By: Jotham Lim

A study has found that Malaysian companies are leading in the Asia Pacific region in terms of quantifying the return from their digital transformation initiatives, with 58% of C-Level executives seeing measurable returns. By comparison, only 47% of companies in Singapore and 34% in Japan had seen returns.

Workday, a global leader in enterprise technology for finance and human resources, has released the study titled, “Digital Dysfunction in Asia Pacific”, in partnership with IDC Asia Pacific.

“As Malaysia’s digital economy rapidly expands, it is great to see that local companies are keeping pace and leading the region in their efforts to digitally transform. Despite this success, there still remains work to do to break down company silos to effect change at an enterprise level,” said Rob Wells, President of Workday Asia.

The study looks at the barriers to digital transformation from the perspectives of 1,000 C-level Executives and business leaders in Human Resources (HR), Finance and Information Technology.

49% of C-level executives in Malaysia see organisational silos as a key challenge – an environment where a company’s departments do not share operational information with one another.

“The key theme that comes through in this research is the lack of collaboration and integration among different functions across the region. Digital transformation is a team sport and requires strong support from the top and close collaboration among team members, from HR and Finance to IT and digital teams,” said Daniel-Zoe Jimenez, Assistant Vice President of IDC Asia Pacific.

“Key investment in the right technologies will help both increase employee and finance visibility and drive cross-departmental collaboration, accelerating digital transformation success,” Daniel-Zoe further commented.