It's talked about a lot in the maritime industry: how to digitize your business process. Should you simply just buy a software package from a well-known large international software vendor? If you want to do that, first read these tips to help you successfully digitize your business process to make it successful.
How to Digitize Your Maritime Business
Vision is often seen as a difficult subject. However, a vision on maritime digitalization is absolutely necessary to be successful. A ship does not sail without proper preparation. A vision is nothing more than defining the destination on the horizon that you want to reach with your digitalization efforts.
Maritime Digitalization: Success Requires Vision
In vision development you also determine what qualities your organization (people and processes) must have to make digitalization a success. Include the relevant departments, your colleagues, already in this phase. The sooner you involve the entire organization, the more willingness there will be for this digitalization effort.
And learn from the best, participate in maritime vision development training to help you transform your business through a comprehensive digital transformation strategy. Step-by-step. Shipbuilder, for example, offers such a maritime training course.
Have a Strong Strategy with Realistic Planning
Once the destination is clear and the quality of your organization is known, then you start working out the route to successful digitalization. Nautically speaking, you're going to set waypoints, i.e. goals with subgoals. The questions you need to ask are:
Realistic planning is necessary and also important. Look whether the people have sufficient quality to be able to do this. If not, train them.
Regarding software: From a large player? As far as we are concerned, you choose a scalable software tool that can grow along with your digitalization developments. Too often investments in maritime software solutions evaporate, because the software tools didn't fit the goals, or was way too overwhelming for a shipyard. One user-friendly and scalable option is Shipbuilder Software.
Take Action to Digitize Your Business
Timing is important as well. Of course, you can start digitizing too soon, but waiting too long can also hurt your business. Maritime competitors are developing their digitalization while you spend years waiting or musing over your plans.
Indeed, more and more maritime ship buyers are demanding a level of maritime digitalization that only digitally well-organized companies can deliver.
If you have professionally prepared and are willing to innovate with learning by doing, you are successful. It is also important that you record what you have learned in your new and optimized digital system. With that knowledge, processed in your digital tools, you can make your next projects better and more profitable. That's what we mean by Maritime knowledge-driven operations. And just like a ship in unfamiliar waters regularly needs a pilot, let your company be guided through the maritime digitalization process by professionals.
(Article courtesy Cees Verkerk, Shipbuilder Software)
