From the Editor: Digital Transformation Is Not Just for Systems, It's for People

[Erkan Teskancan]

## The Human Factor in Digital Transformation: More Important Than Systems

For digital transformation projects to be successful, it is not enough to merely implement new systems; it is also critically important to increase employee capacity to ensure these systems are used sustainably.

Today, tools like artificial intelligence, and especially generative AI, have become widespread and cost-effective. Companies of various sizes support and encourage their employees to use these technologies. Management aims to achieve more with fewer resources, bring products to market quickly, and rapidly transform processes digitally. However, even with robust technological infrastructure, employees using these systems often face difficulties.

### The Real Reason for Failure in Digital Transformation

Priyanka Dave, who leads workforce capability development efforts in ERP and digital transformation projects, states that technological failure often stems not from the systems themselves, but from the organization's inability to adapt its infrastructure and processes to the new system. In an article for CIO magazine, Dave emphasizes that failure is not due to a lack of motivation, but rather the inability to build the infrastructure to support new technology and the associated process changes. While setting up and testing a new system can take 12-18 months, it takes much longer for employees to achieve the real competence needed to make complex decisions successfully and confidently.

Dave notes that only 10-20% of the skills taught in training programs translate into sustained on-the-job performance. She explains that this is because training often treats skill development as an isolated training event rather than a systemic performance requirement.

### Developing Workforce Capacity

Dave states that competence is not just knowing which button to press; it is the ability to troubleshoot when data inconsistencies occur, understand the impact of system operations on other processes, recognize situations that are technically possible within the system but violate business controls, and make correct decisions when encountering options not covered in training scenarios.

Therefore, developing workforce capacity in digital transformation is not just a training issue, but a governance issue. Successful organizations treat enhancing employee capabilities as an architectural and operational concern as important as data migration and integration testing.

### The Real Challenge of Digital Transformation: Transforming People

Dave offers specific recommendations to technology and operations managers: The difficult part of digital transformation is not implementing the technology, but transforming the people who will manage these technology platforms under real business conditions. A good digital transformation depends on employees being ready to use the new system reliably, at scale, and under real business pressure.

When real competence is built, success in digital transformation will be inevitable.

### Support for Digital Transformation

Automation.com Monthly continues to provide digital transformation support content for automation professionals in its February 2026 issue. In addition to its annual coverage of automation technology and operational technology cybersecurity trends, it continues to share application guides and important current topics related to digital transformation.

Seven online issues will be published in 2026. Although the PDF format of each issue can no longer be downloaded, the archive is always accessible, and the search function is quite effective. You can easily access the issues by bookmarking the archive page.

If you would like to share your own digital transformation experiences, your contributions are always welcome.

This article was published in the February 2026 issue of Automation.com Monthly magazine.