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Starting a digital transformation in the telecom sector
Telecom companies have been historically evolved and sophisticated, both on what they offer to customers, by constantly innovating and adjusting to market demand, but also on how they support their business using information systems, being early adopters or developing new in-house solutions that can help them in being faster to react to competition, supporting their customers or evolve their business.
The telecom industry has undergone significant transformations over the past few decades, driven by the rise of mobile and internet services. These innovations led to the launch of new companies, which eventually led to numerous mergers and acquisitions. Previously, there was a clear distinction between companies and the services they offered, e.g. mobile services vs fixed line services. Today, however, we see end-to-end telecom providers, a result of these industry consolidations.
With decades of market evolution and a wave of mergers and acquisitions, many telecom companies are now rethinking their organizational, business, and IT structures. This shift has spurred the launch of major initiatives aimed at transforming these companies to meet the demands of the modern world.
In this article, I am going to outline essential factors to consider when launching and managing Digital Transformation programs. Based on my experience in telecom businesses and Salesforce technology since 2014, these strategies are key to ensuring successful execution.
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Ensure that you have the right sponsorship
Both shareholders and board members need to be in sync with the programme goals and the implications that it may have. A high scale programme will require that strategic decisions with impact in people are made, which are typically not popular with the staff, but also company financials, as the programme will require significant investment from all kinds of resources, to ensure that the programme is executed while the company keeps running.
If the programme is not a priority to a part of the company, it is likely going to be understaffed and underbudgeted which will lead necessarily to a painful road to the end or even complete failure.
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Involve the right people
It is quite common to see these programmes being driven by IT and relying solely on financial factors to go forward. Experience shows that this approach carries a risk, as the organisation will have difficulties in understanding the benefits and outcomes that are expected and especially, what is in it for them.
It may start in IT but have other areas contributing from the beginning, especially key business areas. These programmes come once every other decade and they should be seen as opportunities that require full company involvement, allowing to align company goals and objectives to jointly build a vision of the company for the future. Not doing it means:
- No real commitment from key stakeholders as they are not in the inception of the programme.
- The right resources will not be allocated as necessary as it will not be aligned with their own goals.
- There will be a tendency to lift and shift as opposed to transform.
- Distrust from the programme in general and its goals.
While having wide participation is important, it is also key that people are committed with the programme. I would recommend that the success of the programme is linked to people’s goals (yes, exactly those trimesters or annual ones, it depends how you measure, and that are linked with performance results, you know?)
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Don’t rush
Time is a key factor, and it can become a significant enemy. Top level Management will aim for the shorter time possible for execution as it will favour the business case on paper. This, in my experience, will likely lead to an unrealistic programme setup where the business case will fail to meet its goals and deviate from a financial and timeline point of view. Consider that:
- The high-level scope and boundaries of the programme need to be clearly defined with no loose ends, avoiding conflicts at a later stage on discussion on what the programme is addressing and not.
- The organization needs time to evaluate business priorities, bottlenecks to solve and goals. Establish a clear view of the benefits that you want to achieve (formalize them as KPIs that you can measure) and how you are going to manage them. This will ensure that you spend time thinking on what is important and that you can demonstrate achievements as you go through the programme.
- With a clear view of the programme priorities, launch business transformation and simplification initiatives that help in avoiding doing the lift and shift. Make them the first activities of programme delivery and see them as mandatory and not a nice to have. Keep them ahead of programme delivery.
- Ensure that the Architecture principles and tooling are well established to address the programme aim and objectives stated above. This will avoid constant debate on whether the conditions for the programme are gathered.
- Build an approach that allow moments to rethink and realign as it goes. It is unlikely that you get everything right from the beginning. Establish intermediate goals and favour small achievements as opposed to big bang approaches. Avoid doing something just because it is contractually signed if it is no longer meaningful, leave room for adjustments.
- Select the right partners to accompany you in the journey. Right is not necessarily the cheapest.
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Setup a team
Having the right people from the company highly determines the success of the programme:
- Telecom business is complex, and it will consume a significant amount of time of internal resources. They will have to provide requirements, validate functional designs, test software, plan, rewrite operational procedures, be trained, etc.
- Consider the skills required and ensure the internal members have a fair understanding of the architecture and technologies involved (train key members of the team, if not). This will facilitate the discussion and will help in visualizing what the company is going to get as an outcome. Relying only on System Integrators and Vendors puts the company in a fragile position, with limited ability to question and contribute.
- Ensure there are champions willing to change that can mobilize others, that can compensate for detractors that are resistant to change.
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Adjust to new trends
Whereas before the idea of having massive data centres where the company had full control was seen as ideal, today’s trend is to move to cloud architectures, which translates in additional challenges to companies, such as:
- Security (e.g. data flowing from on prem to cloud provides)
- Regulatory (e.g. data stored outside country or region)
- Usage, as cloud providers will charge you on resource and traffic consumption
- Skills, as it is likely that current company employees are not knowledgeable about cloud if before, they’ve only worked on on-Prem scenarios.
Carefully consider what is right for your company based on what you want to achieve. Study and test alternative options as the impact of changing halfway will be severe.
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The cost of Legacy
Even the biggest programme will not be able to remove the entire legacy ecosystem in one go. With decades of existence, telecoms will likely have tenths or even hundreds of systems supporting their business. These will for sure impose limitations on the approach in the programme, such as:
- Legacy unsupported technology with limited knowledge in the market.
- In house-built solutions where only a handful of people understand the system.
- Inability to support new delivery methodologies and multiple streams (e.g. due to the inexistence of environments).
Ensure that these and other limitations are factored into the programme plan.
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Keep the business running
It is likely the biggest challenge. Although a massive programme is in flight, regular business will have to run with minimum impact, responding to market and competition demands. In this context keep in perspective that the way the business runs will change as the programme evolves:
- At the beginning, with nothing in production, the challenge will be in balancing the effort of company staff, between programme and daily job activities.
- Once systems go live, the company needs to manage coexistence of processes and systems. Some rules of thumb I would suggest being on the back of our minds:
- Segregate teams running new processes and working on new systems.
- Ensure that there is a single process addressing the same business outcome (e.g. subscription of a Mobile service A can only be done using new processes / systems).
- Reduce the possibilities of customers to go back to the old offers as it will decrease the complexity of both processes and IT.
- Once you are close to the end, create incentives for customers to move to new offers, as it will accelerate the decommissioning of legacy systems and processes.
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Why Choose us as your Salesforce Partner for a digital transformation in the telecom sector?
Our team specializes in supporting telecoms in transforming their companies, by delivering Salesforce solutions and providing senior advisory, bringing extensive industry knowledge and experience to every project. This ensures that your Salesforce implementation is not just technically sound, but also aligned with the unique demands and processes of the telecommunications sector.
Transform and simplify your business
We’ll work with you to understand the project strategy and how it maps with the company context. We’ll understand the starting point with your business and work in an end state design that promotes transformation and simplification and not only repeat what has always been done.
Industry-Specific Solutions
We understand that the telecom industry has distinct needs and constraints. We will help you in building tailored solutions to address these specifics, ensuring that we leverage Salesforce capabilities and avoid over customization, while still maximizing experience, efficiency andefficiency and other benefits to your project.
Enhanced Communication and Collaboration
We facilitate clear communication among all stakeholders through structured methodologies, ensuring that everyone from business analysts to IT developers is aligned. This reduces misunderstandings and accelerates the implementation process.
Commitment to Continuous Improvement
Our partnership doesn’t end with the initial implementation. We provide ongoing support and optimization services to ensure that your Salesforce solution evolves with your business needs, driving continuous improvement and innovation.
If you’re ready to transform your telecom operations with Salesforce, explore our services and contact us today. Don’t forget to subscribe to our Knowledge Center to stay updated on the latest industry insights and best practices!
