Executive Summary

In recent articles we explored how a perceived lack of data is not the barrier to commercially impactful decision making in online channels, and that software is not the promised solution. This begs the question – what is the real challenge organisations must address in order to see greater impact of their investments?

The problem? It’s the organisation!

It is inefficiencies in the operating model that most significantly hold back effective decision making and commercial impact of digital teams with many organisations struggling to effectively align the three components essential for success in digital effectiveness; People, Proficiency and Process.

By mapping organisational effectiveness against these criteria, decision makers and digital leads can obtain a holistic view of their operating model to identify where, and why, they need to improve. This often reveals that organisations do not struggle for lack of people or proficiency but rather through the lack of effective processes for data, insight and experimentation that hold back otherwise ambitious, capable teams from delivering impact.

An ineffective process experimentation in online channels results in an operating model that prioritises opinion and volume over informed and effectively prioritised investments. As a result, despite significant energy invested from teams, organisations fail to see impact.

At its heart, innovation in online channels is scientific and it is through adoption of the scientific method that organisations are most likely to see value impact of their activity. By first understanding their shortfalls in effectiveness, organisations can undertake targeted programmes of change and development that address these opportunities to embed a model for innovation that is consistent with scientific best principles, allows for alignment of investment with customer understanding, unblocks product roadmaps, delivers commercial value and provides room for innovation and creativity.

To unlock commercial impact, you must unblock the operating model.

The Challenge

Organisations are not struggling due to the lack of data or software, but rather because of the way they operate. The barrier to effective decision making is not a lack of data or the need for more technology: It’s the organisation.

Inefficiencies, unclear decision-making structures and outdated ways of working prevent digital teams from turning insight into commercial impact. Whilst many organisations recognise that something feels “off”, few can diagnose the precise challenges behind slowing performance. This leads to well‑meaning but rarely effective programmes of investment, digital transformation and costly consulting engagements that in many cases fail to solve the underlying issues.

Organisations struggling with ineffective operating models typically encounter one or more of the following challenges:

• Insufficient capacity

• Limited room for innovation

• Unanswered questions of performance

• Opinion-led decision making

These challenges accumulate over time; expectations increase but the operating model fails to evolve at the same pace. This creates a widening gap between ambition and reality, which no amount of software investment can bridge. This results in frustration, fading commercial impact, loss in return on investment and the yielding of ground to the competition.

To be successful, operating models for digital organisations requires alignment of three ingredients: People, Proficiency, and Process. When any one of these falls behind, commercial impact fades.

People

Organisations need sufficient capacity to match their ambition. Recruitment can address this, but often creates its own complications: onboarding delays, increased management overhead and process strain. Many organisations also face budget constraints that make significant headcount expansion unrealistic.

This is where efficiency becomes the lever with the greatest return. By reducing time spent on low‑value activities, improving prioritisation and through smart use of automation and AI for repetitive tasks, teams can reclaim capacity without additional cost.

Additionally, effective digital teams require benefit from the shared awareness of:

• Why they exist (purpose)

• What they must achieve (objectives)

• How their work drives value (commercial context)

Empowerment is the final requirement. Even highly capable teams stall when every decision requires senior approval. Speed, accountability and confidence all depend on trust.

Proficiency

Digital effectiveness requires a specific blend of skills; analytical, scientific and operational. Many organisations have strong UX, CRO or marketing expertise but lack deeper capabilities in statistics, experimental design or advanced data analysis.

Without these capabilities, teams may run experiments but misinterpret results, produce dashboards but not insight, or identify problems without knowing how to address their root causes.

Organisations can address gaps in proficiency through recruitment, training, or professional services. Often, a combination of these solutions delivers the greatest and fastest uplift. The key is recognising that proficiency is not optional: data‑driven teams must be fluent in evidence, not just familiar with it.

Process

Even with strong people and robust proficiencies, process is where many organisations fall behind.

Poor processes create bottlenecks, slow decision-making and limits the scale and ambition of experimentation with organisations suffering from a process gap being associated with:

• Dashboard‑watching instead of true analysis

• Over-focus on data perfection and alignment

• Rigid product roadmaps with no room for iteration or change

• Commercial storytelling that avoids transparency

• Velocity based KPIs that misalign teams and create conflicting priorities

These behaviours result in the challenges covered in recent articles; organisations bemoan a constant need for ‘more data’ and ‘better software’ without identifying the real barriers to impactful decision making and growth in digital channels.

The scientific method

Outsee Analytics is, at its heart, scientific and the scientific method provides an ideal framework for innovation in digital channels. It forces clarity and creates a rhythm of discovery and improvement that aligns teams and accelerates activity.

Effective application of the scientific method to digital effectiveness drives positive feedback loops; insight informs experimentation; experimentation address customer frustration, performance improves, new insights are created which inform iterations to previous experiments.

Applied correctly, the scientific methods becomes a powerful engine for innovation that moves teams away from opinion and towards measurable, reliable progress. The ultimate outcome being sustainable, measurable commercial impact, not only in optimisation efforts but marketing, CRM and product strategy.

Enabling effectiveness

Embedding an effective operating model for digital effectiveness begins by identifying the greatest opportunities and areas for improvement, this is achieved through an organisational effectiveness mapping.

Outsee Analytics maps organisational effectiveness across People, Proficiency and Process to identify strengths, weaknesses and opportunities. Our mapping processes produce an effectiveness score (from 1–5) within each theme (People, Proficiency, Process), highlighting where investment in capability development will drive the greatest improvement.

People effectiveness is measured against capacity, purpose, objectives and empowerment with typical behaviours associated with these components at varying levels of organisational effectiveness shown below:

Proficiency effectiveness is measured against core capabilities, data analytics, statistical methods and experimentation principles with typical behaviours associated with these components at varying levels of organisational effectiveness shown below:

Process effectiveness is measured against data and customer centricity, hypothesis creation and alignment with the scientific method, typical behaviours associated with these components at varying levels of organisational effectiveness shown below:

Not every organisation needs to achieve perfection; even moving from level 2 to level 3 can unlock significant value if applied correctly to change and experimentation programmes.

Conclusion

The commercial impact of investments in digital, be them optimisation, product, marketing or otherwise is limited not due to a lack of data or software but rather due to barriers put upon digital teams by the organisation itself.

To be effective, and to see positive commercial impact of their investments, organisations require the effective alignment of People, Proficiency and Process against an overarching commercial ambition.

In many cases, organisations do not struggle for a lack of People or Proficiency with teams being populated by eager, capable individuals, but rather due to a lack of effective Process – it is the absence of a clearly defined and adhered to process for change and experimentation that most significantly holds back commercial impact.

Fundamentally, improvement of online channels is scientific and Outsee Analytics advocates strict alignment of digital programmes to the scientific method. This provides organisations a framework for experimentation led by customer insight that delivers sustained commercial impact through an iterative approach and provides room for innovation through the alleviation of commercial pressures.

Organisations that seek to improve their operating model must begin by mapping their organisational effectiveness to identify where, and why, the organisation needs to improve. This allows organisations to focus their time and resources on addressing the barriers to their own effectiveness that will, in turn, allow for greater commercial impacts of their investments in online channels. The result being sustained commercial growth, surpassing that of the competition.