"This included investment in the shared data asset and scalable customer data architecture as well as the continued development of capabilities within the advanced analytics centre, specialist technical expertise, and robust data governance," he said. View my verified achievement from Project Management Institute. Wesfarmers is hoping to transform the way its organisation uses data, making data analytics a business strategy instead of a side effect. Typically, the CIO or CTO should lead this pillar of digital transformation and the KPIs to indicate success are access to new tools, reduced maintenance costs, improved employee satisfaction, and better business performance. However, as AI, machine learning, and big data becomes increasingly used across organisations, Lowthorpe acknowledged that ethics must be maintained as a priority in any data-driven business strategy. It will remain so until cloud [providers] understand and contemplate the same levels of redundancy we take for granted in the way we have active-active data centres, for example, he claims. For leaders, it can be hard to know where you should be focusing investment and what kind of digital transformation youre really after. As noted at the recent half year results, more detail on Wesfarmers OneDigital will be provided at the Strategy Briefing Day in June 2022. It is useful to remember this, because the real benefits from technology are not hard (i.e., cheaper systems or infrastructure), but soft (i.e., capturing valuable data). View my verified achievement from Project Management Institute. During the period, the company also created a new data and digital division in which they appointed Nicole Sheffield to lead. Because of the back-end technology, were able to deploy this information in very easy-to-use, graphically intuitive front-ends on tablets to people in our shops and at work.. Whats exciting for me over time is narrowing down my focus on infrastructure, and making it less of a discussion point for small and medium-sized projects and workloads. Managing Change. The Rural Intelligence Platform uses artificial intelligence, machine learning, and cloud-based geospatial technology to give farmers the heads up on how their property is changing and is expected to change in the future. She has implemented a set of best practices and processes to ensure that they are truly transforming digitally. He says the software has an open architecture, it sits in the cloud, it is low cost and it is flexible. Having the right leader, resources, and measures of success for the journey towards each different pillar can contribute greatly to success. Digitizing operations is a fundamental pillar of digital transformation in the sense that, without it, your company will be left behind by more efficient operators. For many organizations, persuading experienced employees or senior managers to deploy new tech tools is a rather similar experience. Several global retailers are using digital channels, AI and predictive analytics to access prospects and customers, set up digital marketplaces, viral campaigns, and geo targeting campaigns. My head of digital and loyalty systems gets on exceptionally well with the head of digital marketing, and the two understand how they can add value to each other. Delivering a net growth of 5.7% after-tax profit, Wesfarmers boss Rob committed to digital strategy and technology investments preparing the group for future growth. As part of the digital function, executives were also tasked with digitizing the entire ecosystem as well as a separate department with a task to build and maintain the resulting ecosystem. Broadly speaking, these capabilities will span four use cases: Wesfarmers is also accelerating its digital transformation efforts across other parts of the group. According to Harvey, certain loads are always going to be difficult for large corporates to move into the cloud. On average, we would perceive that hosting most loads is still marginally cheaper internally than externally, but we expect that as the cloud fully matures that line is going to shift, he says. Sheffield joins Wesfarmers' executive leadership team as a managing director from November and is tasked with leading development of what it's hoping will be a market-leading data and digital ecosystem. Underpayment epidemic: Software Problem? In its most basic form, this pillar can mean swapping out analog activities with digital ones. He says the legacy systems at Blackwoods, combined with its extensive range of products, had combined to make it impossible for staff using a computer to check inventory in each of the seven Blackwoods distribution centres in real time. That said, there is one thing that hasnt changed namely the fact that all of this is just the new version of an old task or challenge every leader has always faced throughout human history: to prepare their teams and organizations for the future, and create a better future. Typically, companies tackle the first pillars we describe near the start of their digital transformation journey, although as they mature they may continually upgrade to add additional pillars. As a company rearchitects their processes, they also start to unlock more transformational possibilities. Which pillar is the right starting point for your company depends on your context, needs, but also your digital maturity. Consider the chart below: However, these are all American-headquartered companies. Coles has been running the insights applications for eight months across 1200 iPads in-store and the Coles Store Support Centre, and is rolling out a similar application for Coles Express. Since I have been able to take the team under my wing, we focus very much on being part of the business, rather than a service provider. I once managed to persuade my grandfather to buy a cellphone; he never even bothered to take it out of the box. This almost-great Raspberry Pi alternative is missing one key feature, This $75 dock turns your Mac Mini into a Mac Studio (sort of), Samsung's Galaxy S23 Plus is the Goldilocks of Smartphones, How the New Space Race Will Drive Innovation, How the metaverse will change the future of work and society, Digital transformation: Trends and insights for success, Software development: Emerging trends and changing roles. Ive loved making significant changes with my team and really making a difference to the way our team members work at Coles, and the way our customers shop with us, he says. While IT plays a pivotal role in informing people of new trends, technologies and opportunities, its crucial we make sure the solution, as it is formed, delivered and then run, has to be owned by the right person and right function in Coles.. In early 2022, the Club Catch subscription program was rebranded and repositioned as OnePass. This pillar is different from the others in its focus on digital tools to interact and sell to customers. Harvey has had plenty of occasions to both influence and instigate innovation at the Australian supermarket giant during his 10-year tenure. Being clear about their differing demands can help you make smart tradeoffs and clear progress. The third pillar is putting information in the hands of team members. Youve got to make someone really want the technology and see how its going to add value to them and to their mission, as well as deliver for the customer, he says. In other words, you will only transform when you have managed to change how people behave, and how things are done in your organization. The point here is not to be right, but to find better ways of being wrong. Wesfarmers' managing director of industrial David Baxby is overseeing the implementation of Microsoft Dynamics 360 at Blackwoods. The key to success is simply getting clarity that digital transformation is not one thing, but rather many different things. Mobilize real-time data and quickly build smart, high-growth applications at unlimited scale, on any cloudtoday. Recognize the emotional side of digital transformation. Having the stakeholders lead this means every day they are helping set and adjust the priorities based on the technical realities being encountered by my team.. Follow the topics, people and companies that matter to you. AI for Good, says Westpac CIO, Pleasing Progress On Digital Strategy: Wesfarmers, The Key Drivers Behind Rising AI Investment in Australia, Woolworths Announces $700 million Technology Investment, The top Supply Chain Trends according to Gartner, Amazon Reimagines Retail With Amazon Dash Cart, Woolworths announces $700 million Technology Investment, Coles re-platforms digital channel and doubles online capacity. Deloitte US | Audit, Consulting, Advisory, and Tax Services Although there is no indication of any reduction in digital investments, any impact of COVID-19 outbreak and underpayment troubles on technology roadmap seems unlikely yet although Target remains a concern. While that isnt as dramatic as some of the gains seen in the American companies mentioned earlier, it is certainly still an impressive increase. He says the company rejected SAP and Oracle because these software systems are not only expensive to install but have to be customised to suit the business. Again, we've been fortunate enough that board members at all levels are actually enthused by that. This is more than just swapping analog processes for digital ones; it is about rearchitecting the organization and the digital operations to serve customers better. Blackwoods carries about 260,000 stock-keeping units (SKUs). In the rapidly evolving world of technology, staying compliant can be difficult, but with the appropriate tools, it's simple! Following an initial pilot in Tasmania (Bunnings is not rushing this after the UK debacle), click-and-collect will be rolled out in Victoria and then the rest of Australia. Wesfarmers OneDigital will complement these divisional capabilities, particularly through the benefits of the shared data platform and OnePass program. Click and Collect, an important bridge between click and brick, continues to be a growth element for the Wesfarmers companies. Read:From big data to AI - Where are we now, and what is the road forward? Strong performance in Bunnings, Officeworks and Kmart businesses overshadowed by underpayment and Target troubles. Testing RFID blocking cards: Do they work? How public utilities use analytics to improve interactions with customers, 6 ways data analytics are advancing the enterprise, Do Not Sell or Share My Personal Information. However, in FY20 Bunnings announced that would be outlaying $30 million on upgrading its online sales platform to enable click-and-collect. Chanticleer is Australia's pre-eminent business column. Let's look at five of the most exciting digital transformation trends shaping the future of business and how they can help your business grow in 2022. In this role you will be responsible for optimising data platform engineering and architecture, as well as designing and building data products. Through all of his work, Harvey says innovation and ideas have come both from within IT, as well as across the organisation. The digital revolution forced every organization to reinvent itself, or at least rethink how it goes about doing business. David Baxby, who runs the industrials division, says before the company set out to spend about $45 million to replace its 30-year-old legacy COBOL systems it looked at all the major ERP vendors. Announcing the half-year results, Managing Director Rob Scott said: pleasing progress continues on Wesfarmers digital strategy. Woolworths, Coles and other retailers have been focused on digital growth as a critical element of overall growth strategy. September 25, 2020 By Saibal Chakraborty , Tauseef Charanya , Romain de Laubier, and Akshaya Mahesh. Summary. Leadership is always an argument with the past, with tradition it is the essential task of leaders to create a bridge between the past and the future, and in that sense digital transformation is not an exception to the rule, but the name we give to todays bridge. OneData also provides data analytics support OnePass and Catch. At the moment, the cloud isnt really geared for that; its geared for quick and easy renting of capacity. Lydia joined WES corporate office in Business development and commercial. Harvey points out his own team takes a highly disciplined approach around capital and investment, knowing what benefit levers will be pulled and what will be delivered before they embark on any project. Where Harvey has placed his emphasis is on helping marketing to move from solving problems one by one, to building platforms people can use to solve problems at scale and more efficiently. Wesfarmers says COVID-19 disrupts H1 operations but bumps up online sales, Wesfarmers investment in digital assets pay off as online sales jump 57%, Kmart Group to shift its mainframe to the cloud, AWS skills training for 1,400 Kmart and Target employees, Do Not Sell or Share My Personal Information. We have a large number of our stores on assisted checkouts and are constantly growing new models of those checkouts, which allows us to offer new options to our customers. how Blockbuster missed their big opportunity. In support of this, recent research from IDC indicates that organizations which had begun an ERP cloud migration as part of a digital transformation initiative prior to the COVID-19 pandemic fared far better than organizations that didnt. Except this is not really the final step after you evaluate results, you need to go back to the data. Our diverse business operations cover: home improvement and outdoor living; apparel and general merchandise; office supplies;health, beauty and wellbeing; and an Industrials division with businesses in chemicals, energy and fertilisers, and industrial and safety products. Revealing the current impact is minor, Wesfarmers acknowledged it remains a dynamic situation that is progressing daily. While reporting for the data and digital division remains as part of corporate for FY22, the company said this will be separated from FY23. He describes his time at Coles in two chapters: The first as head of the Coles IT unit; and the second as a core business contributor. Head of engineering Gurnam Madan told the PagerDuty Summit 2022 that OneDigital had the benefit of being a brand new organisation. we equip you to harness the power of disruptive innovation, at work and at home. More specifically, Wesfarmers last year invested in the creation of an Advanced Analytics Center which uses purchasing and other customer data to calculate and calibrate the value of customer offers and loyalty programmes. To measure whether they are succeeding, the bank carefully analyzes their ability to increase customer retention in the core financial services business but more importantly, for the new businesses, measure number of daily/monthly average users, engagement, and cross-selling opportunities. Click and Collect, an important bridge between "click" and "brick", continues to be a growth element for the Wesfarmers companies. Trevor Collens. Catch will move from Kmart Group and join Wesfarmers OneDigital on 1 July 2022. ", Google Cloud, Golden State Warriors ink analytics, cloud partnership at new arena. Against that I always need to balance the right levels of robustness, security and location that means Im delivering the right outcomes for customers.. Wesfarmers OneDigital has set SaaS model standards for itself, supported by service standards, engineering practices and tools that together create a foundation for the nascent digital and data arm to grow. We work hard on ensuring we are one of the top participants working in-store, and we continue to get very high engagement scores.. On the back of its solid growth, Kmart continues investment in digital and technology. OnePass The OnePass program provides members with additional benefits and convenience when shopping with the Group's retail businesses. The next generation of phishing attacks could come with unexpected delivery AI for Good: Westpac joins collective of industry experts backing responsible Kmart lures former Amazon VP to lead Catch, Gartner Forecasts Australian Enterprise IT Spending to Grow 3.6% in 2021. Wesfarmers OneDigital will power the Groups data and digital growth ambitions and provide customers with a more seamless, rewarding and valuable omnichannel experience across the retail businesses. Although not an exciting story as the big banks digital initiatives, the overall outlook for business and digital investments is positive notwithstanding Target and underpayment troubles. These Experts Are Racing to Protect AI From Hackers. It does require time and technology but the benefits, measured by the central KPIs, are savings in time, money, and people to solve business problems and serve customers. Leaders put in charge of a digital transformation feel pulled in many different directions, with competing demands from IT, marketing, sales, and operations. As noted by customer experience expert Blake Morgan, when done strategically, digital transformation can improve stock prices and revenue in the long run. But to enable the instant payments demanded in todays market required rearchitecting the PayPals organization, merging once separate divisions for payments and compliance into one entity. Previously, these individuals would have been walking around with wads of paper constantly trying to refer documents that may or may not be up to date. Security is at the heart of how this whole thing works, and weve put that together with some of the structure weve put around MyColes, which means we are as confident as any CIO can be that we have a model thats extensible, reliable and secure, Harvey says. Digital transformation is not a destination; it's a permanent state of evolution. Like many things, its tempting to look for the conflict, but if you just focus on the win-win, the roles just naturally evolve themselves. As part of the change, Catch Managing Director Pete Sauerborn has decided to leave the business on 30 June 2022. "As a result of progress in recent years to develop deeper customer relationships, stronger digital engagement and expanded ranges of everyday products, the group's retail businesses are well-positioned to manage the transition as COVID-related restrictions are eased," the company said. What is needed is a shift in mindset, culture, and talent, including upskilling and reskilling your workforce so that they are future-ready. As the COVID-19 pandemic continues, executives are finding their companies' digital transformation more urgent than ever. Investment in divisional digital capabilities will continue and is expected to support enhancements to customer value propositions, expansion of addressable markets and delivery of operating efficiencies.". Below we outline the four pillars and how to invest properly to set yourself up for success. The first deputy CEO was in charge of this transformation and be built a team that contained individuals with strong innovation capabilities, which tested and built each new business. But for more mature digital companies, investment is still required to use advanced tools such as artificial intelligence. We run millions of transactions every day and its necessary for us to have the sorts of resilience that still naturally come out of two data centres hooked together by dark fibre. Then they will lead the change because you helped them see the opportunity.. Wesfarmers primary objective is to deliver satisfactory returns to shareholders through financial discipline and strong management of a diversified portfolio of businesses. This will provide benefits in the attraction and development of digital talent as well as logical synergies between the Groups shared data platform, advanced analytics team and subscription capabilities. Tweedie posed the ethical question of whether organisations are avoiding making assumptions on who the normal user is, emphasising that it is important to "[think] about who are the most vulnerable users and how could your project can affect them negatively". Also read: The top Supply Chain Trends according to Gartner, Also read: Coles re-platforms digital channel and doubles online capacity. This is why talent plays such a critical role in unlocking (or indeed blocking) your digital transformation. 1. Nobody is truly a leader if they are in charge and keep things as they are. Its problematic when companies decide to embark on a digital transformation agenda without having a clear definition, let alone vision, for what it means. The Catch acquisition has also improved digital expertise leading to better execution and innovation. With her strong business background, she has been instrumental in ensuring that. It is going to break. Although these failures have multiple causes, they are generally the result of underestimating the various steps or stages required to successfully execute a transformation agenda. Other current mobility projects are trialling a tablet ordering solution for produce, and a mobile-based picking solution for online. 2023 ZDNET, A Red Ventures company. Choosing and prioritising those assets is a two-way conversation. Growth momentum was maintained in the B2B segment while continuing a strategic focus to improve better customer experience and operational excellence. OneData, formerly the Advanced Analytics Centre, manages the Wesfarmers shared data asset, providing a single view of the customer and enabling the divisions to deliver a more compelling offer to customers. Learn howand get unstoppable. [You] might as well just break it yourself in a controlled environment and learn from it, and thats where PagerDuty plays a key role.. Our database provides customer insight and contextual information on which enterprise applications and software systems Wesfarmers (Bunnings Warehouse) is running and its propensity to invest more and deepen its relationship with SnapHire, SAP, UKG or identify new suppliers as part of their overall Digital and IT transformation projects to stay . The investments in data and digital transformation continue with an additional $10mn budget with the data and analytics initiatives enhancing productivity and inventory optimisation. View my verified achievement from Project Management Institute. "People's data is increasingly a part of their identity, so when they give you their data how do you treat it? To the degree that we have meaningful insights, a story, a notion of what may be going on and why, or a model, we will be able to test this model through a prediction. CIOs need to ensure they are business-first and commercially focused if they wish to remain key contributors to strategy and retain a seat at the executive table, Harvey claims. At Wesfarmers we believe sustainability is about understanding and managing the ways we impact the communities and environments in which we operate, to ensure that we continue to create value in the future. Wesfarmers is also accelerating its digital transformation efforts across other parts of the group. Yep, we're here again, Case study: Transurban uses automation to detect road incidents, Cover Story: The business of gaming will reshape marketing, technology. To address these needs, Wesfarmers Industrial and Safety has identified the need to be digitally ready as a priority and embarked on a Digital Transformation Journey with New Web Platforms. And other retailers have been focused on digital tools to interact and sell to customers transformation youre after. 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