Tips and best practices for rolling out new software at your organization.
“You can’t teach an old dog new tricks.” It’s a saying we’re all familiar with – even to the point of cliché – but it’s especially applicable in the corporate world. Organizations frequently struggle with rolling out new technology or software because routines are hard to break. Enforcing adoption of a new CRM, for example, has been the bane of countless sales managers. However, introducing a new habit to your team does not have to be a death sentence. By clearly identifying a use-case for your audience, communicating value to your team, and setting goals prior to launch, you can make a software rollout surprisingly painless.
Identify your use case
What team is the software for? How are they going to be interacting with the platform on a day-to-day basis? How familiar or unfamiliar will they be with the new tool? All of these are questions that you need to ask yourself before you can move forward. If you can’t specify who will benefit from a new technology, you don’t need it in the first place, and regardless of the next steps you take to prepare, any rollout will fail.
Identify your internal administrative team
ID the internal group that will be managing the software and its use on a day-to-day basis. This team will need to be trained on the software from both a technical and business perspective to effectively communicate value to their groups. Some questions to consider: What team is leading the initiative? Who is in charge of group management/access? Who needs insight into usage statistics, reporting data, etc.?
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Set goals and communicate them clearly to your organization
After identifying your user group and your administrators, gather management and leadership to develop specific training goals. The more specific the better – unless your team knows why they need to be using something, chances are they simply won’t. Most importantly, make it known that the software is mandatory and part of their new job description. Clearly communicate to them why it is important they use and how they benefit. For example, an excuse you hear many times from salespeople adopting a new CRM is “it takes time away from me selling”. If you can frame a new CRM as beneficial prior to launch you’ve successfully set expectations and explained value – CRM, like email, Excel, PowerPoint, and your iPhone, makes your job easier by streamlining all your sales data – you’ll avoid major adoption issues.
Launch and gather feedback
It’s time to launch. Even after following a pre-launch framework there will be issues that arise. Deal with discontent, confusion, and lack of adoption by listening to your users. What issues are they having? Where are the gaps in communication? By being transparent both before and after go-live you’ll gain trust and respect from your community making it easier to course correct and drive continued success!
Here on the LearnCore team we take great pride in knowing our solution is one of the easiest to implement. Besides being an intuitive and easy-to-use platform, LearnCore has a great support team that will walk you through every step of the way during implementation. Talk to our sales team today to hear how easy it would be to start making your team smarter and more productive with LearnCore. Contact us at sales@dev.learncore.com.
