Adoption & Change Management: The Human-Tech Connection
Sit a modern worker down in front of a new software platform and chances are they’ll be able to figure out how to use it. They’ll noodle around a bit, check out the menus, click buttons, and soon they’ll be up and running with the basics. This is what a lot of workers do when faced with new technologies adopted in response to organizational changes. And lately, there’s been a lot to figure out. Demands for efficiency and automation have resulted in a proliferation of specialized software solutions. The rise of remote and distributed work added sophisticated collaboration tools. Mergers and acquisitions have left many companies with a patchwork of disconnected platforms. Without a cohesive plan for adoption and change management, users are often left to their own devices to make technology work for them.
Intuitive software has a lot of advantages, but it can also have hidden costs if it wasn’t rolled out with a plan. Whether due to rushed deployment or happenstance, users who have to find their own way around a new tool can end up with a superficial understanding of its capabilities. That can leave many useful features untapped. A tool implemented to streamline processes can instead lower productivity, compound inefficient workflows, and even generate avoidable errors. Frustration can lead to wasted time as users struggle to figure out how to accomplish their tasks. They may even be tempted to bypass security measures in acts of desperation.
Cleaning up the mess
Adoption and change management connects humans to the technology that supports their jobs. It’s a holistic approach that looks across the entire IT environment in order to maximize integration, collaboration, and productivity. The trend toward individual business units determining their own technology needs and making decentralized purchase decisions has left many IT teams overwhelmed. The focus is often on researching and acquiring tools rather than optimizing the environment to maximize user satisfaction and knowledge.
Many organizations are taking the opportunity to implement adoption and change management in conjunction with data migrations. Migrations are being triggered by mergers, acquisitions, cloud consolidation, and workplace modernization. Any substantial migration includes a discovery and planning phase. This pre-migration phase gives IT a chance to audit and clean up the environment. It’s always been a best practice to delete or archive data that’s past its retention lifespan. The same can be said for obsolete or redundant applications. A pre-migration audit allows you to identify best-of-breed systems and determine how they can be deployed company-wide. This is where adoption and change management comes in.
Planning, communication, and training
The general framework for adoption and change management starts with identifying roles, structures, processes, projects, leadership competencies, and performance measures (KPIs). Organizations often work with technology services providers like SoftwareOne to develop a comprehensive plan based on their maturity, objectives, and employee needs. The migration itself is usually the easiest part of the process – especially with MigrationWiz. Proper preparation and implementation can turn a migration into an efficiency and productivity engine that results in a more streamlined IT function as well as a clear picture of how IT can support future growth.
Communication and education are vital to the adoption and change management process. Training will help address any changes users might encounter when familiar software is on a new platform. It can also help level set people throughout the organization to assure they’re getting the most out of their technology tools. Another best practice is to designate internal champions or ambassadors who will help their peers. Internal advocates play an important role in identifying specific use cases that require attention for the project to be a success.
Make it more than a migration
Whether it’s patchwork IT that has evolved as a response to a rapidly changing environment, or mergers and acquisitions that result in a collection of disparate systems, a fractured IT infrastructure is a drag on collaboration and productivity. And that’s a drag on ROI when every opportunity for efficiency counts. Organizations that see employees as their key to success see adoption and change management as the fulfillment of that commitment. It’s an opportunity to support employees with the right tools and the knowledge they need to use them.
Making that human-tech connection is a critical component of what services providers like SoftwareOne offer. MigrationWiz is an important tool in the toolkit, with adoption and change management increasingly being built into migration projects in order to take advantage of opportunities for consolidation, integration, and efficiency.
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