Strategic Alliance Magazine Q1 2018 - 54

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By Cynthia B. Hanson

Onboarding Company Culture
to Surf the Digital Wave

The cover story in this issue of Strategic Alliance
Magazine is not a sexy topic: security concerns in
multi-partnering during digital transformation-yawn.
But it gets more interesting if you follow the trail. The topic
leads to the fundamental importance of changing company culture, including security concerns, in an era of digital
transformation. For the alert CEO and alliance manager,
it's a key concern if you are even thinking of riding the
digital wave. You may have all the latest surfing gear, but
getting the company onboard can make or break the transition.

Nobel laureate Daniel Khaneman would call it WYSIATI
(what you see is all there is), the tendency in all of us to
"just pay attention to the things that are in front of us and
sometimes neglect other potentially important information," says Alex Blau, a behavioral scientist at ideas42 in
New York. (See Page 28 for more of Blau's insights.)

"The history of technological advance in business is littered
with examples of companies focusing on technologies
without investing in organizational capabilities that ensure
their impact," points out the 2015 MIT Sloan Management
Review and Deloitte digital business study "Strategy, not
Technology, Drives Digital Transformation." "In many
companies, the failed implementation of enterprise resource planning and previous generations of knowledge
management systems are classic examples of expectations
falling short because organizations didn't change mindsets
and processes or build cultures that fostered change."

"It has to do with what behavioral science refers to as
mental models, which are simple models we all use to
make sense of the complexity of the world around us,"
Blau says. "These models help us to make predictions
about the future, but they also have the consequence of
directing our attention toward certain things while we
ignore others. Executives at different organizations likely
have different mental models when thinking about risks
and security for their organization. If, when forming
strategic alliances, or merging organizations together,
you don't address the differences in those mental models
appropriately, both parties may miss risks."

The 2017 study by Paris-based Capgemini business consulting firm, "The Digital Culture Challenge: Closing the
Employee-Leadership Gap," surveyed 1,700 senior executives, managers, and employees from 340 organizations
worldwide, as well as interviewed executives and academic
experts. Capgemeni's study concluded that companies are
"significantly lagging on culture dimensions." The "damning" verdict is based on the significant gap in perspective
uncovered between company leaders and employees.
Among other things, the study found that:

So how do we circumvent the WYSIATI to lead better in
the workplace? For starters, "you often have to dig into the
details to see what features of the workplace or interface
environment are driving the behavior you ultimately want
to change, and make small tweaks to more effectively guide
better behaviors," Blau points out. Context matters. Stop
berating the team. Instead, look outside of the box and explore ways that you can change their overall environment.
The key, he says, is to dig into the design system and create
better user decisions for the team.

n Some 85 percent of leaders believe "we easily collaborate across functions and business units;" by comparison,
some 41 percent of employees agree.

Also, breaking down functional silos and "focusing on
cross-functional collaboration is considered crucial to success in digital environments," according to the 2017 Digital
Business Global Executive Study and Research Project performed by MIT Sloan Management and Deloitte Services,
LP. "More than 70% of digitally maturing businesses are using cross-functional teams to organize work and charging
them with implementing digital business priorities. This
compares to less than 30% for early-stage organizations.,"
states the report "Achieving Digital Maturity." n

n Some 75 percent of leaders believe "we have a culture
of innovation, experimentation, and risk taking;" only 37
percent of employees agree.

n Some 56 percent of leaders believe "my organization
has a culture of flexibility and agility;" only 40 percent of
employees agree.

n Some 65 percent of leaders believe "we have a culture of
openness to the outside world: we work closely with startups and partners;" a mere 34 percent of employees agree.
STRATEGIC ALLIANCE MAGAZINE | Q1 * 2018

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Strategic Alliance Magazine Q1 2018