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World desk6 min

How Can Businesses Turn Digital Transformation Into Lasting Value?

Digital transformation changes how a business creates and delivers value. Learn how to set an outcome, build the needed capabilities and measure what lasts.
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Digital transformation is a sustained change in how a business operates and creates value, enabled by digital technology. It is not simply buying software or moving existing processes online: the aim is to improve a business outcome, then build the skills, systems and ways of working needed to sustain that improvement.

The OECD’s 2026 Going Digital Integrated Policy Framework offers a useful lens for planning that change. It treats technology adoption, innovation, workforce outcomes, inclusion and trust as connected concerns—not isolated IT projects.

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What digital transformation means for a business

McKinsey’s 2024 explainer defines digital transformation as “the rewiring of an organization, with the goal of creating value by continuously deploying tech at scale.” That is a business-oriented definition, not a universal formal standard. Its key idea is that technology matters when an organization uses it to change how it creates or delivers value.

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A company can install a new platform without transforming anything meaningful. Transformation involves decisions about the work itself: which customer or operational problem to solve, what should change in the process, who needs to do the work differently, and how the organization will know whether the change helped.

Possible benefits include more efficient operations, growth, innovation, improved services and new business models. They are opportunities, not guaranteed returns: the technology must fit the problem, be adopted in practice and be maintained over time.

Use the OECD’s 2026 framework as a planning lens

Published on 2 March 2026, the OECD Going Digital Integrated Policy Framework identifies seven interrelated dimensions. It is a policy framework rather than a company transformation scorecard, but its breadth helps businesses avoid treating technology deployment as the whole job.

  1. Access to communications infrastructure, services and data: establish that people and systems can reach the connectivity, services and information the work requires.
  2. Effective use of digital technologies and data: focus on whether tools and information are actually useful in day-to-day work, not just whether they have been purchased.
  3. Digital and data-driven innovation: consider whether technology can enable better products, services, processes or business models.
  4. Good jobs: account for how changes affect work, roles, skills and job quality.
  5. Social prosperity and inclusion: consider who can access and benefit from changed services, and who might be excluded.
  6. Trust in the digital age: address security, privacy, data governance and confidence in how digital systems are used.
  7. Market openness in digital business environments: recognize that a company’s options and constraints are also shaped by the wider market environment.

For an individual business, the dimensions are prompts to consider together. For example, a customer-facing digital service needs reliable infrastructure and well-governed data, but also accessible design, capable staff and a business model that can support the service after launch.

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How to start with a business outcome

Begin with a customer, product or operational domain where a specific problem matters. Avoid starting with a preferred technology and then searching for a use for it. The following sequence is practical implementation guidance synthesized from the OECD framework and business sources; it is not a prescription tested for every organization.

  1. Define the problem and intended result. State what should improve for customers, employees or the business. Make the objective concrete enough to evaluate, such as reducing a particular source of delay or making a service easier to complete.
  2. Record a baseline. Identify how the relevant process or service performs now, using measures that match the problem. Without a baseline, a later change cannot be meaningfully assessed.
  3. Assign accountable leadership. Give an executive owner responsibility for the business result, cross-functional decisions and resources—not only the technical delivery. McKinsey senior partner Rodney Zemmel put it this way in the 2024 explainer: “To succeed in a digital transformation, it needs to be a CEO agenda item.”
  4. Map what must change. Identify the process, data, technology, roles, skills, integrations and controls needed to reach the objective. Include operating and maintenance work, not just initial implementation.
  5. Test adoption and effects in the work itself. Check whether intended users can use the changed process and whether it performs as expected. Use feedback and observed results to make adjustments before extending it more widely.
  6. Scale only with a sustainment plan. Decide who will own the system and process, fund upkeep, address security issues and maintain the skills needed after rollout. Track whether the intended business result persists.

Measure business results and the capabilities behind them

Count launches and licenses when they help manage delivery, but do not treat them as evidence of value by themselves. The OECD’s 2019 measurement roadmap calls for indicators spanning digital technology and data, economic impacts, skills, trust and well-being. It remains a foundational measurement source, not a 2026 performance benchmark.

Pair a business measure with indicators that show whether the organization can deliver and sustain the change. The examples below are options to select according to the objective, not a universal scorecard.

What the initiative is meant to change Business-result measure Capability or risk indicator
Operational efficiency Time, cost, error rate or throughput for the targeted process Staff ability to use the new process; system availability and maintenance needs
Customer service Completion, response or resolution measures relevant to the service Accessibility, user feedback, data quality and service reliability
Growth or innovation Use a measure tied to the specific offer or business model, such as adoption or revenue where appropriate Ability to develop, operate and support the offer; relevant skills and data readiness
Trust and responsible use Use a business-relevant trust or service measure where one is available Security controls, privacy and data-governance practices, and processes for addressing incidents

Review results over time, including after the initial rollout. A single universal transformation score would hide differences in objectives, business contexts and risk. The cited sources do not establish a current authoritative success rate or guaranteed financial return for businesses generally.

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Build workforce, inclusion and trust into the plan

People and safeguards are part of the operating change. The OECD framework places good jobs, inclusion and trust alongside technology use and innovation, giving businesses a reason to plan for these matters at the outset rather than treating them as final checks.

  • Skills and roles: identify who needs training, what new responsibilities are created and where specialist support is needed. A tool that employees cannot confidently use will not deliver its intended benefit.
  • Workforce effects: assess how tasks, decision-making and job quality could change. Explain the purpose of the change and give affected teams a way to surface problems.
  • Accessibility and inclusion: consider whether employees and customers with different needs can use the changed process or service. Look for groups who could lose access when a familiar route is removed.
  • Security and data trust: decide what data the system needs, who may access it, how it will be protected and how the organization will respond to problems. Connect these controls to the actual process and data involved.
  • Ongoing ownership: allocate responsibility for updates, integration, support and maintenance. A system’s value depends on keeping it usable and appropriately governed after launch.

Scale the approach to the business, especially for SMEs

Smaller and medium-sized enterprises may have less staff time, fewer specialist skills and tighter capacity for maintenance than larger organizations. The OECD’s 2026 AI-focused publication on SMEs identifies efficiency and growth as common motivations for adopting digital tools, and time constraints, maintenance costs, skills gaps and cybersecurity concerns as possible barriers. Those findings concern SMEs and digital-tool adoption in an AI-focused publication; they should not be generalized to every business or every transformation project.

For an SME, a bounded initiative with a clearly owned problem may be more manageable than a broad organization-wide program. Before committing, estimate not only purchase and implementation effort but also staff time, training, integration, support, security and recurring upkeep. The appropriate scale is the one the business can operate and improve, not the largest deployment it can launch.

What the evidence does—and does not—show

The OECD’s 2026 investment framework describes automation, data-driven decision-making and new business models as ways digital adoption can support modernization in traditional sectors. These are mechanisms and opportunities, not a guarantee that any particular investment will pay off.

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A McKinsey article published in 2021 reported that technology capabilities, talent, leadership and resources were associated with better economic outcomes among survey respondents. That is historical survey evidence and an association, not causal proof or a current universal benchmark. It supports attention to organizational capability, but it cannot predict the result of a specific company’s project.

Accordingly, a sound business case should say what outcome is sought, what evidence will indicate progress, what capabilities and safeguards are required, and what ongoing costs the organization can support. It should not promise a standard return based on a headline success rate that the cited sources do not establish.

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