Today’s businesses must adapt to rapidly changing market conditions, manage and derive insights from massive volumes of data, and meet the rising demands of today’s always-on customers. In short, they must modernize—rethinking processes and leveraging technology to seize opportunities earlier, achieve maximum value from their investments, and innovate faster than ever before.

The impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic further drive these changes. Businesses across all industries must now move even faster to embrace new work styles and drive down costs. Recent research suggests that more than 90 percent of enterprises are accelerating cloud adoption plans because of COVID-19.1

Many organizations are instituting digital transformation initiatives in response to these growing pressures. By embracing new ways of building applications and services, these organizations can connect previously siloed data, streamline processes, and accelerate innovation in ways that delight their customers.

Digital transformation promises substantial rewards, with leading companies achieving critical business advantages such as higher productivity, faster time to market, and a stronger bottom line.

Reaching these rewards can prove challenging, however. Digital transformation represents a massive undertaking involving far-reaching changes to technology, processes, and culture. Breaking the process down into distinct phases can help prevent organizations from losing their way.