Digital maturity, measured

A maturity assessment is only useful if the organisation recognises itself in it. That means measuring with one instrument across every entity — including the headquarters that commissioned the study — and letting the group hear its own voice: verbatims, scores against the group average, and the gaps between what people say and what the data extracts show.

In a diversified group, the finding is often the same: the holding is the entity least equipped to lead the transformation it demands. No transformation function, outsourced IT unable to challenge vendors, fragmented reporting, Excel everywhere. We call it the holding paradox, and naming it is the first useful act of the assessment, because it reframes the question from “which projects” to “which role for the centre”.

The role we recommend most often is control and steering: a control tower of two to five people who judge evidence rather than produce deliverables, subsidiary-owned roadmaps, and performance contracts. The tower validates that a project has passed its gates — system of record, examined data, named product owner, subsidiary funding, cheap first step — and the subsidiaries and providers deliver.

Use cases follow, not lead. In one group, 80 candidates became nine, then six deepened; an AI project on port terminals was re-sequenced behind dashboards and data discipline, while irrigation and electricity use cases worth a measurable amount per hectare went first. Credibility came from that sequencing, not from the number of use cases found.