Chapter 1: Introducing Digital Transformation

Industrial digital transformation is the journey that organizations undertake where they integrate business model change, process improvement, and cultural shift, often leveraging a number of digital and emerging technologies. We will refer to industrial digital transformation often in the context of companies from the commercial or public sector that deal with physical assets, factories, and field operations, generally dealing with business-to-business scenarios, and the transformation involves improvements in these products, equipment, and operations. On the other hand, when the transformation involves software or business enhancements for asset-light or pure tertiary services companies, including business-to-consumer scenarios, then we will refer to it as digital transformation. To include both, we will refer to it simply as transformation. Likewise, our use of the term industrial includes both the commercial and public sectors, in the same way as industrial revolutions have used this term.

On the one hand, this book will be a guide for business leaders, Line of Business (LoB) managers, C-suite executives, including the Chief Information Officer (CIO) and Chief Technology Officer (CTO), and digital leaders to help identify opportunities for transformation. On the other hand, this book will provide mid-career professionals in Information Technology (IT) and business with recipes for success in the transformation journey, both in terms of digital technology selection and implementation, to help achieve the associated business outcomes. This book will prepare technology professionals to influence business decision makers toward industrial digital transformation. In this process, mid-career professionals will achieve significant professional advancement.

In this chapter, we'll be exploring the following topics:

• Exploring industrial digital transformation
• Identifying the business drivers for industrial digital transformation
• The evolution of industrial transformation
• The impact of industrial digital transformation on business
• Quantifying business outcomes and shareholder value
• The phases of the digital transformation journey