AI and Enterprise Transformation: The Human Side of Making It Work Ft. Erica Volini

Rajat Kohli: Hi, welcome to another episode of Zinnov Podcast. I’m Rajat, Partner with Zinnov, and today we’re going to have a very interesting conversation. Before I introduce the person, I wanted to set the context. If you look at enterprise transformation, it has been one of the biggest promises over the last many years.

Boards have pumped in the money. Consulting firms have invested a lot into that. Platform companies have been valued on the back of it. However, yet another study after study, it is coming out that the majority of the transformation is failing what they’re supposed to deliver. What are the key reasons? Is it the technology? Is it the people? Is it the strategy?

Those are the things that we want to uncover, and somehow the industry is not able to accept that. What are the challenges? That’s what we are seeing. So the question is why enterprise transformation is failing, and we believe that technology is not the reason.

And the person that I’m talking to today, she brings a lot of experience from different ecosystem entities. She’s spent many years at Deloitte, advising large enterprises on transformation. Then she moved to ServiceNow to build and lead the partner ecosystem, that partner ecosystem that promised enterprise transformation, and now she’s with MongoDB to manage and grow customer outcomes.

So she has looked at it from three different seats, three different systems, but trying to solve the same problem, and I’m super happy to welcome her today. Welcome, Erica Volini.

Erica Volini: Thank you so much for having me here, Rajat.

Rajat Kohli: Yeah, it’s super exciting to have a conversation with you. Before I get into those hard questions, and definitely I’ll come to the hard questions. I’ll give the floor to you.

I have introduced you from the problem that we are trying to solve, but who are you? What are you trying to do today, and how do you define the through-line between Deloitte, ServiceNow, and MongoDB?

Erica Volini: Oh, that’s a big question. That is not an easy question.

So, as you said, right now I’m the Chief Customer Officer for MongoDB. But I think the through-line for everything I’ve done has always been transformation, and it’s really always been anchored in organizational change.

At Deloitte, I led the human capital practice globally, and we were helping organizations navigate work transformation, workforce transformation, in the face of technology coming in – whether it was ERP, the cloud, or navigating the complexities of SaaS technologies, and even early-stage AI and RPA.

It was about helping them figure out how to leverage the technology and how it could have an impact on the way they do work. That was at the core.

At ServiceNow, taking over the partner world, it was almost the same. It was all about a big organizational change. I came in because our CEO, Bill McDermott, had big objectives for the company. He wanted the company to really change its brand from being pure ITSM to a true enterprise platform. And he wanted to grow revenue exponentially. And he knew he couldn’t do that without partners and the ecosystem.

So there it was about changing the nature of partners fundamentally – going from delivery capacity to a true revenue-producing function. But again, it was all about that transformation in the face of new business strategies.

And now at MongoDB, it’s the same thing. So that’s been the through-line throughout my career, and honestly, I think that’s the core. And we’ll talk about this – the unlock for AI as well.

Rajat Kohli: It strikes me that technology is not the only reason in this transformation journey. There’s a big gap between what organizations intend to achieve and where they are today. What are the initial signals you’re seeing? Why is this gap there?

Erica Volini: Ultimately, everything we do, if it impacts employees, is about behavioral change. You’re asking employees to behave and act differently, and that change management is hard.

Technology is not the outcome. You don’t get to go-live and say we’re done. The system is an enabler. It unlocks potential, but humans need to change how they work and interact. That’s a massive effort.

And what we’re finding is that we’re not taking enough time to step back and evaluate how work is being done today. Then define how work should be done in the future – not incrementally, but fundamentally.

And then create a world where humans feel they have a role. That’s the tricky part with AI.

There was a study that came out – 80% of white-collar workers are rebelling against AI mandates. 54% are ignoring them, and another 30% aren’t using AI at all. A big part of the reason is fear. They don’t see themselves in the future.

So how do you bring them along? That’s the challenge. And this isn’t new – we’ve been talking about change management since ERP days. It’s just becoming more important.

Rajat Kohli: If I ask you personally, how do you see that?

Erica Volini: I understand it. It’s fear and survival instinct. But here’s how I look at it—the only truly exponential asset a company has is human creativity.

AI works on existing knowledge. Humans create new knowledge. That’s what we need to explain to people. There will always be a need for humans to create, innovate, and think differently.

AI helps us do that faster – but humans still define what’s next.

Erica Volini: And I think there is a way to create that space within organizational constructs. It’s just hard work to do it.

Rajat Kohli: Well, coming back to, as you mentioned, the Deloitte days, the ServiceNow, and now MongoDB. Which one of those changed you the most, and what change happened?

Erica Volini: Oh gosh. They all taught me a lot of different things, right? But I think ServiceNow was a big change for me because that was the first time I got to put together both sides of the equation.

I had seen what it was like to be a partner at Deloitte. We were a partner of ServiceNow, and I was also the Chief Commercial Officer for the ServiceNow relationship. And then at ServiceNow, I got to see what it was like managing partners.

So I truly got to see both sides of the same equation – what partnerships look like as the partner, and what partnerships look like as the technology company leading partnerships. That ability to truly see the same issue from both sides of the coin – that was game-changing for me.

Because when you gain that understanding of what both sides are thinking, you can come up with incredible solutions. Now you can speak both languages. You don’t need a translator in the middle.

And it really taught me that I need to take the time to truly understand and live in the customer’s world. Now that I’m in MongoDB, how do I live in that world and absorb it? Because then I’ll be able to understand what they’re feeling and come up with solutions that actually work.

That mindset shift was incredibly important. I don’t think a lot of people get to see both sides of the coin. And it was really powerful for me – it was a massive mindset shift.

Rajat Kohli: Sure. Now looking at that, going back to that statement – if you go back to Deloitte or ServiceNow – have you ever walked away from an enterprise deal where you realized that a transformation is not going to take place? And what was the learning that you used for future engagements?

Erica Volini: I’ve never walked away, but there are many situations where I should have.

People always ask, what’s your moment of failure? And I’m like – which one do you want to talk about?

The biggest lesson I had was during a transformation at Deloitte for a very large pharmaceutical company. They were trying to standardize everything in an outsourced model. But this company didn’t do anything in a standard way. They were essentially a series of companies under one brand.

I should have known from the beginning – this isn’t going to work. It’s completely counter-cultural. But they had signed the contract, and we continued to push through.

What happened was the controller pulled the plug – literally the morning we were going to cut over on payroll.

And it had been brewing the whole time. We should have stepped back and asked—is this the right decision for your culture?

But sometimes you get so caught up in execution that you don’t step back.

Now, when I see early signals – something feels off, people aren’t aligned – I try to pause and ask: am I seeing this correctly? Should we pull back?

It’s hard, because you want to execute. But this applies directly to AI as well. If adoption isn’t happening, you can’t just push harder – more training, more mandates.

Instead, you need to ask why. Once you understand the why, you can find a different path to the outcome.

Rajat Kohli: There are different versions of transformation that look good on paper – the milestones are achieved, the solution is released—but in reality, nothing changes in the organization. How common is that?

Erica Volini: It’s incredibly common.

Because you’re measuring the “what” – did we go live, did we complete testing – but that’s just the beginning. It always drives me crazy when a project plan ends at go-live.

It’s not a straight line. You have to continuously drive adoption.

We’re seeing this right now with AI. There are gains in individual usage and performance, but it’s not translating at the enterprise level.

The disconnect is that people are using the tools, but they’re not changing the nature of the work.

If you use new technology within old processes, you’ve just made old processes more efficient. That’s not transformation.

True transformation is a new way of working.

And that requires creating a safe space for people to reinvent work. At Deloitte, we used to call it the re-architecture of work.

It’s like building a house – you can’t just tweak things. If you want real change, you have to change the foundation.

Rajat Kohli: It is. But Erica, it’s easy to say and difficult to execute.

Erica Volini: Yes.

Rajat Kohli: And even the example – you wish you could have done that. But how do you relate it into the organization, like the current organization?

Erica Volini: I think part of it is finding the people in your organization who are true change-makers. And I don’t mean the senior executives – that’s often a mistake.

We tend to push everything top-down, but this kind of change often comes bottom-up. You need to identify the real influencers in the organization – the people who shape how work actually gets done.

There are even tools that map influence – through emails, chats, collaboration patterns. Find those people, bring them in, explain the business rationale, connect it to the strategy, and make them early adopters.

Then let them showcase what’s possible. Create space for working sessions, ideation sessions.

At Deloitte, we talked about “digital DNA” – the characteristics that make a company truly digital. One of the most important was the ability to fail fast and treat failure as a strength.

How do you build that into your culture? How do leaders become more transparent about experimentation – what worked, what didn’t, and what they learned?

You have to treat this like a full-scale program, just like a technology implementation. Culture change needs to be executed end-to-end.

Rajat Kohli: Interesting. Let’s talk about fragmentation – across teams, platforms, and ownership.

At ServiceNow, you built a large partner ecosystem – 2000+ partners. At what point did you realize that this network itself can become a source of complexity?

Erica Volini: Where do I begin?

Ultimately, the complexity wasn’t the technology. ServiceNow is actually quite easy to configure and implement.

The complexity comes from getting it into the customer’s environment – aligning with their policies, regulations, and ways of working—and then driving adoption.

That’s what separates a good partner from a great partner.

A great partner understands not just the technology, but the customer’s business environment, the change management required, and the fact that go-live is the starting point – not the end.

From there, the focus should be: are they using it? Are they adopting it? Are they seeing impact? Can they articulate value?

Our best partners focused on that – and used it to drive expansion.

Rajat Kohli: Was there any learning from Deloitte that you applied at ServiceNow, and then from ServiceNow to MongoDB?

Erica Volini: At Deloitte, I learned that transformation is about storytelling.

You need to inspire people, connect everything back to business strategy, and then bring it down to the individual.

At ServiceNow, I didn’t come in thinking about “partner strategy.” I started with the company’s strategy, and then defined what partners needed to do to support that.

That was a big shift.

Now at MongoDB, I’m applying what I learned about the power of ecosystems.

We need to show up with partners from the beginning – not as an afterthought. Customers expect a unified ecosystem, not disconnected vendors.

We should show up as one team, focused on delivering value.

Rajat Kohli: Ownership at the customer end is still unclear – CIO, CDO, CISO – everyone wants to own transformation. Is this a leadership failure?

Erica Volini: No, I don’t think so. The reality is that it’s hard to have a single owner.

Everything today is cross-functional.

Take AI – is it workforce or technology? It’s both.

So instead of creating more isolated roles like Chief AI Officer, we need cross-functional governance.

Technology companies also need to adapt. Sales is no longer to a single stakeholder – you’re dealing with multiple stakeholders with different objectives.

You need to align them and show how everyone wins.

Rajat Kohli: You meet a lot of enterprise leaders. Who impresses you the most?

Erica Volini: Transparency is at the top.

Leaders who are open, who share what’s really happening, who are humble, and willing to understand how work actually gets done.

Also, leaders who can inspire and build trust.

Trust is currency.

And leaders who can make tough decisions – who can say no, even when something looks good on paper.

Because prioritization is everything.

Rajat Kohli: There’s a lot of tension with AI – opportunity vs fear. How do you navigate that?

Erica Volini: You make it about the individual.

People need to see themselves in the future. They need to understand what skills they’re building.

If they don’t see themselves in the story, they won’t participate.

That’s why we’re seeing resistance.

Honestly, I think every leader should study human behavior and organizational dynamics. If you can’t drive behavioral change, technology won’t deliver outcomes.

Rajat Kohli: Boards are asking for AI ROI in 12–18 months. What’s happening behind the scenes?

Erica Volini: AI is a huge expense.

Companies are trying to figure out how to fund it, sometimes through layoffs.

They’re also looking for partners who don’t just bring technology – but bring a new way of working.

That’s what they really need.

Rajat Kohli: Are customers confident in their AI journey?

Erica Volini: No. It’s changing too fast.

They need strong support – from both platform companies and partners.

It’s a long journey, and we’re still at the very beginning.

Rajat Kohli: What are partners expecting from companies like yours?

Erica Volini: They want responsiveness and deeper understanding.

Customers are asking us to truly understand their business, how technology is used, and how it impacts outcomes.

They don’t want vendors, they want partners.

Rajat Kohli: If a CIO is working with multiple vendors, what should they do?

Erica Volini: Get everyone in a room.

Align on a shared goal.

A true ecosystem means everyone shows up for the customer – not for their own agenda.

Without that alignment, you’ll have great tools but no integration, and no real impact.

Rajat Kohli: What about data readiness?

Erica Volini: You cannot have AI without data.

It’s the biggest barrier after change management.

Data today is complex and unstructured. Companies need better infrastructure, access, governance, and scale.

That’s critical.

Rajat Kohli: Final question – your advice to platform companies?

Erica Volini: Focus on the business problem, not just features.

Build deep customer intimacy.

Have a clear point of view – what do you stand for?

That’s how you build trust and become the platform of choice.

Rajat Kohli: That’s a very important point – what you should be known for.

And as we discussed, technology alone is not the reason transformations fail. There are many other factors.

Thank you so much for the conversation today, Erica Volini. It was wonderful to have you.

Erica Volini: Thanks for having me.