A clear strategy, aligned vision and business agility are more critical than ever

The telecoms industry is under huge pressure to digitally transform. The need to lower costs, increase agility, find new revenue streams, and compete with digital natives has never been more pressing yet the industry continues to be resistant to change. Even those with the willingness to change, continue to move so at a glacial pace. The latest TM Forum Digital Transformation Tracker 4 (DTT4) which surveyed 142 CSPs from 77 different countries shows that very little has happened to CSP transformation programs since 2017 when we carried our first industry survey. Three years on, a third of operators have still not started their transformation programs, and most that have, are still in the very early stages. Only 22% of respondents stated that they were well along the road and reaping significant benefits.

Despite the lack of progress, CSPs continue to be optimistic about the state of their transformation, with 70% of our survey respondents either reasonably (48%) or very optimistic (22%) about their ability to carry out a successful transformation program. CSPs are certainly willing to change and have the ambition to do so, yet we need to urgently address the barriers which are either stopping transformation success, or certainly slowing it down.

The number one barrier to transformation continues to be the lack of clear, aligned vision and goals within the organisation (42%) followed by cultural and organisation issues (35%) and lack of top management support and the lack of available skills (32%). It is absolutely critical that CSPs have a clear plan on what they want to transform to and in what time frame; address what skills they need to enable that, and then show clear leadership and develop a roadmap which is shared with all employees.

The majority of the above barriers can be broadly expressed as cultural issues, as culture change must be supported from the top of the organization, while the lack of aligned vision and goals can be attributed to the wrong behaviours happening within an organisation. As part of DTT4, TM Forum again asked CSPs to describe their culture and again we see little change from the last survey. CSPs still see themselves as hierarchical, resistant to change and not very agile and diverse. To meet the challenges ahead and to successfully transform, the industry must adopt new ways of working, increase operational agility, roll out new technologies, become data driven, improve the customer experience and enter new lines of business. As the old adage goes, it is often “easier said than done.”

A great reference point and kick-starter for CSPs to measure and track how well they are doing in their digital transformation programs as well as formulate their strategy and identify gaps, is the TM Forum’s Digital Transformation Model (DMM). First launched in May 2017 and endorsed by leading CSPs and vendors, it has recently gone through a major revamp, with a 6

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data dimension added as well as updated criteria and questions. The DMM collaboration team have really embodied what true agility and agile working means and Covid-19 wasn’t enough to stop them working on the latest version of the model. Instead of meeting in Dresden, Germany last week, they held a week long video conference to finish the next release which will be available to all of our members to use from 5

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June 2020. This is exactly the type of agility and culture that we need to see from all CSPs to ensure they survive and thrive in the digital world. In addition to the new version release on the 5

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June 2020, we are also delighted to announce that Eamonn Mullally, Vodafone; Emmanuel A. Otchere, Huawei; Jonathan Hopkinson, Huawei; and Silvia Flachowsky and Lasse Degner from Detecon have been made TM Forum Certified DMM Associates, recognising the outstanding contribution they have made to the DMM and to the industry. More information on the DMM can be found at tmforum.org/dmm We look forward to sharing the updated model with the industry in June.