Imagine yourself in one of your favourite cities in the world — your favourite travel destination. You’re excited to walk down the streets and through the parks, learn about the architecture or go to a music concert. You can’t wait to enjoy all the great restaurants, as well as long conversations with your friends and the locals. Your travel itinerary is probably full of things to do, places to visit, maps with directions on how to get to some of the lesser known spots, and reservations for restaurants and hotels.

But when it comes to travel, experience has also taught you that some of the best memories come when least expected — from spontaneous decisions, trying something new, meeting new people and sharing your stories, losing your way and walking into that unknown alley. I’m sure in your mind you are already travelling back in time to your favourite travel memories.

Your “digital journey” is actually quite similar to leisure travels. Enterprises in every industry are on a journey to reinvent themselves as technology companies. In other words, organisations are set to transform operations and business models using constantly evolving new digital capabilities. The key question on everyone’s mind is: How do you do it? There is only so much you can and want to plan, both as a traveller and regarding your digital transformation. You want to explore options, envision new ideas, get inspired by someone who has done it before and enjoyed it, create minimum viable products, pilots, prototypes. You want to take a turn down an unknown street, safely.

With the “Your pathway to digital success”  series on THRIVE, DXC’s platform for thought leadership, we want to help you explore your personal city of digital transformation. This guide was created based on research by IDC analysts as well as the conversations and experiences of numerous companies working together with DXC Technology on their digital journeys. We hope these insights inspire and help you build new capabilities and understand the steps along the pathway to success.

We understand that digital transformation isn’t easy. It’s a long process and requires hard work. Does digital transformation ever really end, we wonder. To be successful, you need to be a fearless organisation, have the right performance indicators, an environment where it’s possible to fail without shame, and very importantly, have a culture of innovation. Digital transformation is not an initiative, a project or a program, and it does not happen in isolation. Stakeholders from across the entire organisation will need to find common ground and collaborate. The change needs to come from the top down, new budgets need to be set, skills upgraded and digital talent attracted.

We hope that studying the chapters of this “travel blog” will take you even further on the digital transformation path. At any point in your journey, feel free to reach out to us, join our community and share your own experience. If digital transformation teaches you one thing, it’s that collaboration is essential. You don’t have to do it all on your own; you can rely on an entire ecosystem of partners.

This article is part of the “Your pathway to digital success” series, written to inspire business leaders to overcome common challenges along their organisations’ journeys.