Rethinking digital transformation: from digitisation to collaborative value creation

The digital transition is frequently discussed as a race to adopt the latest technologies. However, for the Cultural and Creative Sectors and Industries particularly experience-based sectors like festivals, museums, live music and performing arts this technology-first approach does not apply. Sustainable digital transformation is not a matter of isolated tool adaptation. It is a structural, ecosystem-level challenge that requires shifting from individual institutional silos to shared, collaborative data practices. 

The structural challenges in the cultural and creative sectors

The structure of cultural and creative sectors is unique as it involves various networks of micro-organizations, creative individuals and multiple public institutions. Nevertheless, these distinctive features create barriers in the context of digital transition: 

• Sectoral fragmentation: The CCSI is highly fragmented across very different disciplines and sub-sectors that rarely intersect in practice and learn from each other. 

• Uneven digital maturity: Even though some institutions have proper IT resources, most cultural organisations operate with limited technical equipment and low internal data literacy. 

• The perception gap: There is a widespread lack of skills and knowledge regarding digital transitions, data is frequently perceived as irrelevant within individual institutions. 

Thus, such issues significantly hinder the ability of organisations to utilise and exchange data properly causing valuable information to be confined within organisational boundaries. 

The misconception of digital transformation 

While cultural institutions do try implementing digital projects, they usually mistake the notion of digital transformation for digitization. 

Digitalization focuses strictly on converting physical assets into digital formats such as scanning paper archives or adopting tools like online ticketing systems. While these changes are necessary operational upgrades, they do not address the deeper structural barriers of sectoral fragmentation and misaligned organisational workflows. 

When an organisation introduces complex new software without upskilling its workforce or reorganizing its internal structures, it creates a tool misfit. Instead of driving innovation, the technology strains staff while yielding minimal long-term value. 

To access the real value of data, the CCSI must adopt an ecosystem logic. An ecosystem is defined as a multilateral network of partners that must interact for a central value objective to materialize. Applied to the cultural sector, this requires a transition toward Collaborative Data Ecosystems (CDEs): 

A Collaborative Data Ecosystem is a network of organisations that manage, share, and use data through common governance frameworks, ensuring security, an ethical approach and data sovereignty while enabling collective value creation that would not be possible individually. 

CDEs amplify and act upon the value of data by connecting otherwise siloed insights, fostering cross-sector learning and accelerating the development of new services. By moving beyond simple and one-time data exchanges, a CDE allows permanent cross-sector data practices. 

Value in an ecosystem cannot be generated by isolated actors. For example, an individual festival tracking its audience demographics creates limited value on its own. However, when multiple regional festivals, transport authorities and local museums share data through a unified framework, they unlock aggregated insights. This model allows them to optimize regional tourism, map cultural participation patterns, and design joint programming. 

Ultimately, shifting to a CDE requires redirecting focus away from raw infrastructure and toward coordination, governance and trust. Data must be trusted, data owners must maintain sovereignty and actors with different digital capacities must operate under shared rules. 

The ARCHS framework: 

The EXCENTRIC project developed the conceptual and adaptive framework called the ARCHS, whose first iteration was published as a living document in September 2025. Rather than evaluating an organization’s digital readiness purely through technological capacity, the ARCHS model assesses it across three interconnected levels: the individual worker, the institution and the collaboration network. 

Using tools like the ARCHS Compass, institutions can visualize where they stand across these dimensions, helping them to plan clear conversion tracks that will lead to structured solutions. The framework relies on five core interdependent principles designed to ensure that technology serves human, structural and public missions: 

• Adaptive: This pillar refers to the operational flexibility and internal resilience within leadership and the workforce. It ensures that cultural teams can dynamically adjust to evolving technical systems, skills acquisition and fluctuating socio-economic pressures. 

• Responsible: This principle demands strict legal compliance with frameworks like GDPR and the AI Act while anchoring data management in an ethical foundation. It actively prioritizes data transparency, accountability, and digital solidarity across the sector. 

• Collaborative: This measures and fosters an organisation’s readiness to cooperate, build mutual trust and share ownership of collective goals. It relies on establishing clear, structured governance to successfully manage inter-organisational networks. 

• Human-Centric: Designed to protect core cultural missions and creative labour, this pillar positions humans at the center of digital integration. It prioritizes continuous digital literacy and ensures that new tools support employee well-being and daily workflows. 
• Sustainable: This views sustainability as comprehensive and multi-layered rather than just financial. It balances all digital operations across four critical areas of sustainability: economic, cultural, social and environmental. 

Shifting from isolated tool practices to collaborative data ecosystems allows the cultural sector to growth and achieve long-term resilience. This capability-driven evolution generates key outcomes. 

With organizational, social and governance conditions that make data sharing doable, cultural actors can optimize their operations and therefore foster stronger competitiveness. Aggregated ecosystem insights allow small organisations to scale their impact, compete with major commercial entities and accurately mapping their collective economic footprint. 

Ecosystem-level data practices enable cultural networks to distribute resources effectively creating long-term sustainability. By analysing shared data, institutions can secure diversified funding models, reduce repetitions and explicitly align their digital operations with environmental and social insights. 

The cross-sector innovation is also enhanced by the collaboration of industries that traditionally remain separate in practice. Combining cultural data with adjacent sectors such as public transit, education, tourism and urban planning allows institutions to pilot cross-sector solutions addressing common challenges.