What Is Digital Leadership? – Let’s Know Everything About It

“Your long-term success is not just determined by what you achieve alone, but also by how you empower, engage, support, and elevate your colleagues and teams in the ecosystem around you.”

What is Digital leadership?

Everyone is taking advantage of this growing digital era; then why would leadership lack behind… Leadership updates itself faster than you think, and so a new and innovative form of leadership came into existence- The Digital leadership

Defining Leadership- It is a leadership style in which leaders make use of the digital space to expand companies’ networks in order to achieve business goals and inspire followers to do the same.At the same time, Digital leadership can be at an organizational or at an individual level.

Who is a Digital Leader?

A digital leader is one tech-savvy who uses digital assets in the best possible way by analyzing the ever-changing business requirement, business goals as well as customer needs, etc. Hence, At the organizational level, a digital leader can be a company who achieves heights by maximum utilization of digital assets.

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What is Digital transformation?

Digital transformation is the change of companies and society as a whole, that is driven by visionary leaders, ground-breaking business strategies, and cutting-edge digital technology advancements. Hence, Digital transformation for leaders has become crucial in the past few years.

​Digital transformation leader

Digital Transformation Leaders are the ones who assist leaders and their organizations in leveraging the digital opportunity to create their organizations’ future, innovate, transform, and also, succeed.

Leader’s Tip
Make the most of technological developments by keeping abreast of digital trends, investing in digital skills, and using technology to boost innovation and productivity.

Digital transformation for leaders

The digital era is maturing, and we are in a period where the machine is savvy concerning man-made reasoning (AI), Internet of Things (IoT) and other shrewd and strong computerized advancements. This is making a huge difference for associations and organizations all over the planet.

It implies that we must alter our organizations to accommodate new work experiences, such as machine cooperation, personal development, and a shift in our business and leadership vision.

So here are some ways to practice better leadership in digital age-

• 1.    Recognize the need of this growing digital world and act accordingly with urgency- In this fast-paced digital world, the needs are changing drastically; one needs to be updated all the time and respond to the changing needs with great urgency.
• 2.    Refresh your work culture- True digital transformation entails redesigning an organization’s whole workflow, from technology to data, processes, experiences, and people.
• 3.    Practice transparency- Let the doors for innovation be open for all. Also, Be available for team members at all levels of the organization for discussions.
• 4.    Embrace Beginners mindset- Encourage your staff to think like a beginner and to question the status quo.
• 5.    Re-examine Your leadership style- You need to make some adds to your style of leadership to meet the requirements in this growing digital era. For instance, digital marketing leadership can be included.

Leadership and Digitalization

As new technology transforms business landscapes and traditional organizations are outpaced by younger digital and nimble competitors, digitalization is on everyone’s lips. Understanding the features and economic rationale underlying the mysterious phenomena of “digitalization” appears more important than ever in this uncertain climate.

It is crucial for a leader to implement digitalization in order to achieve business goals more efficiently.

5 digital leader qualities

Here are the leadership qualities of Digital leaders-

1. Firstly, Digital leaders are able to develop a vision that others can follow.
2. They think out of the box
3. set out to create fresh as well as tech-savvy methods to put their idea into action.
4. They guide their teams through periods of transition and upheaval.
5. Always ready to fight against risk and challenges
6. At last, Digital leaders are masters at networking

5 Examples of Digital leaders

Here are examples of some digital innovation leaders-

1. Dion Hinchcliffe – Assist Fortune 500 and Global 2000 firms with the implementation of new technologies. His writing examines several elements of technology that organizations must consider, such as employee experience and the digital workplace’s future. His messages are relevant to a wide range of businesses, and he is always looking forward to the next step.
2. Paul Cogan– Voice Sage’s chief operating officer, His writing strives to assist businesses in navigating the banking industry’s digital transition. Further, He focuses on how businesses may integrate new technologies into their existing strategy.  His remarks are mostly focused on the banking business; many of his insights are relevant to other industries.
3. Andrew Morawski- senior vice president and general manager of Oracle Communications, studies digital transformation in a variety of industries, including construction, product manufacturing, and agriculture. His essay exemplifies how digital transformation executives frequently take digital methods from their own organizations and demonstrate how they can be applied to other industries.
4. Diego Lomanto- vice president of product marketing at UiPath, is no stranger to writing about technology’s impact on marketing and marketing strategy. He also writes about the effects of technology adoption in the workplace in general, such as how robotic process automation may improve the employee experience.
5. Debra Ruh- CEO of consultancy firm Ruh Global Impact, offers a unique viewpoint on digital transformation by emphasizing disability inclusion. She works with firms to guarantee that new products and technologies are technologically accessible to everyone. Her article examines the broader advantages of digital inclusion and how businesses should incorporate it into their digital strategy from the start.

Digital Leadership examples

Leader’s Tip
Promote a digital culture by encouraging employees to adopt a growth mentality, providing them with the means to fully embrace digital tools, and providing a safe space for them to do so.

Here are some examples of leadership in a digital world

1. IKEA: Understand Your Customers

While many businesses struggle to find answers to the digital problem, IKEA has been particularly successful in surfing the digital wave. As the world’s largest furniture firm, it is skilled at knowing its clients and employing strategies to pique their interests.

2. LEGO: Get Back to Basics

The LEGO toy firm has grown from a maker of children’s building blocks to a global brand with theme parks, clothes, novels, and video games. LEGO management, desperate for a comeback, reorganized the company to emphasize core building goods, minimize expenses, and engage youngsters with digital technologies. While the firm has found success through construction kits and two extremely popular films, the digital world is where they have carved out a future for themselves.

3. Burberry: Hire Fresh Eyes

Burberry, a global fashion powerhouse, was an early adoption of digital technology, even down to choosing a technologically aware CEO. Under Angela Ahrendts’ leadership, digital was positioned at the centre of the company’s strategy and implemented through a number of projects aimed at driving revenue both online and off.

5 Advantages & Disadvantages of Digital Leadership

Advantages of digital leadership transformation-

1. Increases employee productivity
2. Allows to provide a better customer experience
3. Helps increasing revenue
4. Increases overall efficiency in business processes
5. It helps save time and resources
6. Increases employee engagement
7. Facilitate easy communication with employees and customers
8. Facilitates storage of data in a more systematic manner

Disadvantages of digital leadership transformation-

1. Can cause uncertainty for employees
2. Effective implementation of new technologies takes time
3. Loss of interpersonal communication by limiting face to face communication
4. Increases employee dependency; they can become heavily dependent on technology to complete their everyday tasks.
5. Upgradation of software as per business needs may cost a huge amount.
6. Because technology is at the core of most businesses, they are easily vulnerable to cyber-attacks.

5 best Digital leadership Books

Underlisted are some digital age leadership books-

• Leading Digital: Turning Technology into Business Transformation by George Westerman, Didier Bonnet and Andrew McAfee
• Be the Business: CIOs in the New Era of IT by Martha Heller
• Driving Digital: The Leader’s Guide to Business Transformation Through Technology by Isaac Sacolick
• Digital Transformation: Survive and Thrive in an Era of Mass Extinction by Tom Siebel
• Why Digital Transformations Fail: The Surprising Disciplines of How to Take Off and Stay Ahead by Tony Saldanha

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5 best digital leadership quotes

Here are some quotes for inspiring the leaders of the digital era-

1. In Today’s era of volatility, there is no other way but to re-invent. The only sustainable advantage you can have over others is agility; that’s it. Because nothing else is sustainable, everything else you create, somebody else will replicate.”—   Jeff Bezos
2. Clearly, the thing that’s transforming is not the technology — it’s the technology that is transforming you.” — Jeanne W. Ross 
3. When digital transformation is done right, it’s like a caterpillar turning into a butterfly, but when done wrong, all you have is a really fast caterpillar.” — George Westerman
4. You can’t hold firewalls and intrusion detection systems accountable. You can only hold people accountable.” — Daryl White
5. Technology requires constant hands-on management to ensure that the business is adapting to the change in its DNA — and to ensure that future shifts, both internal and external, are accompanied by the appropriate flex of its tech stack.” —Maria Martinez

FAQs

Key Takeaways

• Leaders in the digital realm are literate in the technology they employ and in the data on which they base their judgements.
• Agility and adaptability: they are able to quickly adjust to new circumstances, refocus their efforts, and take use of new technology in order to thrive in today’s competitive digital landscape.
• A focus on the customer experience through the use of digital channels to provide tailored, frictionless service to individual users is a hallmark of the digitally savvy business.