Do or Die: How large organizations can reach a higher level of digital maturity

Abstract: The business landscape as we know it is being disrupted by an increasing usage of emerging digital technologies, to reap the benefits of the new technological opportunities managers need to transform their organizations. To do so, research literature proposes striving towards digital maturity. However, knowledge within the area of digital transformation and digital maturity is insufficient amongst organizational leaders. Moreover, theoretical guidance in terms of which changes that are required to increase digital maturity in an organization, is still absent in research literature. To address the academic gap and provide guidance in practical challenges, the research objective to create a framework to evaluate digital maturity was constructed. To reach this objective, the following research questions were derived: RQ1: Which levels can digital maturity be divided into and what characterizes each level? RQ2: When progressing upwards along the digital maturity scale, what are the key dimensions that allow transition from one level to the next? To answer the research questions and thereby meet the research objective, an abductive, multiple case study of large companies in the manufacturing and service industry was performed. 16 interviews and two workshops were conducted to provide the data which was then thematically analyzed and structured to provide answers to the research questions. Our findings were then used to construct the Digital Maturity Framework. Our findings suggest the following three levels of digital maturity; Awareness, Experience, and Autonomy. The characteristics of each levels is expressed in six organizational dimensions, namely Processes, Leadership, Culture, Strategy, Analytics, and IT. To transit from one maturity level to the next, Leadership in terms of change management is a key dimension in all transitions. Before organizations qualify for the level Awareness, they must first lay the foundation through Process management. Experimenting and testing new digital tools and technologies is a key dimension to reach the level Experience, and Strategy is a key dimension in both the transition to Experience and the transition to Autonomy. Our findings contribute with a more nuanced framework of digital maturity as well as guidance for managers about what they need to do to progress in digital maturity. The importance of change management is the most valuable managerial implication of our findings, because change will always trigger friction in the organization, which in turn requires strong and driven leaders to drive the change.