Digital transformation may be hotter than Las Vegas in August, but there’s a disconnect between the progress companies are making toward becoming more digital and their perceptions of their own success.

QuickBase Inc., a former Intuit Inc. subsidiary that makes programming tools for mere mortals,, surveyed 301 IT and operational decision-makers in the U.S. and found that digital transformation is, indeed, top of mind. More than two-thirds of senior management rated it as a top organizational priority, and C-level executives were nearly unanimous putting transformation at the top of their priority list.

Four in five respondents said digital transformation is going just great at their companies, but when asked for details of how they’re actually transforming, their confidence appeared to be a bit overstated.

For one thing, only 30 percent of non-executive managers said their organizations are ahead of the transformation curve compared to their peers. That contrasted with 70 percent of the C-level executives who thought they were outdistancing the competition. Clearly, the top brass is a bit more enamored of its own excellence.

Results also indicated that organizations aren’t changing the way they build applications all that much. Two-thirds of respondents said their IT application development teams are developing the applications of digital transformation. Only 23 percent said non-IT staff are building their own applications.

Those findings stand at odds with the conventional concept of digital transformation, which holds that users should take the reins in defining and building the applications they use.

It’s not for lack of understanding that these so-called “citizen developers” have an important role to play. Asked if it’s important for employees to build their own solutions, 84 percent of respondents agreed. They’re just not walking the walk right now

“IT and executive decision-makers have been laser-focused on achieving digital transformation this year, but they’re approaching the problem with the wrong mindset,” QuickBase concluded. Of course, it’s in the company’s best interests to say that, but the results of the survey, which had a margin of error of 5.6 percent would indicate that they have a point.

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