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The role of a software development partner in digital transformation

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Each industry is being disrupted by new technology. That is why digital transformation is a must in every organization. Contrary to popular belief, digital transformation is not just about IT, and it’s a fundamental change in businesses processes and strategy. It’s not a one-time event either.

Digital transformation is an ongoing adaptation to the challenges and opportunities brought in by new tech solutions. Finding the right software development partner can help you not only create and execute the right digital transformation strategy but come up with a cutting-edge product and start the cultural change necessary to redefine your business model and give you an immense competitive advantage.

Everyone wants to do it; hardly anyone can

The pursuit of digital transformation is common. According to IDC as much as 40% global tech spending goes to projects under “digital transformation” label. Everyone wants to embrace the digital age – get rid of legacy technology, processes, and architectures, replace on-premises systems and waterfall development with API-driven microservices, the cloud, and agile methodologies. Finally, use the potential of big data and Artificial Intelligence.

There are many challenges for digital transformation. Organization’s resistance to change is the most common one. The company’s leaders should understand the importance of the digitalization, embrace new business models, take on customer first attitude, dismantle siloed organizational structures.

However, the most difficult challenge to overcome is limited in-house expertise. This may transfer to:

  • Being unable to develop a digital customer journey
  • Sticking to old inflexible methodologies and technology stack
  • Spending too much money on inefficient projects
  • Ineffective data management
  • Burning money holding to legacy models and legacy software.

It’s almost impossible to build a quality in-house team

The natural answer is to hire:

  • product owners with vision
  • agile project managers with excellent communication skills
  • creative web and mobile application designers
  • DevOps up to date with the newest solutions and focused on continuous learning experience
  • full-stack developers skilled with JavaScript frameworks, like vue.js or node.js, Python, Go lang, or other trading programming languages, experienced in big data analysis and machine learning implementations.

There’s one problem – these specialists are not available.

Everyone is looking for them. The biggest players from the tech industry or financial sector are recruiting this kind of talent driving the wages up. If there are designers or engineers available most likely are they are not competent enough to lead the digital transformation in your company.

 

The role of a software development partner in digital transformation

The gateway to the most wanted talent

That is why partnering with an experienced software development company is the best solution. These teams bring in all the experience you need. The organizational culture based on agile and lean project management, where you adjust the product with every iteration, scoping an essential MVP that would solve the exact business problem, meet your customer’s needs.

This is the only realistic way to introduce to your company user-centered strategies that deliver the customers experiences they know from interactions with the most advanced companies, such as Google, Amazon, LinkedIn, and the most successful startups.

Design-first thinking, full transparency, remote teams, continuous improvement approach – these are all the cultural influences an excellent software development partner will bring in to your organization.

This the value added above the product development itself. Partnering with a dynamic software development agency that follows the best practices by global tech leaders like Google, LinkedIn or Amazon can do wonders for your organizational culture.

Your organizational culture needs to evolve

Digital transformation is not something you can just buy and bring into your organization in a box. It’s a profound cultural change. This is an enormous challenge, but there’s a silver lining to it. Digital transformation is spreading throughout the organizations because it’s superior. It brings a culture that performs better, that better suits modern times. That is why once it appears in your company and people are empowered to embrace it, it will spread naturally. The organizations evolve typically they come through digital transformation.

Getting an experienced team involved at the earliest stage of planning the strategic product can encourage such a change. A scoping session with veteran project managers, critically thinking product designers and world-class software developers can open your eyes to the possible solutions that the newest technology brings, as well as to its limitations. Cut out the hype and bring you down to earth.

Most tech trends are hyped up. It’s a rule of thumb with new technology. There’s too much buzz, too much PR put into publicly traded companies. Usually, the most important trends are under the radar since they are boring. Experienced practitioners will open your eyes to them.

Get an insight into the real potential of technology

Partnering with a tech-savvy company will help you pursue new business models and revenue streams. Quality software development teams know you need to experiment with solutions,  introduce the culture of failures that don’t cost much. That is how contemporary software engineering works.

At the strategic level, you can learn where the process automation is applicable in your company – is it marketing or maybe supply chains? How to transform your products into services – just like the software vendors do from Microsoft to Adobe. How to plug your product into the most critical ecosystems as Amazon Alexa, Google Assistant or Apple Store? What key roles should you add to your organization? How to retrain employees? Where and how to set up innovation labs that would drive digital innovation.

Control the costs

Under digital transformation, IT should be involved in the strategic product planning to help business decisionmakers determine the outcomes for customers. A software development partner can bring into the process a quality team.

Last but not least, outsourcing the software engineering will help you control the digital transformation costs. The primary business rule doesn’t change – you have to remember about the two sides of the balance sheet.

Hiring a remote software development team is the only way to quickly scale up and down the IT resources and adjust them to the current business needs. Finding a long-term tech partner is the safest way to drive the digital transformation in your company.

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