Accenture Finds Science & AI Double Transformation Success
Accenture’s latest report has found 96% of global organisations plan to invest more than 5% of their revenue in change initiatives in the next three years.
Meanwhile, research also indicates that only a small proportion of companies have mastered the ability to achieve value from these change initiatives.
Digitisation, automation, AI and technological advancements are shifting the way in which big businesses are working. The pressure to keep up and remain competitive is on, now more than ever.
The potential for disruption is also at a high, meaning the ability to navigate change must become a priority for industry leaders, including procurement professionals.
Accentures ‘Change Reinvented: A New Blueprint for Continuous, Meaningful, Successful Change’ report emphasises this.
Accenture, a global professional services firm with 750,000 employees in over 120 countries, leverages technology to help organisations transform, optimise operations and drive growth through innovation and strong ecosystem relationships.
Its latest report uses economic modelling, data science and global surveys to examine macro trends in organisational change, alongside experimental and ethnographic techniques to understand change dynamics.
It gathered data from over 1,000 C-suite executives and 5,000 workers across 17 countries and 14 industries.
The resulting research suggests there is a critical gap between confidence and ambition, with only 30% of C-suite leaders identifying as confident in their change capabilities, despite 100% of them anticipating changes to their workforce.
What drives change?
According to the report, the key to navigating change successfully lies in embracing six capabilities of continuous change.
These capabilities include foundations, proven practices known to drive success, and innovations, areas of new thinking and practice enabled by technology, data and AI that are focused on turning insights into action.
- Linking change to purpose and using 2-way communication to encourage engagement and commitment.
- Clearly defining value and expectations, while aligning investment to these goals.
- Creating new experiences to inspire people and create a positive environment for continuous learning and improvement.
- Personalising change using behavioural science and AI to discover and promote the things that truly shift behaviour.
- Using data to drive insights and better understand the impact across the business so leaders can adapt their approach to change as needed.
- Growing networks of influencers from both internal and external sources, with trusted, authentic voices helping to activate change.
These capabilities form the foundation of Accenture’s Change Capability Quotient, a method that codifies the practice of continuous change and uses data to predict the likelihood of successful change efforts.
The report found those that scored highly against this quotient are 2.1x more likely to report successful transformations.
However, only 16% of the 1,000 organisations surveyed said they were implementing all six capabilities.
“The business context continues to evolve at an unprecedented pace and the need for a more systematic and evidence-based approach to change is clear,” says Karalee Close, Global Lead of Talent & Organisation at AccentureToday.
“All leaders need to be successful at leading change in order to develop culture and activate strategy—it's fundamental to growth, resilience and innovation.
“What’s interesting about this research is that it demonstrates the link between change capabilities and successful outcomes.
“It’s not just about keeping up—it's about creating positive change to get ahead. Only by approaching change less as an art driven by intuition and more as a science backed by data and evidence, can organisations navigate the complexities of modern reinvention,” Karalee concludes.
Rolls-Royce: Driving science-backed change
One case of transformation Accenture highlights comes from Rolls-Royce, who in 2020, aimed to implement a cloud-based digital procurement platform to streamline processes and enhance analytics.
However, the success of this platform hinged on high adoption rates, which were threatened by low morale following a reduction of 9,000 employees.
To address this, Rolls-Royce applied behavioural science to understand what motivated their procurement workforce.
They conducted randomised control trials based on "values analysis" to identify effective motivators.
The insights gained were used to create targeted communications framing the platform as a means for personal development and career growth.
This approach resonated with employees, leading to a 92% learning completion rate, eventually surpassing 95%.
By aligning individual benefits with organisational goals, Rolls-Royce successfully boosted system adoption and achieved better outcomes on both personal and corporate levels.
“Companies that embrace reinvention as a strategy—where they drive a step change in performance through the power of technology, data and AI and new ways of working—are outperforming the competition,” adds Jack Azagury, Group Chief Executive of Consulting at Accenture.
“These organisations have also made change management a core competency. Change must be built as a capability to continuously reinvent and should be part of the organisational DNA.”
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