Tag Archives: Digital Transformation

Embracing Cultural Evolution in the Tech-Driven World

I wrote about company culture over 10 years ago and that previous post has been getting a lot of attention over recent weeks. That made me think – how has culture changed over the years and how important now is the interplay with culture, technology and both employee and customer success.

Since 2013 when I wrote the last culture article, the integration of advanced technology in the workplace has transformed company cultures globally. And this evolution necessitates a reassessment of how company culture and technology together foster a conducive environment for employee motivation and customer success. The rise of remote work, digital collaboration tools and AI-driven analytics has not only changed how we work but also how we interact, learn, and grow within organisations.

The core principles of a strong company culture – continuous hiring, encouraging entrepreneurship and leading by example – remain crucial. However, their application has transformed. Today, fostering a culture of adaptability, inclusivity and digital savviness is imperative. Encouraging a culture that embraces change, values digital skillsets and promotes a work-life balance in a digitally connected world is key to attracting top talent.

The transparent and data-driven culture facilitated by technology leads to more informed decision-making, enhancing employee satisfaction and efficiency. A culture that leverages technology to understand customer needs better and respond to them swiftly contributes significantly to customer success.

In essence, the synergy of a robust company culture and cutting-edge technology is a powerful driver of growth. It’s about creating an environment where motivated employees thrive, leading to innovative solutions and heightened customer satisfaction.

How does your company culture stack up in 2024? And what’s the future of a good company culture?

Being customer centric

A great way to think about customer centricity that really resonates with me:

“A business is customer centric when it delivers on-going growing value to and for their customers.”

I really like this because…

  1. It’s not just for the short term and the now
  2. It’s about the what (the value) and the who
  3. It allows for customers to include customers as we know them, employees and shareholders and investors

The reason being customer centric is important is not only the obvious – that our customers stay loyal when they have good experiences and the product and sales are delivering on our promises, but also as our customers keep evolving and changing, so too are the ways that we operationalise that and support those customers.

If you are customer centric, it means that you are observing that evolution that’s happening to your customer base, and you’re able to be very agile and nimble in responding to that as a business.

Being customer centric is easy to say but hard to do and it doesn’t come organically. It needs organisation wide buy-in and sponsorship, from sales, to finance, to operations, to support, to customer success, to delivery! We live at a time of unprecedented customer expectations both for business customers and our end consumers, and being customer centric is critical. Why now? Think about your ultimate consumers – they’re you and your expectations have changed. Forrester research have stated “This new world requires leaders to think and act differently” and George Colony, Forrester CEO predicts, if a company is not customer-centric, they’ll simply be out of business between 5 – 10 years. What are you doing to be more customer centric today? I’m going to share some practical ideas and examples over the next couple of days of things I’ve seen work very well with different companies.

“Customer Centricity is a journey and not a destination.”