Vacation reading: Leading Digital and AI

In the ever-evolving landscape of technology. During my holiday, something that already feels like months ago, I had the opportunity of catch up on some reading. I spend time with the book Leading Digital by George Westerman, Didier Bonnet, and Andrew McAfee. The book focusses on understanding digital transformation, and I couldn’t help it but being triggered by it in the context of the ongoing AI revolution.

Over the last three years AI has moved from a buzzword to a something not to be ignored if I may believe the AI crowd on LinkedIn, much like digital transformation did a decade ago. The parallels between these two transitions are striking the more I thought about it, and I figured I would do a write-up of my thoughts.

Leading Digital

If you want to understand what it really takes to thrive in the digital age, you should definitely read the book yourself. It’s about how organizations lead, manage, and transform using digital capabilities, but a quick overview: the book focusses on two practices:

• Digital Capabilities: Using technology to improve customer experience, operations, and business models.
• Leadership Capabilities: Vision, governance, and engagement to make transformation succeed.

The magic happens when companies combine both—becoming “Digital Masters.” The book also introduces guidelines on the impact of digital processes, and the importance of vision, governance and people within this framework, as well as some practical steps. The fun part is that you can apply most of these practices to ’the’ AI transformation as well!

Leading AI transformation

Just as the Digital Masters that excelled in digital transformation, you can see AI Pioneers leading the charge in AI adoption. These organizations are characterized by their strategic use of AI to drive business value, much like Digital Masters leveraged digital technologies.

At Blis Digital we use a similar approach and use our 4 level AI-Adoption framework. We distinguish between AI - Users, Collaborators, Orchestrators and Champions, where the latter are the ones that really lead in AI adoption and provide the leadership capabilities described in Leading Digital. The parallels with Digital Masters are clear: both require a strategic vision, a focus on building capabilities, and a commitment to continuous improvement. You can read more about our framework in this blog post (in Dutch).

Level 1 – AI User

At this entry level, AI is used as a tool or assistant in isolated tasks (e.g. using GitHub Copilot for code suggestions, or ChatGPT for summarization). The workflow itself doesn’t change much; AI is more of a passive helper. The impact is limited, because the way people work remains mostly unchanged. In Leading Digital the parallel can be drawn that Digital Tools are used as Enablers, the early adoption of technologies; experimentation. In Leading Digital, many companies begin with digital technologies in limited areas (e.g. piloting tools, or building Proof of Concepts) before scaling.

Level 2 – AI Collaborator

Here AI is treated more like a teammate. The team begins to involve AI actively in tasks: for example, asking AI for drafts or options, integrating its suggestions more deeply, and learning to write better prompts. There is more awareness of when to trust AI vs when to inject human control, and AI becomes part of the work process.

Teams begin integrating AI into workflows, similar to how Leading Digital expects companies to start aligning operations around digital tools, improving efficiency, and changing processes. Also similar to learning to write good prompts, similar to developing competence in using digital tools effectively.

Level 3 – AI Orchestrator

At this level, AI is orchestrated across workflows. Instead of asking for individual prompts, entire parts of projects can be delegated to “AI agents” (automated tools / workflows) with clear contexts, constraints, and success criteria. There is also stronger governance, quality control, testing (e.g. test-driven development), and people begin thinking in terms of designing processes around AI rather than merely using AI in isolated tasks.

This aligns well with Leading Digital’s prescription for maturity: strong digital and leadership capabilities, ability to execute, embed change across processes.

Level 4 – AI Champion

This is the cultural / leadership level. People at this level do not only use AI well, but help others to grow: they teach, experiment, share what works (and what doesn’t), develop internal standards, documentation, tooling, governance. The goal is that AI capability spreads across the team or organization, not confined to early adopters. The culture supports experimentation, continuous learning,

Level 4 matches the leadership side: champions, internal evangelists, governance, enabling others. This is what Leading Digital says distinguishes digital masters: not just early adopters but organizations where digital is part of identity, where change is continuous and backed by leadership.

Gaining Strategic Advantage through AI

AI offers significant strategic advantages, much like digital transformation did. By leveraging AI, companies can gain a competitive edge, drive innovation, and achieve sustainable success, but it is not by just ‘using’ AI!

The lesson is clear: simply adding AI tools to existing processes will not deliver real transformation. Just as Leading Digital showed that digital mastery requires both technology and leadership, AI-first organizations must rethink how they work, organize, and lead. The shift is not about doing more with AI, but about working differently because of AI—adopting new mindsets, building new structures, and redistributing responsibilities. Those who embrace this change will shape the future; those who don’t risk being left behind.