Learnings from Digital Transformation...

‘Implementing a mobile-first strategy’

There are several objectives for an organization to embark on a mobile first strategy: Improve User experience, collaboration, employee engagement, real-time information etc. The ultimate goal for all these objectives is to improve productivity of the organization.

Moreover, the eco-system to pursue a mobile first strategy is near perfect in several areas. The enterprise software vendors like Oracle, SAP, and IBM are building applications or revamping their existing product lines to be social, mobile, analytical, and cloud based. On the other hand, the usage of smart devices such as iPads and Tablets has been on the rise.
The changes in eco-system coupled with productivity gains prompt the C-Suite executives to develop mobile-first strategy.

 ‘Challenges in implementing a mobile first strategy’

Product Maturity: Most technological products go through the following five-stages: ‘Concept’, ‘Prototype’, ‘Minimum Viable Product (MVP)’, ‘Final Product’, and ‘Commodity’.  Thinking of these stages as a continuum, we believe that digital products for ‘mobile-first’ strategy are positioned between MVP and a final product, but closer to the latter. For an organization building a ‘mobile-first’ strategy, it is important to recognize that the products/solutions may not be fully-mature to meet their business processes. A detailed study of the product features is required before initiating a project.

Data Migration: Migration from old legacy platforms to a mobile first platform is not an easy task either. The migration strategy should also be developed in concurrence with the design. Recently, we implemented a mobile-first solution for a global Pharma client. The originial solution was developed without taking into account the data mapping and migration challenges. Once the application was developed, we ran a proof of concept which revealed several shortcomings in the application design and framework.

We assisted the client in developing the data mapping and migration strategy, and a rollout plan by working around these challenges. If these migration challenges and product features had been analyzed before the start of project, the client could have met the project timeline and saved millions in development and implementation cost.
‘Key aspects to consider’

Ensure mobile-first strategy is aligned with IT strategy: Typically, IT organizations separate applications and infrastructure in different tiers/layers. E.g. Customer facing solutions vs. internal applications. The performance and the governance model for these tiers/layers may be different. It is critical to ensure that the mobile solutions that you develop takes into account the performance and governance model of the layer where you will deploy these mobile applications. Otherwise, the business outcome that you expect from the mobile application will be different from what is expected.

Develop a migration strategy in advance: Some applications may require legacy contents to be migrated to the new platform. When developing the solution, always take into account the data mapping and migration issues that you may encounter. If possible, keep testing the product on an incremental basis to ensure that migration works as expected. The migration may cost the firm millions if the data mapping and migration is not properly developed.

Change Management: So much has been said about change management over the years – but still not enough. The mobile-first strategy implies news ways of working and new behaviors. For global organizations, this can be of significant challenge as the demographic profile of their workforce can be vastly different. To align the vastly different workforce, it is imperative to embed change management at the core of the implementation.
‘Short-Run/Long-Run’

From an economic standpoint, implementing a mobile first solution will prove to be a short-run competitive advantage for the organizations. If the organizations can implement the right mobile-first solutions, they can gain short-term productivity gains as opposed to organizations without such solutions. In the long-run though, mobile-first will become a norm and productivity gains vis-à-vis a competitor may be marginal to zilch.

In conclusion, Implementing a mobile-first solution is the right approach both for short-run and long-run, but it should be implemented in the right way.

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