Tech strategy as a productivity engine

Most Canadian organizations aren’t short on technology. They’re short on impact.

Despite rising budgets for automation, AI, and digital platforms, productivity gains remain modest. We see a massive opportunity for Canadian businesses to optimize their tech adoption processes and strategically align technology to business opportunities.

Let’s first understand what might be holding organizations back and then explore actionable ways to address these challenges.

Tech investments are often disconnected from business priorities. Platforms get funded and rolled out, but there often remain massive opportunities to uplift revenue efficiency, customer service and overcome scattered efforts, underused systems, and frustrated teams.

And of course, legacy infrastructure adds friction. Data is often locked in outdated systems, making it hard to extract, trust, or use, which then blocks automation and AI from delivering real value. Even when the tools are available, they sometimes end up sitting idle because the data isn’t ready or few people know where it truly lives.

Cultural inertia is another barrier. Many organizations experience employees resisting change, leaders hesitating to fund new ideas, and good solutions getting stuck in approval loops. In many cases bureaucracy and silos are preventing teams from acting on high-impact ideas, so by the time something gets greenlit, the opportunity has passed.

Investing in the fix is predicated on maximizing the value of the transformation programs at large. It’s about making tech strategy more practical, more connected to the business, and more responsive to real-world constraints.

Start by asking:

• Are our tech investments solving the right problems?
• Are we enabling our people to act on good ideas?
• Are we measuring what matters?
• Are we working on what matters?

Executives should consider looking beyond the tools and focusing on how decisions are made, how quickly their teams can act, and whether the organization is set up to learn and adapt. A tech strategy that’s close to the business operationally and culturally is far more likely to deliver results.

Here’s what Canadian organizations can do starting this quarter:

• Run a fast, focused tech maturity check.
  Use a simple framework to assess where your tech systems are blocking productivity. Focus on data flow, automation readiness, and integration gaps. You don’t need a 100-slide deck, just a clear view of what’s working and what’s not.
• Optimize your active project portfolio.
  For each one, ask: What business metric will this improve? If the answer isn’t clear, pause or pivot. Prioritize initiatives that reduce manual work, speed up decisions, or improve customer experience.
• Instill a culture of effectiveness and follow through.
  Great ideas are cheap – execution and follow through matter to realize true business value. Reward your people for executing on ideas that feed productivity.
• Start by fixing one legacy bottleneck.
  Choose a single outdated system that’s holding back a high-value process. Don’t aim to replace it but rather extract the data you need to automate or analyze that process. Quick wins build momentum and prove the value of tech strategy alignment.
• Train managers to spot (and implement) automation opportunities.
  Most productivity gains come from frontline insights. Look to equip leaders with simple tools to identify repetitive tasks and route them to automation teams. Better yet, make it part of their KPIs.
• Create a “fast lane” for high-impact ideas.
  Set up a small cross-functional team that can approve and execute tech-enabled solutions in under 30 days. Give them a budget and a mandate to bypass red tape. This isn’t about breaking governance. It’s about speeding up decisions that already make sense.

Avoid the common traps that stall productivity gains:

• Don’t declare victory on the idea alone.
• Don’t launch another digital transformation program without fixing the basics.
• Don’t invest in AI if your data is still siloed or unstructured.
• Don’t assume your teams know how to use the tools you’ve already bought.
• Don’t wait for perfect alignment. Start with what’s actionable and build from there.
• Don’t let governance become a bottleneck for ideas that already make sense.

If your tech strategy isn’t delivering productivity gains, it might be time to rethink how decisions are made, how quickly teams can act, and whether your operating model truly supports innovation.

The organizations that will lead are the ones that can connect business goals to tech execution, remove friction from decision-making, and build cultures that reward learning and adaptability.