Which Digital Transformation Expert to Hire to Grow Your Company?

Want to know which digital transformation expert to hire so you can grow your business? 

If you are, then you’ve come to the right place. Let’s explore in detail how to hire a digital transformation expert for your business.

The Roles You Should Focus on When You Hire a Digital Transformation Expert

First, we will elaborate on the word “experts”. You need developers, testers, and UI designers when undertaking a digital transformation.

We aren’t categorizing the mid-level or junior developers/testers with limited digital transformation project experience as “experts”. A credible track record of delivering digital transformation projects makes one an expert.

Keeping this in mind, you need to hire the following digital transformation specialists:

1. Digital transformation project manager

You need a digital transformation project manager (PM) to deliver successful outcomes for your project. The PM needs to apply all relevant project management competencies, skills, standards, and practices.

You need the PM to do more though! Digital transformation projects demand the following competencies from the PM:

• An ability to connect across the board: The PM should be able to establish meaningful and mutually-beneficial connections across the board. He/she needs to connect to clients, business partners, internal stakeholders, and the team.
• The ability to challenge the status quo: Not only should the PM challenge the status quo but he/she should invite others in the organization to do so. There could be various ways to achieve success in a digital transformation. These options can only emerge when people challenge the way the organization works.
• The ability to respond to unexpected opportunities and challenges: You need a PM that can rise up to unforeseen opportunities and challenges. Digital transformation projects throw up surprises suddenly. The PM should demonstrate the ability to live with such uncertainties.
• The capability to navigate complex projects: Digital transformations have inherent complexities. Many stakeholders might have completely diverging requirements, and the PM needs the capability to navigate such complexity.

Read “Digital transformation: 4 kinds of people crucial to success” for more insights. Look for a credible track record of delivering digital transformation projects.

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2. Digital transformation consultant

You need a digital transformation consultant. This consultant will need to analyze your current products, services, and infrastructure. Based on this analysis, the consultant needs to identify digital transformation opportunities.

A digital transformation consultant will use his/her subject matter expertise to assist the PM during this project. Such a consultant needs the following skills/competencies:

• Collaboration: The consultant will need to collaborate with a wide range of stakeholders, e.g., product managers, customer support team, marketing team, etc.
• Familiarity with digital transformation elements: Successful consultants understand the key elements of digital transformation. These elements are customer experience, operational agility, culture, leadership, workforce enablement, and digital technology integration.
• Deep knowledge of digital transformation frameworks: A proficient consultant should know proven digital transformation frameworks like “The nine elements of digital transformation” from MIT Sloan.

A capable consultant should know the key trends in digital transformation. Such a consultant should be able to help you to measure the RoI of digital transformation. Read “What is digital transformation?” for more insights.

3. Business analysts (BAs)

Include business analysts (BAs) when you hire digital transformation experts. Business stakeholders need to provide their requirements for a digital transformation project and the IT team should implement them. BAs play a crucial role to bridge the gap between business and IT.

BAs use analytics and several other techniques and tools. They do the following:

• Interview business leaders and users;
• Assess how the business functions currently;
• Study the current processes;
• Study the requirements provided by the business users and analyze their feasibility;
• Provide data-driven recommendations including reports to the project team.

The recommendations from BAs include the following information:

• An outline of the opportunities and the challenges;
• The business requirements that is translated in ways that the IT team understands;
• The prioritization of the business and technical requirements.

Read more about the role of BAs in “What is a business analyst? A key role for business-IT efficiency”.

4. Software architect

Plan for a Software architect when you hire digital transformation specialists. Software architects play a key role in the success of strategic software development projects. Since digital transformation requires high-stakes software development, you need a competent architect.

Software architects do the following:

• They collaborate with the BAs, the PM, the development team, and other project stakeholders throughout the project.
• Software architects play a key part in outlining the functional and non-functional requirements.
• They take key architecture decisions that determine how the proposed software will function. The architectural decisions impact the functionalities, security, performance, scalability, availability, reliability, and maintainability of a software system.
• Architects guide the design of the UI, the software components, and how each component interfaces with the others.
• Software architects choose the appropriate methodology and development approach for a project.
• They determine the quality standards and coding guidelines that the team should follow.
• Architects give key inputs to the testing strategy of the project.
• They monitor the progress of development and testing.
• Architects might mentor the development team too.
• Software architects play a key part in communicating with the relevant stakeholders.

Read the “Software Architect Job Description” to learn more about this role. Look for a software architect with a credible track record in digital transformation projects.

5. Cloud architect

Include a cloud architect when you hire digital transformation experts. Businesses are aggressively embracing cloud computing since it saves costs and expedites innovation. You are likely considering it as an important part of your digital transformation too, consequently, you need a cloud architect.

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A competent cloud architect does the following:

• Create a cloud strategy for your organization;
• Manage the cloud adoption process;
• Evaluate cloud infrastructure and applications;
• Organize the cloud systems;
• Collaborate with the IT security team to secure the cloud environment;
• Chose appropriate cloud architecture solutions to cater to the needs of the organization;
• Guide the IT infrastructure and development teams to align with the cloud strategy of the organization.

Read “What exactly is a cloud architect and how do you become one?” to learn more about cloud architects.

6. Software development lead

Onboard a software development lead when you hire digital transformation specialists. Development leads are very skilled and experienced developers. A development lead will perform the following tasks:

• Understand the business requirements in detail;
• Study the detailed technical requirements;
• Analyze the architectural decisions and give inputs when needed;
• Collaborate with the architect to ensure that development guidelines align with the architectural decisions;
• Provide inputs to the PM for project planning;
• Understand the application security solution in detail from the architect and information security team;
• Collaborate with the DevOps lead to ensure that the CI/CD environment established by the DevOps team meets the development requirements;
• Coordinate with the test lead to ensure a sufficient handshake between the development and testing teams;
• Direct the development team so that the development effort aligns with the scope, budget, and quality standards of the project;
• Mentor developers as needed;
• Lead the reviews or participate in them;
• Coordinate with the DevOps team to remove any roadblocks in code migration, version control, etc.

Read more about the development lead role in “Anatomy of a software development role: development lead”. Onboard a development lead with sufficient digital transformation experience.

7. UI design lead

Include a UI design lead when you hire digital transformation experts. UI design leads are highly experienced designers. A UI design lead will do the following in this project:

• Take inputs from the architect to outline the UI design;
• Provide inputs from the PM during the project planning;
• Collaborate with the development lead to align the design and development teams;
• Coordinate with the test lead to achieve coordination between the UI design and testing teams;
• Ensure that UI design follows applicable best practices as mentioned in “User interface design guidelines: 10 rules of thumb”;
• Direct and guide the team to align the UI design work with the project schedule and quality standards.

You need to hire a UI design lead with credible experience in digital transformation projects.

8. Test lead

You need a test lead when building a team of digital transformation specialists. Test leads acquire significant testing experience before they can perform this crucial role well. The test lead will do the following:

• Collaborate with the architect and business analysts to understand the testing requirements of the project;
• Provide inputs to the PM during the project planning stage;
• Coordinate with the development lead, UI design lead, and DevOps lead to set up an effective testing suite;
• Define the scope of the testing in the project;
• Organize the testing environment and processes;
• Choose appropriate testing tools including test automation frameworks;
• Lead the testing team in setting up the test environment;
• Control the testing process to align with the project plan and schedule;
• Lead the testers in developing the test plan and test cases;
• Direct and lead the team through the test execution process;
• Mentor testers when required;
• Monitor testing-related metrics and their reporting;
• Coordinate with the testers, development lead, and DevOps lead during the defect resolution work.

Read “Role & responsibilities of test manager/test lead” to learn more about the test lead role. Hire a test lead with sufficient digital transformation project experience.

9. DevOps lead

Onboard a DevOps lead as you hire digital transformation experts. DevOps is the key to innovating rapidly, therefore, this role is important. A DevOps lead should be a hands-on DevOps engineer with considerable experience and leadership competencies.

The DevOps lead should do the following:

• Collaborate with the architect to choose the right DevOps tools;
• Provide DevOps-related project planning input to the PM;
• Coordinate with the architect, development lead, and test lead for establishing an effective CI/CD environment;
• Lead the DevOps engineers to meet the project requirements;
• Mentor the DevOps engineers if the need arises.

Learn more about this role in “DevOps team roles and responsibilities”. Hire a DevOps lead with a credible track record of executing digital transformation projects.

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Hire Digital Transformation Developers, Designers, Testers, and DevOps Engineers

Now that you have hired digital transformation experts, focus on the mid-level/junior roles. Hire digital transformation developers, testers, UI designers, and DevOps engineers.

Look for the following skills/competencies in a digital transformation developer:

• Professional ethics;
• Technical skills;
• Software engineering skills;
• Industry knowledge;
• Decision-making capabilities;
• The ability to collaborate.

Read our guide “How to Find a Good Software Developer” for more insights.

Final Thoughts

We just explained which digital transformation industry experts you should hire for your project. Additionally, we reviewed the mid/junior-level roles you need. Digital transformation projects can be complex.

Keep in mind that choosing the right digital experts to streamline your digital transformation is the key to the success of your digital strategy.

According to SpiderWorks Technologies‘s founder, “a wrong selection can take your company into a completely wrong path and a U-turn may become inevitable at a later point, posing a big risk for your business success.”

If you need help with such a project, please contact us at DevTeam.Space. We will promptly help you via our field expert and vetted software developers and project managers!

Frequently Asked Questions on Hiring a Digital Transformation Expert