Michael Wade interviews Hamilton Mann, a top executive at European defense group Thales....
At the 2008 Beijing Olympics, the US menâs 4x100m relay team was poised for victory in their qualifying heat. Darvis Patton blazed through the third leg, leading the pack, with Tyson Gayâs outstretched hand ready to receive the baton. But in a heart-stopping moment, the baton slipped through their fingers â a fumble that dashed their dreams and led to a shock elimination.
Just as a team will only win the relay if they are able to pass the baton smoothly, the success of a transformation depends on breaking down silos and fostering collaboration across departments to truly reap the benefits of scale, says Hamilton Mann, VP Digital Marketing and Digital Transformation at French aerospace, defense, and cybersecurity company Thales.
âYou know that if you run a great race, but you donât manage to pass the baton very well, you fail. Not in your own race â you may have a great time â but overall, the company is going to fail.â
So, how do you create the conditions that break down the silos and enable your organization to capture the value of digital tools?
Mann believes a key enabler is setting challenging objectives for departments. Crucially, it should not be possible to achieve these objectives alone; they must overlap with other departments or be contradictory enough in nature that teams must collaborate by sharing talent or resources to address the conflict.
For example, many organizations want to grow their revenues while keeping a lid on costs. At first, this objective might seem contradictory since growing the topline often involves burning through resources. In this case, collaboration between departments isnât just optional or beneficial; it becomes essential for achieving the overall goal, says Mann.
Secondly, objectives should âoverlapâ with other departments. Simply put, they should encompass tasks that go beyond the definition of core activities. A third key ingredient, says Mann, is giving individual departments ownership of company-wide objectives to create âa common destiny.â
How does this work in practice? Mann cites the example of Thalesâ âdigital sellerâ initiative, which aimed to examine the way the company interacted with customers and reimagine operational excellence. The result was its âContentFlixâ platform, which was established with the aim of creating a one-stop shop for the sales team for any material they might need from across the business for sales pitches and client meetings.
Giving responsibility and ownership to specific people across the organization for driving, maintaining, and updating the digital platform was a crucial part of its success, says Mann, because it empowered them to make decisions on everything from design and maintenance to governance. âAnd this comes in addition to their day-to-day work. And this allows us to create one team, one Thales, as we call it.â
At first, there was some reluctance. The sales department noted they didnât usually create content, while the marketing department, used to working with agencies, was perplexed about what the sales team could contribute.
Taking the example of marketing and sales, Mann recognized that the departments werenât working together as effectively as they could. To break these silos, he gave them both the objective of working out which content they needed to produce to support sales.
At first, there was some reluctance. The sales department noted they didnât usually create content, while the marketing department, used to working with agencies, was perplexed about what the sales team could contribute. Yet, given that sales use the marketing material to engage with prospective customers, Mann noted they could provide feedback on which content helps with their pitches and presentations.
âAnd so, we set that objective to the sales family, saying, âThis is not implicit; this is not a nice-to-have. It has to be a must-have if you guys want to be in front of your prospect and customer and always be reassured that the content you have in your bag will be relevant,â says Mann.
For the marketing team, the objective gave them an opportunity to identify proof points that would help them validate whether their content was setting the sales team up for success.
Pushing these departments outside of their traditional comfort zones helped create âa form of disequilibrium,â enabling them to transform the organization in a way that they couldnât if everyone was acting in an autonomous way, explains Mann. âSo as a digital role, you’re stepping in between marketing and sales in a way and connecting them with digital technologies that can enable them both to do more things.â
A lesson Thales has learned when it comes to deploying AI is that it is tempting to invest your resources in something that is technically feasible and brings the biggest potential benefits.
Turning to the topic of generative AI and the potential of new tools to revolutionize the way we work, Mann cautioned against being swept away by the hype. While AI might perform well on certain tasks, it is not capable of replicating the whole gamut of skills that humans bring to their roles, he says. These include âgood humor, motivation, and a form of trust and understanding between peopleâ that form the pillars of organizational success.
âWe all have experienced the situation working with someone, and then that person goes to another job, and we start to figure out that, âWow, that person was so critical beyond what we were seeing so far,â because they had that kind of a link with the people, having that form of ability to [âŚ] make the collaboration happen.â
Furthermore, GenAIâs tendency to make mistakes means it still requires human experts to control and check its output. Companies need to understand the limits of these tools and carefully consider how GenAI can enhance what they already do without disrupting what they currently do well, says Mann.
A lesson Thales has learned when it comes to deploying AI is that it is tempting to invest your resources in something that is technically feasible and brings the biggest potential benefits. But in doing so, you risk overlooking âthe human in that equationâ and whether your organizationâs processes can adapt to deliver the result you want.
As such, the adoption of GenAI is providing an opportunity for Thales to assess what they mean by operational excellence, work out where they perform well, and figure out the areas they should prioritize to further enhance performance, Mann says.
After all, in the relay race of organizational transformation, you donât want GenAI to become something that inadvertently trips up your teams.
All views expressed herein are those of the author and have been specifically developed and published in accordance with the principles of academic freedom. As such, such views are not necessarily held or endorsed by TONOMUS or its affiliates.
Cristina Carvajal, President of one of Latin Americaâs most respected family enterprises, discusses the benefits of having a family member as the CEO of the family business. ...
25 October 2024 ⢠by Didier Bonnet in The Interview ⢠6 min read
Legendary football referee Pierluigi Collina is interviewed by IMD's Didier Bonnet....
YouTube8 October 2024 ⢠by Didier Bonnet, Brian Eno in The Interview ⢠9 min read
Brian Eno talks to IMD's Didier Bonnet about how to unleash the most unexpected innovations....
YouTube
Audio availableChief Commercial Officer Jan Huckfeldt talks to StĂŠphane JG Girod about why organizations need to take urgent action to reduce and remove carbon emissions....
YouTubeExplore first person business intelligence from top minds curated for a global executive audience
Share