Building the Plane While Flying It: Lessons from a Strategic Transformation

Large-scale transformation rarely happens in ideal conditions. It happens while the business continues to operate, production stability must be protected, regulatory obligations remain, and priorities continue to shift.

This session shares practical lessons from a strategic technology transformation programme where platform modernisation also enabled a broader operating model shift. The discussion explores how delivery teams balanced migration, business-as-usual stability, stakeholder complexity, risk, readiness and adoption, while reshaping processes, ownership and ways of working.

Attendees will learn how to balance transformation with operational stability, recognise the operating model change beneath technology delivery, and shift success measures from implementation milestones to sustainable business value.

Key Takeaways

• The biggest risks in transformation are rarely technical: stakeholder alignment, decision-making and operating model readiness often determine success or failure.
• Waiting for perfect is the fastest way to stall transformation; practical approaches can deliver value while managing uncertainty, dependencies and competing priorities.
• Go-live is not the finish line: adoption, ownership and behavioural change ultimately determine whether transformation succeeds.

About the Speaker

Kristi van Tonder is a Technology Platform Lead at RMB Global Markets, leading the FX eTrading platform across South Africa and Africa. An analyst at heart, she began her career as a Business Analyst and developed a reputation for asking questions, challenging assumptions and finding clarity in complexity. Over time, that curiosity evolved into broader leadership across technology delivery, platform ownership, governance and strategic transformation. She is passionate about solving complex problems, developing people, and turning technology investments into tangible business value.