Digital innovation is the strategic use of technology to create new products, services, or business models, or to dramatically improve existing ones. According to some experts, a lack of digital innovation is usually due to leadership.
In a new report released by MIT’s Information Systems Research Center (CISR), Beth Stackpole, of MIT’s Sloan School of Management explains that many organizations still struggle to turn investments into data and artificial intelligence into real business results.
The issue lies not in investing in technology, but in how these processes are led. According to CISR Academic Research Fellow Dr. Nils Olaya Fonstad, a coordinated and comprehensive approach to digital innovation is being overlooked that helps initiatives grow and generate impact. In this way, unnecessary efforts are duplicated, since each initiative should be developed in phases, depending on the evidence and the value generated, and that the entire project should not be measured based on traditional metrics.
To make these processes more effective, organizations seek transformation leaders. Change no longer depends on one person, but on specialized leadership networks. The report mentions three key profiles to drive digital innovation:
Initiative Leaders: Responsible for developing and operating digital projects aligned with the strategic objectives of an organization. Their function is not only to drive ideas, but also to check if they are really viable, useful, and capable of scaling.
Shared Resource Leaders: Help coordinate talent, technology, and reusable tools between different teams to avoid duplicating processes and facilitate the growth of initiatives.
Portfolio Leaders: Prioritize projects, redistribute resources, and make decisions about which initiatives should continue or stop based on their impact and growth potential.
Digital innovation no longer depends just on using AI or advanced technology, but by building structures capable of adapting quickly, testing, correcting, and scaling.
Source: MIT Sloan School of Management