More than half of UK organisations say most or all of their digital transformation projects run over schedule, according to Reading Room. The finding comes from a survey of 150 digital transformation leaders at medium to large UK organisations.
Spending is still rising despite those delays. The research found 85% of respondents reported year-on-year increases, with most saying their organisations spend between £10 million and £25 million a year on large-scale digital transformation work.
Projects are most likely to falter not when organisations decide whether to invest, but during delivery. A third of those surveyed said implementation and integration is where digital transformation projects most commonly stall, ahead of strategy and planning at 17% and budget approval at 15%.
Among organisations reporting delays, the most common overrun was between three and six months. More than half of those with late-running projects fell into that range, while one in 10 said delays often stretched to as long as a year.
Where projects stall
The survey suggests execution, rather than appetite, is the central problem. When asked to rank the factors that most often slow digital delivery, respondents put compliance or security concerns first, followed by data quality issues and legacy technology challenges.
That mix suggests many organisations encounter barriers once projects move from planning into delivery, particularly where systems, governance requirements and existing technology estates must work together. It also indicates the main obstacles are not limited to software choices or budgets alone.
The pattern was consistent across sectors, organisation types and revenue bands, according to Reading Room. The agency said that points to delivery problems that often extend beyond technical complexity.
Polly Lygoe, Managing Director at Reading Room, said: "Our research found this implementation stalling pattern to be consistent across sectors, different types of organisations, and revenue bands, which points away from purely technical explanations and towards something more cultural. We find that implementation failures almost always come down to underestimating what large-scale transformation actually involves. There's a lot that needs to align to make them a success. Platform readiness, data readiness, programme stream alignment all need to come together at once. But the thing that organisations most consistently overlook is cultural readiness. Transformation tends to be driven by a few internal advocates for whom the change feels exciting and necessary, but what's harder to achieve is the thing that's actually most vital for successful implementation - genuine buy-in from the people impacted by the changes day-to-day."
The findings echo concerns raised in reviews of public sector digital programmes, where integration challenges and underestimating technical complexity have repeatedly contributed to delays and higher costs. In the private sector, the same pressures appear to be combining with organisational factors such as competing priorities and limited internal alignment.
Competing demands
Almost a third of respondents said their organisations have between six and 10 digital transformation projects running at the same time. Half said these competing internal priorities slow projects often or very often.
That volume of activity points to a broader management challenge for larger organisations, particularly those trying to update multiple systems, customer channels and operating processes at once. Even where budgets are available, overlapping initiatives can put pressure on staff, decision-making and sequencing.
Several of the barriers identified in the survey are also linked. Compliance and security requirements can delay work if they are addressed late in a project, while poor data quality can make implementation harder when teams are trying to integrate older systems with newer platforms. Legacy technology can add further friction by limiting how quickly organisations can test, migrate or roll out new services.
The survey covered digital transformation leaders at UK organisations with annual revenue of more than £30 million. Respondents were drawn from senior digital and marketing roles.
Lygoe said organisations should narrow their focus rather than pursue too many initiatives at once. "Appetite for digital transformation is growing, but many companies seem to be getting themselves a little lost and trying to do too much at once. The most successful projects are mapped out with a clear business case and expected outcomes from the start, are done in very clear, realistic phases, and are tracked and measured regularly throughout the process. Organisations would be wise to focus on a couple of business-critical areas, rather than trying to do everything at once. It's easy to get excited by and swept up in new technologies and the opportunities they present, but if companies are trying to do too much at once or there's not a clear business case, success will be limited."