It is January 2019, and like many an optimistic person, IT companies like us make up their list of resolutions. Much like the ‘lose more weight – eat better – exercise more – be healthier’ resolution for millions around the world, the same resolve pops up annually for us– without fail – but in different shapes and forms. Our recurring promise to ourselves has always been “this year we will build/launch/promote/update our intranet.” This promise appeared at the top of the list every year – except for the last two.
Sadly, by the second quarter, this resolution would have fallen by the wayside. There was always a good reason why the intranet could not be prioritized – our technical team members were engaged in meaningful projects, our intranet ‘admin’ had changed positions or jobs, the content was not being updated; hence no one was accessing it… The reasons were plenty, and the result was the same: our intranet project was dead, or dying.
As an IT company that has implemented more than its fair share of internal portals (or intranets) for medium to large organizations, we know one thing: Intranets fail. No matter how much money is spent on them – from a few thousand to hundreds of thousands of dollars – intranets do not bring about their promised ‘return on investment.’
In theory, the concept is a solid one – creating an internal portal connecting employees, essential company data, calendars, events, updates seem like a win-win situation all around. Logically, organizations should be ready to update the content; employees keen to access it. But that is hardly ever the way it works.
After spending hundreds of thousands on ‘ready-made’ portals, organizations find that these solutions sit on a virtual shelf, collecting virtual dust because they poorly designed and rarely updated that employees find them unworthy of their time and effort, or so complicated and full of information that they overwhelm and confuse.
Our intranet was a classic example of the latter. On designing it, we decided we wanted everything this ready solution could offer – calendars, events, document management, advanced search, message boards, the works. Our logic was that as an IT company if we don’t use it all, who will?
As it turned out, no one did use it. We had a couple of die-hard portal fans who insisted it made life more comfortable, but the majority of employees either accessed it once and forgot how to do it again, or accessed it only when they occasionally received an email about something they could find on it.
Here we list the top reasons why intranets fail:
Then again, not all intranets fail. Some organizations boast of relatively good usage numbers, often due to ‘intranet policies’ which are rules or regulations put in place to guarantee some traffic. But is your intranet successful if you need to force traffic in its direction?
So what do you do with your current, sickly intranet? Do you invest even more into it by trying to make it more engaging or creating a ‘mobile interface’? You could – but is it worth it?
After years of trying to breathe life into ours, we decided it was time to cut our losses and identify precisely what we wanted this intranet to achieve. After all, was said and done, we knew what we wanted: a place to host critical organizational data, and disseminate necessary information. It was that simple.
We let the intranet die a slow, inevitable death. For the content we needed, we created a clean, minimalistic information library that made access to data easy, straightforward, and quick. Our focus was on documents, videos, and learning content. We connected this library to iDenedi, our mobile announcement, and engagement application, and the company was able to easily share content using cellular triggers, make important announcements, and engage with employees and partners in a way that was quick, secure, and fun. As an uncalculated side benefit, we found employees were also engaging more with each other.
In summary, if your intranet is not what you wanted it to be – you are not alone. Let it go and give some thought into what you need. You will likely discover that what you need is a lot simpler than what you already have.
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Originally published Jan 20, 2019 12:50:03 PM, updated July 24, 2019
Topics: E-Learning Technadopt
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So you have invested in a cool new IT technology for your business. All is going great, except...your employees are not using it yet. 😥
Employee adoption is one of the biggest challenges in digital transformation for any organisation. Getting new software into your organisation can boost your entire business' operations. It can increase productivity, generate more leads, improve customer service and help the C-suite make better decisions.
Employees are the key to adopt new technology and to the successful digital transformation of your organisation. The sooner the new technology becomes part of the day to day work routine in your organisation, the better.
Make sure that you inform your employees properly of all the advantage of the new technology. Will this new tool save them time (or nerves), will it boost their productivity? Or will it alleviate their stress job-related and make their work-flow more efficient?
Paint a detailed picture for them because they probably will not know this at an early stage. Once they become aware of all the benefits associated with the new software, they will be more likely to get on board.
Humans are creatures of habit. It is not as easy as you may think for some of us to adopt new tools and gadgets. This especially true if your team has been working with the same workflow and tools for the past several years.
So before giving them deadlines or ultimatums, put yourself in their shoes. Consider their age and general attitude towards change. Are they young and grew up with digital technology? Or are they enthusiastic about new technologies? Based on this information create the best possible plan and timeline for the adoption of the new IT technology.
You may notice that each employee may have a different speed of adopting and becoming proficient with the new system. And that's okay. Just make sure to give your team a reasonable timeline to switch over to the new tool.
Find a team member who is known to be great with new technology and assign them the role of a champion. Seek their help in promoting, training and gathering employee feedback on the new software.
Having a relatable influencer can positively impact the attitudes of the employees and help them transition in a much easier way.
Encourage your team members to train and adopt the new tool. Reward those that do adapt quickly and use the new technology at work. These incentives can be gift cards, perks, swag, or anything that really excites the employees about the new transformation.
In conclusion, introducing new technology to your team can be demanding and difficult, especially when it comes time to motivate employees to use it. But with a little tact, patience and empathy you and your team can get there. Besides this, don't forget to make it a fun process for your team. And they will reward you with cooperating and getting on board with you and the new technology.
Are you currently struggling to implement new technologies in your company?
Learn how Exceeders' Technology Adoption Program (Ta7awul) can help your employees get on board with the new technology at your organisation.
Exceeders: Connecting businesses with hundreds of innovative IT providers for cost-effective digital transformation.
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There is no doubt regarding the tremendous impact technology has on companies around the world. The use of technology have opened up a whole new world of insight and possibilities for these companies helping them gain deeper insight into their customers, improve their products and services, optimize their operations and more. However, the introduction of new technology isn’t easy, and usually is met with a lot of resistance from employees who are used to and comfortable doing their work in a specific way that they don’t fancy changing.
As per Wikipedia Technology Adoption is defined as a sociological model that describes the adoption or acceptance of a new product or innovation, according to the demographic and psychological characteristics of defined adopter groups.
What that means in english is that whenever a company introduces a new technology into the work culture it should take into account that not all of its employees are the same. And in order to gain the maximum benefit of this technology it should customize its launch approach to suit the different types of employees in the company.
Most often these companies implement new technologies and build a standard one size fits all launch program that treats all employees alike resulting in resistance, low usage and very low return on investment.
To build a proper technology adoption program that minimizes resistance, promotes change and increases the return on investment from technology the first thing companies need to do is understand the different adopter groups that their employees fall under which are:
With the above being said, it should be clear that one size doesn’t fit everyone, and for a company to successfully launch new technologies it must personalize and customize it’s approach of introducing technology and innovation in the workplace. Below is a list of some (but not all) options that companies can adopt per user group to successfully launch new technology and innovations:
For companies to get the most value of the technology they invest in, they need to make sure they launch it in the best way possible that entices employees to adopt it as fast as possible. In subsequent articles we will be going over building and launching technology adoption plans, moreover we will cover some scenarios, examples and best practices based on our experience.
If you are interested in someone helping you with launching new products in your environment and building a technology adoption culture, please visit Ta7awul.
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In a previous blog, we talked about how organizations are striving to transform the way they do their business digitally. For them to successfully change, they need systems that serve the different functions their businesses operate on.
So, after identifying what system is required to facilitate this digital transformation for a function within the organization, and the team that will be building this system, putting a plan in action for delivery is required.
If we take a typical scenario of how delivering a system would look like, we would first have two teams; the business or function owner who wants the system, and the IT Service Provider are providing that system.
These teams meet several times, in the beginning, to capture and document all the requirements, put together a scope of work, and agree on a framework and project timelines for delivering the system or “product.” Once the project kicks off, it will go through all the defined phases and eventually gets signed off when the product is presented to the customer, and user acceptance testing is conducted successfully.
An ideal scenario is one where the product being delivered meets the exact (and full) requirements of the customer, so sign off comes quickly and with no issues. But in reality, with projects that span a long time, they tend to have some everyday challenges such as:
This is why we need to shift our thinking from delivering projects to delivering products. If we can convince customers of the value of an MVP “Minimum Viable Product,” they will quickly come to realize the benefits of such an approach as opposed to traditional product development and delivery.
With an MVP, Customers Will be Able to:
I’m sure if we tell our customers that we can deliver to them a product with basic features in a brief period for them to see, test and give their feedback on, we will notice an increased success rate in our product and project delivery, and most importantly in customer satisfaction.
If we take the example of an organization that wants to transform by automating their business processes digitally, then the Enterprise Submission Platform – ESP- can be an excellent fit for them.
ESP has been designed in a smart way to give customers the ability to create workflows and processes in as little time possible (it can be done in under 5 minutes). Therefore, for this organization to have a working system that is capable of automating business processes in a short time, and can also do the important job for them, then they are already better off than having to wait until the final product is delivered. And if they need customizations and enhancements to be done to the platform for it to fit their exact and specific requirements, then this can be done in phases or releases, all the while giving them the ability to see and use it.
Visit www.exceeders.com/store/esp to learn more.
