Uploaded July 2026 | Updated September 2026, 3 hours ago
Picture a meeting room. There's a Surface Hub on the wall: big, beautiful, pen-ready, a device that wants you to stand up and solve problems together. And around the table? Six people, laptops open, doing status updates. Nobody has touched the Hub. Nobody is going to. It sits there looking impressive until the cleaner wipes it down at the end of the day.
That isn't a hypothetical. And now the Surface Hub has been discontinued. Today I want to talk about why, because it's not the story you'd expect.
The hardware was exceptional. What failed wasn't the technology, it was adoption. Around 70% of digital transformation initiatives fail to meet their objectives, and the cause isn't bugs or missing features. It's people not changing how they work. The Surface Hub is just a very visible version of that.
I can say this with some authority: my team at ASI trained thousands of people on the Hub over nearly ten years, and it still wasn't enough. Because knowing what a device can do doesn't change what you actually do with it. So here's the lesson for the CIOs signing off on these deployments. If you'll spend hundreds of thousands on hardware, you have to spend at least as much on the people and culture around it. Hardware first, people second is how we got here. People first, hardware second is how we get out.
The Hub is gone, but the problem it tried to solve matters more than ever, because the next wave of devices all depend on the same thing: people being willing to work differently in a room together.
Have you seen a Surface Hub used well, or gathering dust? Tell me in the comments. If this resonated, hit subscribe. See you in the next one.
CHAPTERS
00:00 The screen nobody touches
00:24 Not a technology problem, a people problem
00:52 Why adoption fails: the wider pattern
02:34 The meeting room and the laptop default
04:32 A shared canvas nobody steps up to
05:50 The real barrier: social pressure
07:30 Installed, not adopted
09:19 A message to IT leaders
10:45 Where this series goes next
SOURCES & FURTHER READING
02:01 — "Around 70% of digital transformation initiatives fail to meet their objectives"
McKinsey, via MeltingSpot (Oct 2025)
blog.meltingspot.io/why-digital-transformation-projects-fail
02:25 — "Only 35% of digital transformation initiatives reach their goals"
BCG analysis, via Mavim (Oct 2025)
blog.mavim.com/why-70-of-digital-transformations-fail-insights-and-solutions
02:34 — "70% of software implementations fail due to poor user adoption"
MeltingSpot (Oct 2025)
blog.meltingspot.io/why-digital-transformation-projects-fail
06:39 — "About 37% of employees actively resist change in the workplace"
Whatfix (Aug 2025)
whatfix.com/blog/digital-transformation-failures
09:19 — "The one-time training... it has never worked"
MeltingSpot (Oct 2025)
blog.meltingspot.io/why-digital-transformation-projects-fail
FURTHER READING
69% of workers describe their last major change experience as negative
MeltingSpot (Oct 2025)
blog.meltingspot.io/why-digital-transformation-projects-fail
60% of organisations say their change management approach is outdated
MeltingSpot (Oct 2025)
blog.meltingspot.io/why-digital-transformation-projects-fail
On localising adoption with frontline workforces
World Economic Forum (Jan 2025), via TRIA Recruitment
triarecruitment.com/why-digital-transformations-fail
Picture a meeting room. There's a Surface Hub on the wall: big, beautiful, pen-ready, a device that wants you to stand up and solve problems together. And around the table? Six people, laptops open, doing status updates. Nobody has touched the Hub. Nobody is going to. It sits there looking impressive until the cleaner wipes it down at the end of the day.
That isn't a hypothetical. And now the Surface Hub has been discontinued. Today I want to talk about why, because it's not the story you'd expect.
The hardware was exceptional. What failed wasn't the technology, it was adoption. Around 70% of digital transformation initiatives fail to meet their objectives, and the cause isn't bugs or missing features. It's people not changing how they work. The Surface Hub is just a very visible version of that.
I can say this with some authority: my team at ASI trained thousands of people on the Hub over nearly ten years, and it still wasn't enough. Because knowing what a device can do doesn't change what you actually do with it. So here's the lesson for the CIOs signing off on these deployments. If you'll spend hundreds of thousands on hardware, you have to spend at least as much on the people and culture around it. Hardware first, people second is how we got here. People first, hardware second is how we get out.
The Hub is gone, but the problem it tried to solve matters more than ever, because the next wave of devices all depend on the same thing: people being willing to work differently in a room together.
Have you seen a Surface Hub used well, or gathering dust? Tell me in the comments. If this resonated, hit subscribe. See you in the next one.
CHAPTERS
00:00 The screen nobody touches
00:24 Not a technology problem, a people problem
00:52 Why adoption fails: the wider pattern
02:34 The meeting room and the laptop default
04:32 A shared canvas nobody steps up to
05:50 The real barrier: social pressure
07:30 Installed, not adopted
09:19 A message to IT leaders
10:45 Where this series goes next
SOURCES & FURTHER READING
02:01 — "Around 70% of digital transformation initiatives fail to meet their objectives"
McKinsey, via MeltingSpot (Oct 2025)
blog.meltingspot.io/why-digital-transformation-projects-fail
02:25 — "Only 35% of digital transformation initiatives reach their goals"
BCG analysis, via Mavim (Oct 2025)
blog.mavim.com/why-70-of-digital-transformations-fail-insights-and-solutions
02:34 — "70% of software implementations fail due to poor user adoption"
MeltingSpot (Oct 2025)
blog.meltingspot.io/why-digital-transformation-projects-fail
06:39 — "About 37% of employees actively resist change in the workplace"
Whatfix (Aug 2025)
whatfix.com/blog/digital-transformation-failures
09:19 — "The one-time training... it has never worked"
MeltingSpot (Oct 2025)
blog.meltingspot.io/why-digital-transformation-projects-fail
FURTHER READING
69% of workers describe their last major change experience as negative
MeltingSpot (Oct 2025)
blog.meltingspot.io/why-digital-transformation-projects-fail
60% of organisations say their change management approach is outdated
MeltingSpot (Oct 2025)
blog.meltingspot.io/why-digital-transformation-projects-fail
On localising adoption with frontline workforces
World Economic Forum (Jan 2025), via TRIA Recruitment
triarecruitment.com/why-digital-transformations-fail
