Digital transformation: why does culture determine a project's success?

Implementing technology doesn't guarantee that an organisation will change the way it works. Often, the real challenge lies in people, their habits and teams' ability to adopt new practices.

Daniel Barrientos shares his perspective on how to approach these processes, involve the different levels of the organisation and turn change into an institutional capability.

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1. It's often said that digital projects fail because of culture, not technology. What are the hardest forms of resistance to spot when a new tool is rolled out?

There's some truth in that statement, although it can also be used to excuse badly built technology. If a tool doesn't fit the way people actually work, resistance is reasonable.

One of the hardest forms of resistance to spot appears when teams feel the change could affect their role. I experienced it at an educational institution in Chile, when we implemented self-enrolment. The solution worked, but there was a question nobody asked openly: what would happen to the team if students could complete the process by themselves?

There are also quieter signals: keeping parallel spreadsheets, using a tool only for reporting, or abandoning it a few weeks after launch.

Resistance rarely presents itself as such. Often it shows up in the phrase “this doesn't work for our case.”

If a tool doesn't fit the way people actually work, resistance is reasonable.

2. How can you involve middle managers so they become champions of change rather than a brake on it?

The first step is to stop seeing them as a brake. Middle managers have to sustain day-to-day operations and, at the same time, absorb the cost of a change whose benefits will only arrive later.

There are three key ingredients to involving them: having them take part from the start, giving them tools to support their teams, and building the change into their objectives.

There's also something that tends to be underestimated: transformation is sustained in each team's day-to-day, and that day-to-day depends largely on the direct manager. A ritual that the manager convenes and uses to make decisions endures. One that gets delegated disappears.

3. The arrival of AI and agentic automation creates fear of job loss or irrelevance. How should that uncertainty be managed?

I'd start by not promising what can't be guaranteed. Saying that nobody will lose their job can be reassuring, but it often isn't true.

However, there's an important distinction: automation happens at the level of the task, not the role. Even if some activities disappear, there can still be functions where a human contribution is needed.

In one team we support, we work on identifying new opportunities within the organisation, with mobility options and skills development focused on the use of AI. That way, we turn a threat into a shared question: where can we contribute more?

4. How do you measure the progress of a cultural transformation?

There are outcome indicators, such as efficiency, NPS or workplace climate, and behavioural ones, which make it possible to anticipate those outcomes. Among the latter, I think it's especially important to observe how the use of a tool affects people's lives.

At an educational institution, for example, the CRM we implemented cut staff workload by 27%. That translated into less stress, less absenteeism, higher retention and a better quality of life.

There are other signals too: parallel systems disappear, meetings are backed by data, and teams propose improvements on their own initiative.

My favourite test is to ask myself what happens when we leave. If everything holds, there was a cultural change. If it falls apart, there was only a project.

5. How important are small wins for sustaining motivation during long transformation processes?

They're essential. Long processes demand trust before delivering results, and that trust can run out. That's why early wins aren't just for lifting morale: they help build credibility.

For them to work, they need to solve concrete problems for the people doing the work, become visible within a few weeks and be recognised by the teams that receive the benefit.

We also have to avoid showcase wins: those that look good in a presentation but don't change day-to-day work. They wear people down because they convey that transformation is a communications matter, not a matter of work.

6. To close, what message would you leave for anyone currently leading a transformation in their organisation?

Stop thinking of change management as something reactive. Change isn't only managed: it's also prepared for, built and integrated.

That means treating the capacity to change as a competency installed in the organisation, not as a budget line within each project. When that capacity exists, every new initiative finds teams with experience and practices that make adoption easier.

Change isn't only managed: it's also prepared for, built and integrated.

Technology changes every few months. The capacity to absorb it is what needs to be built.