What it takes to be a digital leader

The current study "Digital Leader - Leadership in the Digital Age" by Crisp Research on behalf of Dimension Data shows that only a small minority of decision-makers in German companies can provide important impetus for the digital transformation and manage the necessary change process in the company.

For the study, 503 managing directors and IT and business decision-makers in companies in German-speaking countries were surveyed on digital leadership culture.

According to the survey, 71 percent of the decision-makers surveyed are "digital beginners" who lack both the technological skills and the corresponding mindset to drive forward the transformation in their own company.

Around one in five are on the right track and have either the necessary skills and knowledge ("digital skills") or the digital-first mindset ("digital mindset").

"The study clearly shows that employees in key positions in Germany, Austria and Switzerland are not yet sufficiently equipped for the digital transformation"

says Sven Heinsen, CEO of Dimension Data Germany.

"Only a small minority have the skills of a digital leader who sees digitalization as an opportunity, strategically tackles new digital business models and critically examines existing IT solutions in terms of their value contribution to their own company.

But this is exactly what companies need in order to initiate innovations and realize competitive advantages that enable a consistent digital transformation."

A generational issue

These results are in stark contrast to the self-assessment of decision-makers: almost 40 percent see themselves as digital leaders and a full 60 percent rate their digital skills as strong or very strong.

The study also shows that successfully shaping the digital transformation in companies is a generational issue. The proportion of those who are convinced that digitalization will have a very strong effect on their own company is almost twice as high among the under-40s as among the older generation.

A similar effect can be seen with the average age in the company: The higher this is, the lower the influence of digital transformation is considered to be. A total of 50% of decision-makers are convinced that their company will not be affected by digitalization at all or only slightly.

Apparently, the decision-making level is also not linked to the digitalization strategy and management in more than one in five companies: 22 percent of respondents stated that they were not involved in a single digitalization project.

Those who are working on building next-generation IT have the restructuring or cloudification of IT infrastructure and IT security at the top of their agenda; this is currently being implemented in 39% of companies.

"At the same time, however, it is surprising that digital transformation projects have only reached strategic or board level in just under a fifth of companies"

comments Heinsen.

"By adopting the outdated view that the IT department alone is responsible for digital issues, managers are missing the opportunity to actively shape change and drive it forward decisively"

adds Heinsen.

"This harbors the risk that the solutions are not tailored to the business strategy and that the high investments in new technologies do not pay off."