Week 1
New vs. Traditional ways of working
Define the four activities of managers in the traditional approach to work – managers expected to:
● Plan ahead: Need to know what the objectives are for next week or next quarter
● Select and organize people: Need to identify the people they need to organize a put
together team that can actually accomplish these goals.
● Command and drive employees: About checking in and making sure that you’re fulfilling
the objectives. Working your way down the checklist to make sure that you’re fulfilling all
of the requirements expected by the organization
● Coordinate and control activities: Need someone who has that perspective to give an
overview of all different people and tasks. And make sure that they’re accomplished.
- Fredrick Taylor: Founder of management. Took an engineering approach towards
management and believed there was only 1 right way to do it.
Explain the three questions under the new approach to work and how they apply to work
● Focus on leadership:
○ Where are we going?
■ Look even further down the road + providing a roadmap, anticipate
changes, Point the direction + provide a vision which can include
milestones, tasks, values. Having long-sighted vision.
○ Why are we going there?
■ Focus beyond tasks – more on vision and change
○ How are we going to get there?
■ Communication is key! Leaders accompany followers through change.
Guiding employees step by step through a changing environment. Need to
be clear and concise and precise. Message needs to be understood by
employees.
What is digitalization?
Define Digitalization
○ The move from analog, traditional approaches established in the industrial age to
creative, digital and technology-based approaches
○ Digital technology is used to replace humans in doing monotonous, repetitive tasks
but also it includes a complete change in creative adaptation to the way that tasks
are completed at all.
1
,Name the three places where we see digitalization
● Organizational level
○ High digitalization creates a culture of innovation, exğerimentation and updating
value proposition, and being process orientated instead of outcome orientated.
This fits a highly changing environment. Organizations need to create a culture that
supports digitalization. This poses two challenges:
■ Attitudes towards innovation – does the organization have more of a
culture of experimenting or is it more of a culture of “if it’s working for us
now it should continue to work in the future”. Innovative, experimental and
learning oriented approaches to these problems to staying competitive can
open up digitalization opportunities. It also increases the potential for
successful implementation.
■ Investing considerable time into the process –we can’t predict exactly
what’s going to happen. Especially in a changing environment the only
constant is needing to adjust. When we have a flexible and thorough
process we can make adjustments along the way much easier. “Agile
organization culture” which refers to a focus on the systems or process.
Behind the way things are done or the way that decisions are made when
the processes are well coordinated then the teams can operate largely
independently. Leaders then are free to focus on removing roadblocks and
facilitating the teams in achieving their goals.
● Dyadic and group level (2-person, team level)
○ A large portion of the work is being completed in geographically dispersed teams of
people who need to work closely together and coordinate with each other. But
they’re physically separated. video calls or emails. Digitalization means that we rely
heavily on digital technologies to enable teamwork with people we may never even
meet in person. Biggest challenge is creating trust amongst team members with a
relatively limited amount of live interaction.
● Individual employee level
○ High digitalization creates increased self-leadership, difficulties with managing
boundaries with technology and work/private separation. Additionally
digitalization creates opportunities for continuous learning: how to improve skills,
keep up with innovation etc.
2
, ○ 2 challenges for the digitalization
■ To separate work from private life. Or integrate it. It’s about creating rules,
practices or philosophies for yourself about the role work will play in your
life.
■ Higher need of self leadership. You need to take a great deal of
responsibility for yourself. How and when you complete your tasks, asking
for help when you need it, being fully online means you won’t have a
manager or leader stopping by your desk to check in. You as an employee
need to create those types of interactions.
Digital transformation and digital maturity
List the four factors that signal that firms are digitally mature
● Communicate a clear, coherent digital strategy that is aligned with the overall
organizational strategy.
○ They talked and articulated a strategy around digitalization or how they’re going to
incorporate digital technologies.
● Focus on the long-term
○ Anticipating innovation and new technologies are coming. This makes it more likely
for firms to successfully adopt new technologies as they emerge.
● Experiment and explore
○ Create a flexible culture that allows experimenting and exploring. There needs to
be an orientation or culture focused on experimentation and exploitation,
exploration. This means avoiding being static, not always doing what has worked
for us. Actually consistently looking for new ways to do things. Collecting results
and using those for next steps.
● Invest in continuous learning and retaining talent
○ Investing in the right people. Hiring the right people, training them and keeping
them. It helps organizations to stay digitally mature. It provides opportunities for
continuous learning, development. E.g. companies provide funds, trainings. To have
a competitive edge in their social capital.
Name the four key areas for digital transformation/Factors driving the need for digital transformation
- Emerging digital technologies: As new technologies become available firms are pushed to
integrate these technologies to stay competitive and innovative.
3
New vs. Traditional ways of working
Define the four activities of managers in the traditional approach to work – managers expected to:
● Plan ahead: Need to know what the objectives are for next week or next quarter
● Select and organize people: Need to identify the people they need to organize a put
together team that can actually accomplish these goals.
● Command and drive employees: About checking in and making sure that you’re fulfilling
the objectives. Working your way down the checklist to make sure that you’re fulfilling all
of the requirements expected by the organization
● Coordinate and control activities: Need someone who has that perspective to give an
overview of all different people and tasks. And make sure that they’re accomplished.
- Fredrick Taylor: Founder of management. Took an engineering approach towards
management and believed there was only 1 right way to do it.
Explain the three questions under the new approach to work and how they apply to work
● Focus on leadership:
○ Where are we going?
■ Look even further down the road + providing a roadmap, anticipate
changes, Point the direction + provide a vision which can include
milestones, tasks, values. Having long-sighted vision.
○ Why are we going there?
■ Focus beyond tasks – more on vision and change
○ How are we going to get there?
■ Communication is key! Leaders accompany followers through change.
Guiding employees step by step through a changing environment. Need to
be clear and concise and precise. Message needs to be understood by
employees.
What is digitalization?
Define Digitalization
○ The move from analog, traditional approaches established in the industrial age to
creative, digital and technology-based approaches
○ Digital technology is used to replace humans in doing monotonous, repetitive tasks
but also it includes a complete change in creative adaptation to the way that tasks
are completed at all.
1
,Name the three places where we see digitalization
● Organizational level
○ High digitalization creates a culture of innovation, exğerimentation and updating
value proposition, and being process orientated instead of outcome orientated.
This fits a highly changing environment. Organizations need to create a culture that
supports digitalization. This poses two challenges:
■ Attitudes towards innovation – does the organization have more of a
culture of experimenting or is it more of a culture of “if it’s working for us
now it should continue to work in the future”. Innovative, experimental and
learning oriented approaches to these problems to staying competitive can
open up digitalization opportunities. It also increases the potential for
successful implementation.
■ Investing considerable time into the process –we can’t predict exactly
what’s going to happen. Especially in a changing environment the only
constant is needing to adjust. When we have a flexible and thorough
process we can make adjustments along the way much easier. “Agile
organization culture” which refers to a focus on the systems or process.
Behind the way things are done or the way that decisions are made when
the processes are well coordinated then the teams can operate largely
independently. Leaders then are free to focus on removing roadblocks and
facilitating the teams in achieving their goals.
● Dyadic and group level (2-person, team level)
○ A large portion of the work is being completed in geographically dispersed teams of
people who need to work closely together and coordinate with each other. But
they’re physically separated. video calls or emails. Digitalization means that we rely
heavily on digital technologies to enable teamwork with people we may never even
meet in person. Biggest challenge is creating trust amongst team members with a
relatively limited amount of live interaction.
● Individual employee level
○ High digitalization creates increased self-leadership, difficulties with managing
boundaries with technology and work/private separation. Additionally
digitalization creates opportunities for continuous learning: how to improve skills,
keep up with innovation etc.
2
, ○ 2 challenges for the digitalization
■ To separate work from private life. Or integrate it. It’s about creating rules,
practices or philosophies for yourself about the role work will play in your
life.
■ Higher need of self leadership. You need to take a great deal of
responsibility for yourself. How and when you complete your tasks, asking
for help when you need it, being fully online means you won’t have a
manager or leader stopping by your desk to check in. You as an employee
need to create those types of interactions.
Digital transformation and digital maturity
List the four factors that signal that firms are digitally mature
● Communicate a clear, coherent digital strategy that is aligned with the overall
organizational strategy.
○ They talked and articulated a strategy around digitalization or how they’re going to
incorporate digital technologies.
● Focus on the long-term
○ Anticipating innovation and new technologies are coming. This makes it more likely
for firms to successfully adopt new technologies as they emerge.
● Experiment and explore
○ Create a flexible culture that allows experimenting and exploring. There needs to
be an orientation or culture focused on experimentation and exploitation,
exploration. This means avoiding being static, not always doing what has worked
for us. Actually consistently looking for new ways to do things. Collecting results
and using those for next steps.
● Invest in continuous learning and retaining talent
○ Investing in the right people. Hiring the right people, training them and keeping
them. It helps organizations to stay digitally mature. It provides opportunities for
continuous learning, development. E.g. companies provide funds, trainings. To have
a competitive edge in their social capital.
Name the four key areas for digital transformation/Factors driving the need for digital transformation
- Emerging digital technologies: As new technologies become available firms are pushed to
integrate these technologies to stay competitive and innovative.
3
