Key information

Duration: 5 days (on-campus)
Programme dates:

17 -
18 -
24 -
23 -
Fees: £5,950

Programme Overview

In this intensive five-day Digital Transformation Strategy course you will gain the skills to develop and implement a digital strategy within your organisation. Drawing on insights from Imperial College Business School faculty, industry leaders, case studies, and your peers, you will develop a robust understanding of digital cultures, foundations, and frameworks to craft your own transformational strategy.

Participants will undertake a personalised learning experience where they develop their own digital transformation strategies, with coaching from experienced academic and industry leaders throughout their journey. A network of experienced and international programme peers will assist you in crafting and stress-testing your strategy.

The training programme concludes with a scenario where participants pitch their digital transformation strategies to their peers. They will leave with practical feedback and insights, and a completed plan to implement a digital transformation strategy within their organization. 

Explore how Artificial Intelligence, ChatGPT, Web 3.0 et al. are a catalyst for digital transformation

You will explore how emerging technology is a catalyst for digital transformation, including Artificial intelligence (including ChatGPT and AutoGPT), Data Science, Web 3.0 (including blockchain and NFTs), and topics like crowdsourcing and Decentralised Autonomous Organisations (ADOs). As well as understanding the technologies, you will try a range of tools hands-on to see how they can be applied in practice.   

Who should attend? 

This course is designed to equip mid to senior-level executives with insights and practical skills to develop their own digital transformation strategies. The diverse programme cohort will include participants from a range of countries, job functions and industries.

Learning Objectives

  • Develop a robust understanding of digital transformation

  • Build a solid understanding of the key challenges that can help and hinder a successful digital transformation strategy

  • Develop a digital transformation strategy that can be taken away and implemented

  • Stress test your strategy with industry experts and a network of experienced peers

Learning Journey

Welcome - David Brown and Daniel Rowles

Digital Transformation in perspective: Why you need a digital culture
Daniel Rowles, Programme Director

This part of the programme walks you through the range of factors that have lead us to the fast changing environment we find ourselves in. It explores the technology behind the change and in turn explains what this means for our organisations. As well as helping us understand the present, this section also prepares us for a future in which the pace of change will increase, and in which organisations will not survive unless they are prepared for constant change.

·       The increasing pace of change

·       The technology catalyst

·       New channels, tools and business models

·       Why organisations really fail at digital

·       Research Insights from CMI book of the year “Building Digital Culture”

Plotting your digital journey
Daniel Rowles, Programme Director

In this part of the training programme, we then start to build the steps we must go through to achieve our journey to implementing an effective digital transformation. As well as talking through some of the practical steps that we need to take along the way, the section takes a look at a number of examples from organisation that have already gone through the journey and successfully implemented their digital transformation.

·       Digital is dead – What ‘being digital’ means for your business

·       Auditing your strengths and weaknesses

·       Building your plan: goals and objectives

·       How to do it and who’ll you’ll need with you

·       Your strategic approach

·       The Digital Transformation Strategy framework and toolkit

 

5 Game-Changing Technologies for Business explores the game-changing technologies that are driving digital transformation across organisations and industries and enables you to develop your own strategy to put them to work in your business.
Chris Tucci, Professor of Digital Strategy and Innovation 

•    The Cloud and Mobile
•    The Internet of Things
•    Big Data Analytics
•    Automation and Artificial Intelligence (Chat GPT)
•    FinTech and Blockchain

Digital transformation strategy planning session
Daniel Rowles, Programme Director

Each day you will bring together the building blocks of your digital transformation strategy, culminating in your strategy presentations on the final day of the programme.  

Networking Drinks

Welcome - Day 2

Lessons from industry
Alistair Welham, Director of Marketing and Communications at NOW: Pensions

Alistair Welham explores his extensive implementing digital transformations across a wide range of industries. Alistair will introduce his step by step framework for implementing digital transformations effectively, that can then be used to start building your own digital transformations strategy.

Ethical Leadership in Digital Transformation
Celia More, Professor of Organisational Behaviour

The question of leadership – and of how well our current leaders are doing – feels like a particularly salient issue right now. Climate change, Brexit, Covid 19, the war in Ukraine and the economy have all amplified social tensions and divisions in society. As a result, we have seen more calls for “strong leadership” although what it is meant by that can vary dramatically from person to person. Of course, leadership affects all our lives in different ways – not only on a national scale but also at work. Professor Moore’s academic work is driven by a desire to make a difference in how people treat each other in the workplace after working for a “psychopathic boss” who sparked in her an intellectual fascination with “why snakes get ahead”.

The Role of Data in Driving Change
Daniel Rowles, Programme Director

This session explores the role of data science and the importance of data visualisation. Delivered in a highly innovative and hands-on way, the session helps people know not only when they are looking at patterns in data that matter, but also how to put across their findings in a way that moves people. These data visualisations can then be used to drive forward any digital transformation and gain stakeholder buy-in.

  • Data science in perspective
  • Data visualisation in digital transformation
  • Data science and AI tools hands-on
  • Ethics in data science and artificial intelligence
  • The data and AI opportunity

Digital transformation strategy planning session
Daniel Rowles, Programme Director

Each day you will bring together the building blocks of your digital transformation strategy, culminating in your strategy presentations on the final day of the programme.  

Welcome - Day 3

The Digital Transformation Framework
Daniel Rowles, Programme Director

This part of the programme gives you a structured framework of all of the things you’ll need to consider to build an organisation that is operating in a constantly changing environment. The section works as both the core building blocks of your strategy, but also as a reference and guide that you re-visit as you take on the particular challenges involved. Throughout this section over three days you will build your digital transformation strategy plan and constantly test it against industry best practice and learn from the success and failure of other organisations.

The Digital Transformation Framework: Foundations
Daniel Rowles, Programme Director

The Foundations section will help you understand and explore the core things that need to be in place for a successful digital transformation and build the central parts of your digital transformation strategy. This section will help you clarify the key objective and vision you will need for your digital transformation and how gaining and keeping leadership buy-in throughout the process is key to success. You’ll learn the techniques and methods to create an agile organisation, including agile working methodologies and organisational structure and design. You’ll go on to look at environmental analysis tools and frameworks to understand the environment we are operating in, and build an understanding of the central role of skills and talent throughout the organisation.

·       Definition and Vision

·       Leadership

·       Agility

·       Environment

·       Skills and talent

The Digital Transformation Framework: Readiness
Daniel Rowles, Programme Director

In the readiness section you’ll learn about the technologies, techniques and processes that can make or break your digital transformation. As well as learning from industry experts, you’ll also have the opportunity to explore Imperial Colleges world leading research into topics like Organisational Architecture, Artificial Intelligence, Cybersecurity and Blockchain. You’ll use this knowledge to build you digital transformation strategy and understand the risks and opportunities each of these technologies provide. You’ll also explore the internal processes, structure and working practices that are often at the heart of digital transformation failures, and you’ll learn from both success and failure case studies so we can avoid these pitfalls.

·       Strategic Positioning

·       Translation and communication

·       Technology

·       Process and governance

·       Structure

·       Connections

Digital transformation strategy planning session
Daniel Rowles, Programme Director

Each day you will bring together the building blocks of your digital transformation strategy, culminating in your strategy presentations on the final day of the programme.  

Welcome - Day 4

The Digital Transformation Framework: Performance
Daniel Rowles, Programme Director

The Performance section of the programme will deep dive into measuring the success of our digital transformation strategy, help us build measurement frameworks for iterative improving and look at how measuring ROI is key to digital transformation success. You’ll learn how to tie digital measurement techniques to your organisations financial success, and in turn how this can help build a culture of innovation and internal entrepreneurship.

·       Measurement

·       Innovation and entrepreneurship

·       Financial

 

The Digital Transformation Framework: Keeping up with change
Daniel Rowles, Programme Director 

In this part of the programme we look at what happens once you’ve been through the process. We explore the techniques and approaches that will prevent you from lapsing back into previous approaches and how you can filter the ongoing change to work out what’s important and what’s not. Most importantly section chapter will explore how other organisations have dealt with the most common pitfalls and problems, so we can avoid the same challenges.

·       Keeping measurement at the core

·       Separating the ephemeral from the enduring

·       Distributed development (sharing the load)

·       Internal entrepreneurship and collaborative innovation

·       Who to follow and what to watch

Building the Agile Business: How to Lead Digital Transformation in Your Workplace
Peter Abraham, Author and Digital Transformation Practitioner

In this section, Peter Abraham, explores and range of case studies and examples from his wide ranging experience of implementing digital transformations across a huge range of industries and sectors. Exploring topics like measurement, people and organisational structure, you’ll learn a range of techniques and insights that you can apply to your own digital transformation strategy plans.

Digital transformation strategy planning session
Daniel Rowles, Programme Director

Each day you will bring together the building blocks of your digital transformation strategy, culminating in your strategy presentations on the final day of the programme.  

Welcome - Day 5

Digital Transformation Case Study Exploration
Daniel Rowles, Programme Director

You’ll explore an in-depth industry case study of a successful digital transformation and learn what made the transformation successful, so you can apply these learnings to your own plans.

Digital Transformation Strategy Development and Coaching
Daniel Rowles, Programme Director

You’ll now have time to work in groups and with an industry expert to build out your digital transformation strategy plans and start to refine and add detail. You’ll also carry out a series of ’stress tests’ on your strategies to see how they might perform as they are implemented and you’ll do a series of practice pitches in preparation for your final day presentations.

Transformation Strategy Presentations
In the final section of the programme you will pitch your Digital Transformation strategy to your peers for practical feedback and insights.

Transformation Strategy Refinement and Completion
Daniel Rowles, Programme Director

Complete your strategy with the feedback gained and reflect on your learning over the 5 days. Leave with a completed Digital Transformation Strategy plan and guidance documents on how to implement it.

You can then submit a refined version of your strategy in video format within 2 weeks of the programme to gain valuable industry expert feedback.

Programme Faculty and Experts

Daniel Rowles

Daniel Rowles

Daniel Rowles is a Lecturer at Imperial College Business School, CEO of TargetInternet.com, and Programme Director of the Imperial Digital Transformation Strategy Programme. Daniel has been working in Digital Marketing and Digital Transformation for the past 25 years, with extensive experience working both client-side and within the agency environment. He is also a Course Director for the CIM, an award-winning author for publisher Kogan Page and host of the Digital Marketing Podcast, a global top 20 business podcast.

Celia Moore

Celia Moore

Celia Moore is Professor of Organisational Behaviour and Director of the Centre for Responsible Leadership at Imperial College Business School. Prior to joining Imperial, she held positions at Bocconi University in Milan and London Business School, where she was on the faculty for nine years. She has also been a visiting scholar at Harvard Business School and a Fellow of the Edmond J. Safra Center for Ethics at Harvard University. She is currently an Academic Fellow of the Ethics and Compliance Initiative and sits on the UK’s Banking Standards Board Assessment Steering Committee. 

Chris Tucci

Chris Tucci

Professor Tucci received the degrees of Ph.D. in Management from the Sloan School of Management, MIT; SM (Technology & Policy) from MIT; and BS (Mathematical Sciences), AB (Music), and MS (Computer Science) from Stanford University. He was an industrial computer scientist involved in developing Internet protocols and applying artificial intelligence tools.

Professor Tucci's primary area of interest is in how firms make transitions to new business models, technologies, and organisational forms. He also studies crowdsourcing, Internetworking, and digital innovations.

Alistair Welham

Alistair Welham 

Director of Marketing and Communications at NOW: Pensions

His career began in financial services with Bristol & West Building Society, before moving on to become Hamptons Marketing Director. Switching sectors to lead the nationwide expansion of the CarLand car supermarket chain and then the launch of Mercedes-Benz Direct. Returning to financial services in 2005 he brought Derbyshire, Cheshire and Dunfermline Building Societies together with Nationwide Building Society, then moved on to launch Virgin Money in 2011 and grow the Elevate platform for AXA Wealth.

Peter Abraham

Peter Abraham

Peter has 20+ years ‘digital’ experience in Digital Marketing & Digital Transformation, another 15 years prior in creative agency industry - very good understanding of digital and commerce.

Participant Testimonials

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Key information

Duration: 5 days (on-campus)
Programme dates:

17 -
18 -
24 -
23 -
Fees: £5,950

Contact us

Get in touch

Asmik Magakian

Asmik Magakian

Business Development Executive

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