41. How to make your next digital transformation project a success - with Mark Lockton-Goddard

41. How to make your next digital transformation project a success - with Mark Lockton-Goddard

Hannah Munro: 0:49 

Hello, everybody, and welcome to this episode of CFO 4.0. I am your host, Han Monroe, and today I'm talking with Mark Lockton-Goddard. So, Mark is the CEO and founder of Embracent, a digital transformation and strategy company. And we're going to talk about what it takes to implement a successful financial technology project. So, welcome, Mark. It's fantastic to have you on the show. 

Mark Lockton-Goddard: 1:13 

It's great to be here. Thank you very much. 

Hannah Munro: 1:15 

Well, because you've had quite an interesting journey to, you know, starting Embracence and doing what you do now. So, tell us a little bit about your story. Where did you start? 

Mark Lockton-Goddard: 1:27 

You know, it's yeah, it goes back some way, actually. And I started out in technology back in the day up in the north of England when I was 18. doing quite a lot of software development, actually. I try not to tell the team that I've done too much software development in the past because I try to keep that one quiet. But I actually started out doing quite a lot of technology for the stock exchanges back in the day. And I was writing in DOS and all these different programs. So, I came from quite a technology kind of heavy heritage and then worked for a number of different businesses in the North, in Bradford and Leeds and one or two other places. I've probably got two or three parts to my career, actually, which I think is quite helpful for me because I spent quite a long time in consultancy. So, I worked with the big four consultancy organizations, more latterly, PwC. doing big technology transformation programs all around Europe and mergers and acquisitions around technology and kind of proper deep kind of technology consultancy work. I then spent about eight years out as global CIO of some large businesses working all around the world from California through to Hong Kong for people like Michael Page, Fidesa, which is a very large derivatives trading platform, some big kind of foxy 250 PLCs. And I really loved that. I did that for about eight years. But I also found that I missed some of the consultancy work that I used to do. So, I decided to create a consultancy business that was probably What I wanted to be doing when I was at the Big Four and without kind of doing them down because they do a fantastic job. When I was in PwC in the Big Four, I spent a lot of time talking about how to make the big four more money, how to make the consultancy more money. And less time, as I got more senior, talking about how we help clients, how do we really stand in their shoes, how do we really help them embrace technology. And hey, presto, that's where our company name came from. Embracent means embrace new technology. Because there's a lot of talk about technology being disruptive and it's all very doom and gloom. And I thought, well, that's a bit negative, isn't it? Because if we think about how we can really embrace technology and do consultancy in the way that I always wanted to do it, so, much more pragmatic, hands-on, very much the antithesis of the kind of slick-looking consultants in black BMWs. I wanted to make sure that we could do that in a way that clients could relate to. We could just do some great work for some very nice clients, and that's what we do now. So, I had a bit of a heritage around technology. bit of a heritage around consulting, then was in the sharp end as a CIO of a range of businesses where it was quite challenging as we went through different kind of digital transformations. And I've seen the good and the bad of that. And now what I try to do is bring all of that and the team that we've got here to help businesses do technology in a pragmatic and sensible way. And our strapline is we help make sense of technology because there are lots of people who sell you stuff and lots of people will, you know, kind of try and persuade you that it's very, very hard. And some of it is complicated, but actually you can also do technology in very sensible, pragmatic, realistic ways where you drive the benefits on a kind of a much more sensible path. So, that's what we're trying to do. We're not trying to be too complicated. We do some complicated stuff around automation, especially RPA, especially data analytics, especially we do some clever stuff. but we try to do it in a way where we're not trying to make it clever. We're trying to make it simple. 

Hannah Munro: 5:16 

And I think that's a great, so, I often talk to our team when we're going into projects about it's, There is a bit about, like you say, the practicality of implementing systems and being realistic about goals and getting away from all of this jargon about digital transformation to actually talking about what does that mean for that customer and how do they make that change and go into it and look at it in a way that drives an impact. And, you know, rather than trying to do everything at once, I don't know about you, but I'm a massive fan of sort of, you know, small wins, getting the team on board. approach but enough about how we approach technology I'd love to talk about how you guys approach a new technology project if you're speaking to a client what are some of the conversations that that you have with them at the start about what they're looking to achieve and how they're looking to approach 

Mark Lockton-Goddard: 6:07 

you know it's um having been around these kind of technology program projects for you know far too many years now um there's we've done quite a lot of analysis and I've done quite a lot of analysis over the years as to why programs fail um and it's hardly ever the technology. It's mostly about client expectations. It's mostly about client dynamics. It's mostly about leadership. It's mostly about change management. It's mostly about things that are not specifically about the technology. So, one of the things that we try and do right at the beginning is understand the client. And what I mean by that is that we've got some companies that we work with that understand we're quite fortunate in that we've got a range of clients that we work with. So, at one end of the spectrum, we've got a wonderful client, which is, you know, I think Europe's largest manufacturer of sausages. So, that's really kind of one end. And then at the other end, we've got a very corporate bank. And we've got everything in between. And every one of those clients is different. And their ability to understand and embrace technology is different. And their teams are different. And their capabilities are different. So, what we probably spend quite a bit of time doing right up front is understanding what works and what doesn't work within that client's environment. What capabilities they've got, what expectations they've got around technology, what are they actually trying to achieve? Because one of my phrases is, you've got to try and slightly avoid the shiny new toy mentality in technology. Everybody gets excited about, I must have... you know, whatever the latest phrase of the day is. And let's call it robotic process automation, because that's, you know, intelligent automation. These great buzzwords, everybody gets excited. I must have one because somebody's told me I need one. And, you know, in a very simple way, we kind of say, what are you going to do with it? What do you want from it? What's your expectation? How is that going to make your world better? Because coming back from the technology, I think there's always a real need to understand what are the business outcomes, what are the business benefits, how is it going to make your life better? And I've had so, many conversations with people over the years. I remember one about six years ago with a group of finance directors, and there was 15 finance directors in a room, and myself, and we were talking about technology, and I was talking about this technology roadmap for that business over the next few years. And they were all saying, we need cloud, we need cloud, we need cloud. So, you can tell the date of this. This is probably, yeah, maybe 8, 10 years ago. We need to move to cloud. And I said to them in a nice way, look, if I asked each one of you what you actually mean by cloud and what cloud is, you'd probably give me a different answer. There's 15 of us in the room. You'd probably get at least 15 different opinions. What you actually, I think, want is... flexible, scalable cost management of your technology platform. You want to move something to agile. You want to get some benefits out of it. You maybe want to save a bit of money, and you want to be not constrained by all this on-prem hardware in the future. So, what you want is an outcome. What you're saying is I need cloud. And actually, cloud might not be the answer at that time. And some of it was in some ways and it wasn't in other ways. But, you know, it's pinning it back to what are you actually trying to achieve? clients. So, to answer your question, Hannah, I think what we do is we ask those kinds of sometimes difficult questions and sometimes questions that people don't like answering because they just want to buy a shiny new toy and I've decided I need a CRM platform and ERP platform I need to upgrade to oracle or whatever it might be I've made my mind up about what I need and we probably ask some of those awkward questions and say well okay what are you going to do with this you know how's that going to make your business better what are the benefits that you're going to track Are they realizable? Can you track them? Do you understand what you're going to do with them even if you can? It's all those boring, difficult questions that we ask because we know that those are the things that are fundamental to project success. If we have a clear goal, a clear set of benefits, a clear set of outcomes, then actually we can navigate programs pretty well. But what I find is the ones that go wrong, they were kind of set up wrong in the first place because those things just weren't clear. 

Hannah Munro: 10:27 

Yeah, and I think, do you know what? It's a really interesting piece around what you're talking about, about focusing on the outcomes. So, I've noticed it's, interesting trend that's happening moments people coming with like lists of features that they need rather than and the challenge is that then becomes a tick box exercise rather than a conversation about let me help you make the most of the technology that we're suggesting um and it and I've noticed it happening more and more especially in things like tenders where rather than sort of using the knowledge of that technology and because every technology is slightly different there's some commonalities but there's ways to use it, in my personal opinion, to make the most of it. And sometimes you can be forced into going down a route where it's actually, like you say, it's not actually tied to what they're trying to achieve. It's just a tick box of, is it cloud? Is it this? Is it that? Rather than actually, what are we trying to achieve with that feature rather than a piece? So, I think that's a really interesting point. And it's certainly a trend that I'm seeing at the moment. 

Mark Lockton-Goddard: 11:35 

And I think, you know, to your point there increasingly especially with the options that we've got available with technology you know every company you know this side of California is coming with some new products every five minutes so, so, with the technologies that are available there are so, many different ways of solving problems um and that's useful right because you can pull and polish on different levers based on what's important at any one point in time so, so, that's good But therefore, it's even more important that you don't have a tick list, that you actually rely on people who know what they're doing to say, what I'm actually trying to achieve is this. You tell me what the different options are. Because otherwise, what happens is you just go down a very standard route. And that's not always the right answer. The simple answer is, let's just upgrade the system that we've got. Let's just replace. Let's go with the standard. And what you'll find is that that will give you a reasonable... outcome probably but you might be missing some really great ways of improving customer experience improving employee experience driving out benefits because you're not allowing the people who are the experts to say Yeah, that's great, but have you thought about this over here? Because this, okay, it's only been around a couple of years, but what we're finding is it's got massive impact in an organization. So, you know, it's important to allow the flexibility and the freedom for you to consider things that you might not have thought about before. But also, you've got to be sensible. You know, I think another project that we were involved in reviewing was a program that was going way off track. I think the original budget was £8 million for this technology program. And they'd called us in at £15 million because they thought, hang on a minute, this is a problem. And what had happened is over the time, the scope had changed. People had added in different requirements. And it all just crept along in a slightly different route. And I remember talking to some of the team there about one particular change. Just to give an example of how this kind of creeps along. One particular change was going to cost £250,000 for this one particular module component feature. And I said, well, what are we doing that for? Who's that for? And it was for one particular client, for one particular scenario. They needed to do some invoicing and some billing in a particular way. I said, okay, great. How much does that client make us per year? profit terms about 20,000 pounds a year. So, we're going to spend a quarter of a million pounds for a client that makes us 20,000 pounds a year to give them the service that they need. Would it not be better off to just go and talk to that client and say, can we do this a different way, please? And in reality, we then did go and talk to that client and guess what? They said, oh, that's okay. We'll work with this in a different way. And that's what happens. If you focus on the technology too much, you actually stop thinking commercially. You stop thinking about the business and you stop thinking a little bit more laterally about how you can solve problems. And I see that all the time. People get fixated on the technology. And I'm saying this is a technology consultancy, so, it's probably not a great marketing message in some ways. But at the same time, people get fixated on the technology and forget the business side and the commercial side. So, we just pull people back to that. 

Hannah Munro: 14:58 

And I think that's a really interesting point about not designing your systems for a small percentage. If we think about the 80-20 rule we hear about, don't focus 80% of your technology development on the 20% of people that might use it. And I think that's a really good takeaway for anyone that's listening is just to, yeah, the weird and wonderful scenario is one of the questions that has to be asked is how often does this actually occur? Because the amount of time and, you know, a bit like you guys as consultants, we spend a lot of time just challenging some of the questions and, you know, asking them why, why are we doing this? Why do we need that in the first place? So, yeah, I think that's a great point. 

Mark Lockton-Goddard: 15:40 

I think I liken this. I was talking to one of our clients who's a CIO of a very large, organization. I was saying, we channel the inner five-year-old, you know what I mean? It's like, why'd you do that? Why'd you do that? Why do you do that? What's that about? Why'd you do that? We ask lots of why questions. And, you know, it's, you'd be surprised how many times we get the kind of response, which is, well, that's what we thought we needed. We kind of haven't really, you know, when you ask us why, we don't really know why actually, you know, we now, we now need to go and think about that, you know? So, so, yeah, that's, that's always, you know, it's always important to ask those why questions. And, having been on the receiving end as a CIO, when I used to be a CIO, and also in consulting, of some fairly big programs that have gone way off budget, and they've gone way off track. And a lot of the themes are the same, Hannah. They are really, you know, it's just about people losing sight of what's actually important and getting carried away with the technology. 

Hannah Munro: 16:41 

Yeah, and I really like that theme and, you know, I work in technology. We love technology and we think it's the best thing since sliced bread, but you are 100% right. You know that piece around folk, and very often it's processes that are the problem, not necessarily technology. And like you say, people is one of the biggest success factors of any digital transformation project. So, for anyone that's approaching that sort of digital transformation projects, what's your advice in If they're sort of leading that and they've sort of taken responsibility for it, in terms of how they approach maybe the people side first, what are your thoughts on some top tips that you can share on how to approach that successfully? 

Mark Lockton-Goddard: 17:25 

Yeah, funnily enough, I was having the same conversation with one of our other clients on the last week, which is they've got quite an ambitious digital transformation program. And, you know, it's a fantastic program. I wish I could tell you more about it, but they're really changing the fundamental premise for why they are a business because they've realized that, you know, they created their business 150 years ago, a great business. But the world's moved on, and therefore there's a whole different agenda around how to make this a digital business that's ready for the future. And that's about new revenue streams. It's about new services being provided. It's about engaging with customers in an entirely different way. So, they really are doing a proper job. They've got a fantastic vision of their digital transformation. And I think the hardest thing that they will have been, in many ways, taking the people with them. because the people, the longevity of service is quite long. They've got a lot of people within the organization that are very long-serving, very loyal, very capable people, but they've been used to doing the things the way they've done them for the last 30 years. And one of the things that we do around the people side is as part of the program, we clearly understand what the vision is, what we're trying to achieve. We try and break that down into what does that actually mean for people? And then we try and create some different personas. So, maybe there's a persona of a finance manager. Maybe there's a persona of an IT manager. Maybe there's a persona of a customer. Maybe there's a persona of a supply chain director. We create these different personas and say, what does that actually mean for me? If we go on this journey, what's the journey I personally am going to have to go on? Because one of the things that we find is that getting people on board, making sure that they understand the journey and what it means for them and somehow demystifying it, taking the scariness out of it. That's really important. You know, we do a lot of finance automation using RPA. We do a lot of automation across businesses. The usual strapline there is we're using robots to put people out of work. And of course, we're not. What happens is people's jobs change, sometimes quite significantly, but they do change. And therefore, the greater opportunities to add more value, to get more involved in decision support and different things, but their jobs definitely change. And the fear comes from an unknown view of what that change is actually going to mean for that person. So, we spend quite a bit of time up front saying, what does this mean? What does it mean for the organization? Why is it important? Let's make sure that everybody buys into this vision. And then what does it mean for the key people around the organization? And really spell it out. And then there's a big piece around change and comms for that. I think the other thing that we do, which I think is something that we've learned to do over the years, is Try and do some things quickly. So, in other words, try and, I know we all talk about quick wins and it's like a bit of a tedious statement in some ways, but we try and find some early, early successes where we actually go, you know, if we've got people that we think, yeah, they are going to be slightly resistant to change, they're going to be slightly worried about this. Let's go and find some ways of making their day better now. Because if we can demonstrate that digital transformation can bring something to them, which is great and can make their days better, as early as we can, then you get that buy-in. People think, oh, right, okay, I kind of understand this now. My day is definitely, you know, suddenly I've got rid of all that rubbish task that I used to have to do every month end. I can figure this out now. This is great. It's not all bad. So, finding those things where we think, let's make sure we do a piece of automation or a piece of project or whatever it is, it's going to give you a benefit quickly. And then you think that actually we kind of, we do have you in our minds. And that's one of the reasons why also we kind of, you know, don't promote this idea of these three-year programs that, you know, suddenly there's a kind of a drum roll and a ta-da moment at the end when you get everything you want. You know, we phase things so, that you actually get things as you go along and the benefits ultimately, if possible, pay for the future development work. So, because the whole thing about that is it's, you know, It's hard. Doing digital transformation is hard on people. And it's hard, you know, technologies can be hard, but it's hard on people. It's hard on business change. So, you have to keep people on track by... giving them things along the way, you know, giving them things along the way. I always like the analogy of, you know, I like architecture and building houses and things. So, if you ever watch grand designs, you know, they're trying to build a beautiful house. And at the end, everybody goes, oh, what a beautiful house. There's always that valley of despair in the middle, you know, where suddenly the people that own the house have had two more children and they're living in a caravan, a winter setting. That's what happens in digital transformation. Partway through, you have a bad month end. You've got an acquisition to do. You've got other projects that come along. And everybody's thinking, why on earth do we do this? You have to keep people on side. And I think you do that by really understanding what it means for them and trying to give them some benefits along the way. And then, you know, what you don't have is this kind of Passive-aggressive, I'm going to vote with my feet mentality, which is you technology and business people may have a great digital transformation plan, but frankly, I'm going to now carry on doing things the way I've always done them because I'm happier with that. So, that's probably a long answer to your question, but what we're really trying to do is understand the impact and then work with people to really make it better for you. 

Ad 2: 23:16 

Raise your game with Sage Intact. Bring down your close time by up to 79%. Use agile real-time reporting for instant visibility. Land an average ROI of 250%. With the heavyweight cloud software rated number one for customer satisfaction. Finance that packs a punch. Find out more from ITAS, the UK Sage Intact Partner of the Year at itassolutions.co.uk. 

Hannah Munro: 23:46 

Do you know, I think it's really interesting conversation. So, very often, obviously, when you're speaking to people and they're talking about, you know, what's your life going to look like after this technology is in? And one of the things people forget is that they've spent an awful lot of time training and learning the skills that they need to do their role, right? If you think about like how long it takes to get SEMA accreditations, right? ACCA accreditations, even just getting a degree in accounting for those newbies coming through. That's an awful lot of time spent to learn how to enter a purchase invoice into a system. And I think one of the buzzes I get, I have to say, when I'm implementing new projects is that seeing those people being able to step up and do the interesting bit of finance, the bit that really adds value to that team and the organization and step out of that role. And I think that's something that people forget I think they get so, focused on what are you taking away from me that they actually forget and I think a lot of finance leaders forget to talk about this is all the stuff I'm desperate to give you because I'm doing this and I don't have time to do my job because I'm too busy reconciling to make sure that all that information's in the system 

Mark Lockton-Goddard: 25:04 

yeah, it's you know we all say don't we underestimate the positives and overestimate the negatives. In change, that's what we do. We don't think it's going to be as good as it could be, and it actually might be five times worse. That's what we do. But I suspect that I haven't yet met somebody in finance or any part of the business, but I haven't met anybody in finance yet that really went into finance to be able to check spreadsheets at seven o'clock at night or to be able to, you know, kind of enter invoices and double check them. You know, they didn't go into finance for that reason, actually. They went into finance because, you know, they understand the value of, you know, financial modelling or they understand how that can, you know, the impact on the business. They wanted to be able to do much more of this, helping businesses make better decisions. You know, it was much more the kind of the value of the creation, creative end. It wasn't, just to become a number cruncher. And I think that's what we have to try and reconcile with people, because whilst they didn't go into finance to do that, that is maybe a good part of their job right now. And if we say, well, we're just going to take that away from you, inevitably people are going to say, okay, but what are you going to replace that with? Or are you going to replace me? And there's that concern you know and it's an it's a perfectly reasonable concern for people to have you know I think we most of the clients we work with they then want to repurpose if you like the that role to be much more around analytics insight understanding what's going on with the numbers so, that you can make better decisions for the business and spending less time creating the numbers if you want to say that you know and more time analysing and providing insights which is I think probably a much more fulfilling job anyway. But most of the companies we work with still spend far too much time arguing over whether the numbers are even right in the first place. And therefore, there's a huge amount of energy that goes into creating the numbers, slicing and dicing them in wonderful Excel and PowerPoint slides or Power BI dashboards or whatever. There's a lot of energy that goes into just creating numbers the numbers, and not enough energy goes into, in my opinion, deciding what we want to do about that and where does that take us and what's the insight and how to add some new value to that. So, digital transformation in finance, there's a lot about that actually often. It's the how do we get rid of all that stuff so, that you can get your head above the water and go, okay, right, this is interesting now. Let's start thinking differently. 

Hannah Munro: 27:43 

Absolutely. And I think it's also, as we know this, it's the speed and the time that takes. And I'm pretty sure if I spoke to most people in finance, they'd be quite happy with the fact that they could perhaps leave the office at five on a month's end and not have to worry about the fact that they're going on holiday and it's the third day of the month and they have to time it around that. And that's a whole different world, I think, and perhaps a bit different thinking. But just to go back to your point around phasing, because again, it's great to speak to somebody else that talks about you know structuring projects in a way that isn't this big bang I don't know why you know why so, many people feel like that's the best way to do it but I'm a massive believer in sort of phasing and staging how do you approach that so, if somebody was thinking about a new project how do they identify which pieces to do first and, you know, what would you recommend in how to structure a project to make sure that you, you know, you're not tiring out your staff in that thing. You're not hitting, what did you call it? The valley of death on the way through your project. I love. 

Mark Lockton-Goddard: 28:49 

that. I think there's different strands to it you know because often with these big large programs you have some foundational components that you have to put into place so, so, they those can some of those can be technology related you know we need to actually have a better platform or we need to have a better infrastructure or whatever there can be some foundational things we need to do um and therefore you know we try and understand what those are quite quickly so, that we can plan for those um often There's quite a lot of issues around data because data is often not very organized and not very accurate. And there's some quality issues. So, there might be some foundational components. So, definitely get those out first. Let's understand what they are. And then on top of that, when we're thinking about the actual program itself, we try and tie things back to benefits realization as much as we possibly can. So, if we understand the different components of the project, different parts of that will drive different benefits. And therefore, then we try and shape the program Yes, of course, there's a question about how we shape it in terms of the logical building process. But at the same time, we try and say, okay, but what are the parts that will deliver some benefits in a different way a little bit earlier? So, you know, to use the terrible kind of overused building expression, you know, we work on where are the foundations? What do the foundations need to look like? And let's get the general shape of the house. But actually, you know, if we then need to deliver, you know, the kitchen first, because that's the heart of the house, and therefore everybody feels a bit better because we've got a decent kitchen, and, you know, get the garage sorted out because that's where people work from you know above the garage these days we'll start to think about the programming business benefits context and then we'll try and break things down into modular chunks and say okay well how do we deliver that in different parts because um again you know I having been involved in many multi-year programs um Things change fast in business, so, we all know that. Business is changing very, very quickly. And so, we tend to try and make sure that we're only looking as far ahead as is sensible. So, we might be deciding, if we put the foundations down, we understand that we want a four-bedroomed house, but we're not going to choose whether the conservatory is on the left or the right yet. We're not going to choose some of these things that are more agile, because actually we might have a different view in six months' time. So, we then... take what we call and I'm not going to bore you with technology kind of jargon but we take what we call a waggle approach right so, it's a traditionally in IT you would have a waterfall approach which is you design everything up front to the nth degree and then you build it yeah and of course nothing ever changes in between so, it's perfect yeah and obviously what came along was agile which is much more lets you know more like a prototyping style of approach let's understand you know in much more rapid ways what are we trying to build do a show and mentality around this is what we're building. Do you like it? Yes, let's build it. We take a wagile one, so, kind of an overarching design and view, but then much more agile in terms of, okay, let's do a show and tell mentality of saying, this is what this looks like. Is that what you meant? And therefore, then we can build things as we go in stages. And we have this phrase, which is think big, start small. So, in other words, you have a view of what you're ultimately trying to build, but probably it's more like a vision around, I'd like a five-bedroomed house, and it must be nice. But then let's think about how we build that on a much more agile way based on the changing circumstances. And what we also do, I think, which is probably one of the reasons why some projects don't go well, is we put some hopefully we put some sensible governance around the decision making because what you have to have is good sensible people who understand the business making the decisions about whether we need a window there or a door there because otherwise what happens is you can really go off track. So, having good decision makers who really are empowered within the business and understand the business and what we're trying to achieve, key stage gates to say, yeah, I sign up on this. Yes, I'm happy with that. And try and not Pretend that you know too much. Every project I've seen recently certainly didn't predict what we've gone through over the last 12 months. So, there are these big events. There are big changes in macroeconomics, let alone your local business, which mean that you can start off with an idea today. And if you just build that and it takes you 12 months to build it, you may well end up with something that's okay. but not really ideal. So, taking a kind of step-by-step approach is really key. So, we, you know, the design part, we always separate that out and say, well, look, you know, there's no point really understanding what you're going to do until we've decided, you know, we've got the high-level design right. And then we try and build as many stage gates in as we possibly can so, that we're then saying, let's just, you know, let's just run to the next corner. Let's just run to the next corner. And that way then we can always, you know, check that we're on track. It also helps us bring people with us because that show and tell mentality, you know, is how people like to work. They like to see what they're getting. 

Hannah Munro: 34:03 

No, absolutely. And I think to go back to your analogy, don't decorate the kitchen before you've even built the house. 

Mark Lockton-Goddard: 34:12 

That's exactly, exactly. Yeah. So, and that's, you know, that's, I know I'm probably making it sound, you know, kind of fairly kind of generic. It's an approach, you know, and I think the approach works quite well because the reality is when programs go wrong, it usually is because there's been scope creep. People have decided to throw all sorts of other things that they wanted, you know, or they've lost sight of what was important as a business objective. So, the key thing about that approach is that it keeps bringing everybody back to say, okay, why did we decide we were going to do this in the first place? You know, what were the benefits that we're going to track? You know, let's just remind ourselves before we go on to the next bit, is that what we really wanted? Has anything changed? And it just keeps everybody pinned back to the business and the commercials as opposed to getting carried away with this shiny new toy. 

Hannah Munro: 35:01 

No, absolutely. And I think there is a lot to be said about, you know, if you think about just the environment that we're in at the moment and how quickly businesses are changing and developing. And yeah, I love your concept around, you know, the framework. If the framework is solid, then you can be agile. I think some of the challenges is when that framework and like you say, that overarching vision, clarity of purpose just isn't there. And that's, you know, it all goes back to that. Are you clear on what you're trying to deliver and why you're doing this project in the first place? And have you set the foundations in place? Because if you need to move a window at some point or, you know, change where the conservancy sits, I am going to have to keep, I'm going to keep, I'm going to use that analogy. I'm really sorry, Mark. I know it's a brilliant one. No, I'm not so, sure my husband would be very happy about shifting the conservancy round, if I'm being very honest. He might let me change the curtains if I'm lucky. But yeah, if we think about that concept Like you say, we know how many bedrooms we're going to need and what we might need in the future, what we're trying to achieve. But like you say, you know, are we making the best of that particular plot? Are we looking at how we should be decorating and designing it for them, you know, the family that's going to live in it? So, I think that's a great concept. 

Mark Lockton-Goddard: 36:19 

Yeah, exactly. And I think one of the things that's, one of the things just to add on to that, probably one of the foundational components that people don't always realise with these kinds of programmes is, is data is actually also one of those foundations because people get carried away with data and master data management and data schemas and data programs. And the problem is businesses, and especially larger businesses, they have a lot of data, and they have lots of different types of data. And a lot of people start by saying, well, we need to sort our data out in order to understand where we are as a business and move forward. So, we're going to try and fix every piece of data. every bit of data. And we'll spend two years on a big data program to be able to sort out data. And we take a very different view to that, which is, okay, yes, you've got a lot of data. But actually, the sum of that data that's really valuable, and then the sum of it, which is probably a little bit less valuable, let's be honest. And if you then understand what you're trying to do as a business and what your objectives are, you can then value your data. And you can say, this is the stuff that's really high value over here because that's all about how we engage with our customers or that's all about this particular product. So, if you value your data, what you find is that it's the 80-20 rule. 80% of the data is like, yeah, whatever. But there's 20% that is really, really valuable. And therefore, one of the foundational things that we do within the program is fix the 20%. Don't worry about the other stuff but fix the 20% because that is the heart of the business. That is the value that you have as a business. It's your customer experience. It's your supply chain, whatever it might be. There's some value there. And let's fix the 20% of data. Let's not try and fix everything. And therefore, then, that's one of the foundational things because people get carried away on the application. I need to go to Workday. I need to go to Oracle. I need to do this. I need to do that. Actually, you can plug and play a lot of these different systems if that 20% of your data is really well understood, because the data that is actually valuable, every five years or so,, you'll change your systems, but the data and what you do with it as a business probably won't change that much actually. So, getting the data right is really key as well. 

Hannah Munro: 38:34 

And I think, to be honest, the 80-20 rule is a great, you know, you should always, anyone that's managing and looking after a project or working with technology generally, just constantly have in the back of your head, you know, that 80-20 rule because it's amazing how often it applies. You know, 80% of your problems are always caused by 20% of your customers. You know, 80% of your time that's spent is caused by 20% of your processes. Like the amount when you look across a team and a business, it just is an amazing way of looking at things, but actually quite scary if you think about it, how much time we spend talking age 20s. So, as much, you know, I would love to keep talking to you, Mark, but very aware of that clock ticking away. So, have you got any final thoughts for any CFOs that are embarking on a new digital transformation project or are dipping their toe in the water, what are your top tips to make sure it's a successful one? 

Mark Lockton-Goddard: 39:35 

That's a very good question. I think some of these things we've talked about, know why you're doing it in the first place, understand really clearly what it's going to do for you, your customers, your partners, your suppliers, your people. And then try and break it down into some key chunks that are not trying to be too ambitious because it is hard. And I think you have to learn as you go along, you know, this kind of test and learn or fail and learn, whatever the mentality is. I think you have to learn. Every business that I work with that has gone through a digital transformation. You know, what they knew six months or 12 months later is a lot more about the transformation, the journey, the challenges than when they started. So, don't try and plan everything out from now. Learn as you go along, test and learn, fail and learn. So, break things down into chunks so, that you can then do that process well. And don't be too precious and don't make too many commitments. It's probably what I would say as well, because people can get fixated on, oh, we said we were going to do this and therefore we must do it. And actually, the world's moved on. Things have changed. So, have a good way of identifying whether something is valuable, getting a good decision-making and leadership around that, because it is an uncertain path. It is an uncertainty. And you have to navigate as you go along to some extent. So, I think I would do that. Be clear about what you're trying to achieve, breaking down into chunks, don't overcommit, and test and learn. And obviously, find a great partner to work with. I've got to get back to you there. 

Hannah Munro: 41:10 

Absolutely. And if anyone listening wants to learn about more about what you and the team at Abracent do, then what's the best way to get hold of you? 

Mark Lockton-Goddard: 41:21 

On our website, we've got various different contact forms. We're also on LinkedIn. But just reach out to us. We will respond very quickly. 

Hannah Munro: 41:29 

Wonderful. So, for anyone that's interested, we will of course put the links to Mark and the team in the show notes. And yeah, so, just want to say thank you very much, Mark. It's been a pleasure talking to you today and thank you for coming on the show. No, 

Mark Lockton-Goddard: 41:42 

thank you for having me. It's been great. Thank you.