Digital Strategy & Execution

Healthcare and Life Sciences

Financial Services

The Psychology of Change in Digital Transformation

The Psychology of Change

At Highberg Digital, we help our clients with their digital transformation journeys. Digital transformation can be seen as a journey that has an impact on the core of organizations and individuals. Each journey has its challenges and for digital transformation, it is the response of people to change. Some embrace the changes while others feel more comfortable with the well-known.

Kyra Koper

Netherlands

Digital

Strategy & Change

Ymere aims to become an efficient and results-oriented organization

Cost-effective through data-driven working

Ymere cost effective through data driven working

Ymere is driven by its mission to provide more people with modest incomes a good home in the Amsterdam metropolitan region and aims to become an efficient and results-oriented organization.

Ymere – Cost-effective through data-driven working

AFM is optimizing and digitizing its levy process

Establishment of the levy process at AFM

Establishment of chain collaboration and control of the levy process at afm

The Netherlands Authority for the Financial Markets (AFM) is optimizing and digitizing its levy process. An advisory report has been developed by Highberg, and the next step is implementation. This involves setting up cross-departmental (chain) collaboration with effective governance and meeting structures, communicating the change, and involving the organization.

Establishment of chain collaboration and control of the levy process at AFM

Organizational

Energy and Utilities

Retail and Consumer Goods

Technology and Telecommunications

(High Tech) Manufacturing and Logistics

Government and Public Sector

Media and entertainment

Tips for portfolio organization, the portfolio process and continuous improvement thereof.

Managing value with portfolio management – 3

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In the first part of this blog series I indicated that there can be several forms of development in an organization, but always with a common goal: realizing value. With portfolio management you find each other by continuously managing this in a coherent manner. In the follow-up blog I provided a set of concrete tools to continuously manage the highest value in a coherent manner. In this third and concluding part, I provide tips for portfolio organization, the portfolio process and continuous improvement thereof.

Managing value with portfolio management – Part 3

Guidelines for portfoliomanagement

Managing value with portfolio management – 2

In the first part of my blog series I indicated that in an organization with multiple development forms there is a common goal: realizing value. With portfolio management you achieve the highest value together by continuously managing this in a coherent manner. In this follow-up blog a set of handles.

Managing value with portfolio management – Part 2

People find it difficult to make choices and mainly driven by costs, not by value

Managing value with portfolio management

In organizations with many IT initiatives (development of front-end, ERP system, data platform, infrastructure, etc.) the following sometimes occurs: There is a lack of coherence between all these initiatives, people find it difficult to make choices and mainly driven by costs, not by value. Decision-making starts slowly and it takes a long time before initiatives are realized. All this does not benefit the working atmosphere, which may make it difficult to retain employees.

Managing value with portfolio management – Part 1

How to ensure that agile and devops teams realize the strategic organizational goals

SAFe portfolio management in practice

safe-portfolio-management-in-practice

How to ensure that agile and devops teams realize the strategic organizational goals?
Traditional portfolio management is based on multi-year and annual plans for projects and programs, with associated budgets and management. The portfolio is evaluated over the course of a financial year and priorities are recalibrated. Because the vast majority of technology is developed in an agile way, or even devops, this conflicts with the traditional portfolio cycle. Because agile teams do not commit to the long term; you don't have to expect any planning from these teams. Agile teams are accountable with reviews (demo) every two weeks; progress reporting as an accountability mechanism is a far cry. What is the guarantee worth to a portfolio manager that the capacity is properly allocated? How do you ensure that the realization of the agile teams is in line with the organizational strategy and therefore the portfolio?

Ron Mostert

Organisations have high hopes for their agile transformation. How to succeed?

How an agile transformation succeeds?

how-do-you-make-an-agile-transformation-succeed

Organisations have high hopes for their agile transformation. Yet after the initial successes, many organisations often find that their agile transformation gets stuck. The enthusiasm among employees, management and customers disappears. Improvement stalls or things even get worse. In this article, our experience of what often goes wrong and how to prevent it.

Geert Eggens

How do you make an agile transformation succeed?

Circumstances demand of every organization, that it be designed agile

Agile governance

agile-governance

Agile leadership 
Internal and external circumstances demand of every organization, that it be designed agile. The question is no longer whether you want to work agile, but how you set this up for your organization. And how you shape Agile leadership in doing so.

People

Anticipating an aging workforce and a tight labor market

Aging Workforce in a tight labor market

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With a strategic plan, you prepare the organization for the future. This also applies to Strategic Workforce Planning (SWP). This ensures that the right people are in the right place at the right time to achieve organizational goals.
A major insurer wanted to anticipate the aging of its current workforce in combination with the current tight labor market through strategic workforce planning. They received assistance from Highberg.

Alex Hellemons

The use of data analysis and visualizations for Strategic Workforce Planning (SWP)

Making the change to Datadriven HR, also known as People Analytics Transformation

People Analytics Transformation

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Many companies are beginning to embrace a data-driven HR approach. However, this shift is not always as straightforward as it may appear. In this piece, you can read a case study in which we successfully transitioned a client to a more data-driven way of working.

Gido van Puijenbroek

Making the change to Datadriven HR

interpreting and analyzing open-ended responses

How do you truly listen to your employees?

interpreting-and-analyzing-open-ended-responses

As an organization, you want your employees to enjoy their work. Happy employees ultimately lead to happy customers, and vice versa. Furthermore, employees who are satisfied with their work and employer are likely to stay with the organization for a longer time. This is particularly important now, given the significant challenges in the job market.
One way to measure the satisfaction of employees is through an Employee Satisfaction Survey (ESS). In this method, you ask a set of questions through a survey and repeat the process annually. Although almost every organization is familiar with an ESS, this traditional approach is becoming less popular. This is mainly due to the fact that the one-year interval is too long, the creation, facilitation, completion, and analysis of surveys consume a lot of time, and ultimately, the return on investment is perceived as insufficient.
An alternative to the Employee Satisfaction Survey (ESS) is a Voice of the Employee (VoE) Survey. With this approach, the focus is on structured and continuous measurement, analysis, interpretation, and follow-up of the 'voice of the employee.' It revolves around the employees' experiences, known as the Employee Experience. When you understand the employees' experiences and what influences them, you can respond accordingly.
This is precisely what a large insurer aimed to achieve with their Voice of the Employee Survey.

Interpreting and analyzing open-ended responses

Vitality & Absence analysis

What lead to absence?

which-personal-characteristics-work-and-organizational-conditions-lead-to-absence

Employee absenteeism is a silent disruptor that quietly undermines organizational vitality. Each absence chips away at productivity, leaving a noticeable void in the daily workflow. The burden on remaining staff intensifies, risking burnout and diminishing overall team morale. Hindering the achievement of organizational goals. Financially, the toll is felt with increased operational costs for temporary replacements or overtime payments.

Which personal characteristics, work and organizational conditions lead to absence?

Changes in financial sector are impacting staffing needs

Internally & external impact staffing needs

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Our client is a financial service provider with 100-200 employees. They are facing general changes, such as a recovering economy and increased automation. In addition, the financial service provider is considering an expansion of its services. All of this will probably lead to a shift in staffing needs.
AnalitiQs|Highberg worked together with the client to collect, process and analyse input. We subsequently created an overview showing which functions only require an increase in FTE in the short term and which functions require more FTEs in the long term.

How internal and external changes will impact staffing needs

Clients like to have an estimate even if the work is going to be done "agile".

How do I estimate my agile project?

Hoe begroot ik mijn agile project?

Clients like to have an estimate of functionality (still) to be built, even if the work is going to be done "agile". This seems perfectly justified to me. To estimate, two approaches are common in ICT: working with function points or working with story points. Function points have been around since the 1970s. Working with story points is relatively new and has grown in popularity, especially through agile working. It is sometimes claimed that one method works and the other does not. But this is a lot more subtle. 
When does what work best? Here are my insights on that question and my tips from practice.

Ed van Doorn

Innovation Management

Igniting a culture of innovation with the COIN Framework

From ideas to continuous innovation

from-ideas-to-continuous-innovation

A little over a year ago Achmea Schade Bedrijven, the Business-to-Business arm of the biggest Dutch insurance company, decided to structure their innovation processes using the <a href="https://continuousinnovation.net/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Continuous Innovation (COIN) Framework</a>. The trigger was the large number of innovation projects and initiatives but a lack of concrete outcomes and results, combined with a company-wide sentiment of “simply not getting around to it”. We sat down with Innovation Manager Nicole Stroeken to reflect on the results and learnings, as well as to discover the current challenges and next steps for innovation within Achmea Schade bedrijven.

Liz Derks

Purely in accordance with the letter of Scrum, is the Project Manager redundant?

Scrum challenges the role of Project Manager

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Purely in accordance with the letter of Scrum as an Agile methodology, the collaboration between Product Owner and (scrum) team makes the need for the classic Project Manager redundant. 

A Scrum Master and Product Owner, together with the scrum team, ensure that this task – just like 'testing' for example – is tackled within the team. For this 'self-organizing group of people', direct interaction is central to their mutual cooperation and coordination with stakeholders in the immediate environment.

Aart-Jan Eenkhoorn

Does Scrum really make the Project Manager redundant?

An Agile annual plan requires more than a day of scrumming

Agile annual plan: one day of scrumming?

We willen ons jaarplan met de Scrum-aanpak schrijven, wil jij ons begeleiden?

The end of the year is in sight. This also means the annual moment of looking back and forward. Luckily the caller can't see my smile when he asks: 
'We want to write our annual plan with the Scrum approach, would you like to guide us?' 
The smile is of a farmer with a toothache. Because although facilitating an annual planning session is interesting, it generally has nothing to do with what scrum is intended for.

Report differently in Agile software development to maintain grip and control

Report differently in Agile development

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In the software, past results do not guarantee future performance. Everyone knows examples of software developments that are stopped after so many years without results. Control mechanisms are therefore set up at every level. An important but often forgotten aspect of auditing is: how do you report when software is developed with Agile Working? Important because almost all software is developed with a form of Agile Working: Scrum, DevOps, SAFe, etc. Agile Working requires a different rhythm and different measuring instruments to maintain grip and control over software development.

Agile working or agile software development is not new. Four praticle tips how to manage.

Four practical tips for Agile management

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Agile working or agile software development is not new. Many types and forms of Agile software development have been used over the past 25 years. Each of these types brought a certain focus. Such as Rapid Application Development (RAD) in the 1990s with the bringing together of design and development and Extreme Programming with, among other things, the four eyes principle. Since the millennium, Scrum as an Agile approach has increased in popularity. Scrum is a form of incremental work in which working software is always delivered in small teams in a short time. A working piece of software then takes precedence over producing (a lot of) documentation.

Is Agile Programme Management the solution for 'getting a grip' on changes?

Agile MSP: getting a grip on change

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Darwin observed this 200 years ago: not the strongest or the smartest but the most agile survives. In times of disruptive technologies and changing business models, complex -and long-term- change requires a more agile kind of management.   

So is Agile Programme Management the solution for 'getting a grip' on these changes?

Does Agile working make sense with fixed requirements?

Agile working with fixed requirements?

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If the requirements for a system are known in advance and will therefore not change during the process, does agile working make sense? Because, as is often the reasoning I hear, agility or exploratory work is not necessary. In my opinion, this is only a half-truth and in this blog I would like to share my view on why the agile way of working can be very productive, even with fixed requirements.

Since the introduction of the GDPR, privacy has never been so prominent.

Agile working and privacy go hand in hand

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Since the introduction of the GDPR, privacy has never been so prominent. The GDPR requires by law that privacy has been considered in advance when realizing new services, processes and systems. This is called “Privacy by Design” (hereinafter PbD). Agile working, such as scrum, is delivered per sprint of 2-4 weeks, with a focus on rapid implementation of new functions. Privacy is often still regarded as a side issue or final element. I also repeatedly hear talk about the “privacy ballast” that would hinder Agile working and would also be contradictory to Agile principles. With this blog I want to emphasize that “Privacy by Design” fits perfectly into Agile working and that the two even reinforce each other.

Five reasons Why mergers and acquisitions fail... and how IT can prevent it!

Reasons why mergers and acquisitions fail

five-reasons-why-mergers-and-acquisitions-fail...-and-how-it-can-prevent-it

Approximately 4 out of 5 mergers and acquisitions (M&amp;A) are deemed failures in hindsight <a href="https://chiefexecutive.net/increasing-odds-success-merger/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">[1]</a> - <a href="https://www.zdnet.com/article/enterprise-architects-asked-to-take-the-lead-with-mergers-and-acquisitions/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">[2]</a>. This is a significant number, raising the question of why so many organizations still engage in M&amp;A activities. In this blog, I will delve into five different reasons why M&amp;As fail and what organizations can do on the IT front to minimize the chances of failure.

Daan van Horssen

Five reasons why mergers and acquisitions fail... and how IT can prevent it!

The number of mergers and acquisitions increased for the eighth consecutive year

Architecture in mergers and acquisitions

the-importance-of-architecture-in-mergers-and-acquisitions

Despite the challenges posed by the COVID-19 pandemic, the number of mergers and acquisitions in the Netherlands increased for the eighth consecutive year, making 2021 a record year. However, in the first half of 2022, the mergers and acquisitions market came to a standstill due to significant economic uncertainties<a href="https://fd.nl/bedrijfsleven/1443718/fusie-en-overnamemarkt-valt-stil-door-grote-economische-onrust" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">[1]</a>. This presents an opportunity to take stock of the situation.

The importance of architecture in mergers and acquisitions

Book ‘Grip on Agile working’ with experiences from public and private organizations.

Book ‘Grip on Agile working’

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At the successful CIO seminar “Grip on Agile Working” we brought together managers from public and private organizations to share experiences about managing organizations in relation to agile working. Because successfully applying the agile principles and achieving the agile ambitions of the organizations requires a different type of organizational management. We call the latter Agile Management.

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At Highberg, we help financial institutions navigate regulatory complexity, enhance operational efficiency, and drive digital transformation. Whether in banking, insurance, or investment management, our tailored solutions empower organizations to adapt, grow, and lead in an evolving financial landscape.

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