Leading Digital Business Transformation 50th Edition

Leading Digital Business Transformation

“It was about more than just organizing information,” reflects Vannini. “We saw an opportunity to help connect people, and this set the wheels in motion for digital collaboration as we now know it. This was not common at the time.” “We pioneered social practices, collaboration and engagement into working anytime, anywhere and from any device.” While the project revolutionized the way of working at Merck, Vannini said that with hindsight they started too early. Flexible working was less common at that time, and employee experience platforms were not yet mature. It was also just before the move to the cloud became a possibility. “We built a system that was company-owned, but soon the technology became available that would have enabled us to embrace the cloud,” said Vannini. “When you build on your own, unfortunately you create a lot of heaviness. In 2020, Vannini joined Swiss multinational company Ferring Pharmaceuticals as the Senior Lead of IT Infrastructure Transformation and Analytics. He was tasked with the migration of Ferring’s analytics infrastructure into the cloud. “They refer to me as The Transformer, or The Cleaner,” he joked. “I put things in order when they are not.” Ferring wanted to transform its customer-related processes and to enable more insight-driven decision-making. Vannini explained that to achieve this level of data governance, standards had to be unified across all divisions and customer data needed to be transformed into a common data warehouse in the cloud. This would ensure efficient business workflows and give employees the ability to obtain powerful insights from company-wide data which would enhance customer experience. Ferring sets its sights on being an insights driven organization

A foundation of intertwined data is laid

The pilot project took three months to implement, and during this process it was important to create a single source of unified data from multiple sources. This single source of data would enable Ferring’s marketing teams, no matter which of the 65 countries they were in, to use data-driven insights that create personalized client-centric campaigns to drive higher engagement. “We converged multiple internal data streams to create Ferring’s data foundation,” explained Vannini. “We also set the course for expansion, such as big data from external sources. The platform now is evolving into a single source of truth, unifying processes and data across many offices and countries.” Although Vannini has now moved to a different role within the organization, more focused on infrastructure outsourcing, he found great satisfaction in helping to set up the digital transformation pathway at Ferring. “I have learnt that the key to successful digital transformation is combining business change with technology. This is the essence of what I do. I take a vision and I make it happen technologically. Then when it works, I move on to the next transformation.” Although it has been seven years since he completed IMD’s Leading Digital Business Transformation program, Vannini says he has kept in contact with Faculty over the years to exchange ideas and for some advice whilst working on projects. He is also still in contact with other IMD alumni he met at IMD. “Jobs change, but people don’t,” he said. “We stay connected. This is the major value I see every day from the attending the program.” A like-minded business network

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