Target Operating Model (TOM) and transform their business.

Like any profession, there are levels of competency. The same applies to to Business Transformation and the Business Transformator.

Here’s the following:

Level 1: Novice
Level 2: Apprentice
Level 3: Journey-Man
Level 4: Master

The levels are similar to the building or construction trade and for good reason.

Building a Business architecture is pretty much the same as creating a building.

The output will depend on your level of skill, knowledge and experience.

Want to learn more about the four levels? The table below explains each in-depth:

	Novice	Apprentice	Journeyman	Master
Summary	The new kid on the block, very keen and eager.	A person who is learning their trade through practical experience from a skilled employer.	A skilled worker who has successfully completed an official apprenticeship qualification. Often considered competent and authorised to work as a qualified employee.	A person notably proficient in the art of ‘building’ and qualified or licensed to supervise building construction.
Pros	Makes choices based on the rules and adheres to the framework almost religiously.	All aspects of work are treated separately with equal importance. Possesses a growing perception of actions in relation to goals.	Able to provide a holistic view of the situation which illuminates problems, considers consequences and reuses templates or examples where appropriate.	Illuminates problems, transcends reliance on rules and guidelines, adapts solutions to new situations and has a vision of both how and what is possible.
Weakness	Has limited understanding of adaptability, customisation or appreciation of the interaction between the overall parts of the Business Architecture.	Limited situational perception from lack of practical experience. Takes more time to complete a task than a more experienced member of the team.	Grows situational perception based on ongoing experience. Becomes faster at execution through effective planning and routines.	Limited. Always seeks to better understand concerns issues. Anticipates events, and offer suggestions for improvement.
What to watch out for	Fails to ask the right question to get the right answer.	Interprets requirements at face value and occasionally asks questions to check for understanding.	Constantly and pragmatically questions the status quo of ‘this is how we always do it’

Which level are you? Let us know in the comments!

Thank you for reading this!

Sincerely,

Heath Gascoigne

P.S. If you want to join our Business Transformator community of like-minded Business Transformators, join the community on the Business Transformator Facebook Group here.

P.P.S. The UK Government and startups have used our framework on their transformation projects. You too can learn how in 2-days. Check it out here.

P.P.P.S. If you want to learn more about business transformation, check out The Business Transformation Playbook here.

For more information, visit https://hoba.tech

Heath Gascoigne

Hi, I'm Heath, the founder of HOBA TECH and host of The Business Transformation Podcast. I help Business Transformation Consultants, Business Designers and Business Architects transform their and their clients' business and join the 30% club that succeed. Join me on this journey.

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The Four Levels Of A Business Transformator