How To Get More People Using New Technologies In Your Organisation

How To Get More People Using New Technologies In Your Organisation A Polycom Guide To Driving Adoption Of Technology

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How To Get More People Using New Technologies In Your Organisation

Introduction According to research*, more than half of CIOs (52%) consider innovation an “important priority.” Perhaps that explains the proliferation of new technologies becoming commonplace in the modern enterprise. But for the average end user these can be considered daunting, complicated and unnecessary. One of the biggest challenges faced by the modern IT department is ensuring the adoption of these new solutions across the company; from finance to HR, facilities to marketing, every employee needs to be equipped and motivated to make the most of your IT investments.

Key Technologies With Potential For Improved Adoption

Connected Tech & Wearables

Unified Communications

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*Deloitte, 2014

Cloud & Virtualisation

Video Collaboration

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Why? There are two main areas to consider in relation to driving usage of technology solutions in business:

Resources: • You cannot achieve, nor measure, total ROI until solutions are being used to maximum capacity • Low adoption rates adversely affect productivity and profitability • Space is the big issue for business, both physical and digital. Unused systems become white elephants cluttering up offices and servers

Future proofing: • Remote working is not enough – too many organisations think that enabling employees to work anywhere is enough, when it’s actually about remote collaboration • Technology is the key and essential to the success of the workplace of the future – a workforce who aren’t able to utilise new technologies will hold back the growth of the organisation • New technologies are going to be developed at an increasingly rapid pace – the ability to adapt and assimilate them into workflows and processes is going to be a key differentiator in the marketplace

did you know?

Despite the boom in cloud computing adoption, 59% of IT businesses that are now using cloud solutions feel challenged by the need to find the correct cloud business model for their needs.

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Key considerations: There are six key considerations for the IT department when deploying a new technology or looking to drive adoption of an existing one. Before you start communicating its availability to the whole company you need to identify the profile of your desired user and their average usage pattern.

Application – How are you going to use the technology? • Individually or in groups? E.G. desktop video conferencing versus boardroom video meetings • On site or remote? If it’s remote, how will they access it? E.G. VPN versus cloud or web-based systems, desktop versus mobile

Position – Who is going to use the technology? • How will you allocate access? E.G. by job function or hierarchy? • Will they need a specific reason to access it? E.G. will they have a log-on as standard or will they need to request permission?

Location – Where will the technology be physically located? • Where will the physical access be located? E.G. on every desktop versus only in the boardroom, fixed versus anywhere access • Will it only be available on certain devices?

did you know?

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35% of senior IT professionals in the UK will invest up to £11.7m ($19.9m) in mobility in 2015.

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Facilitation – Who will make the technology work each time? • Are you expecting end users to be able to manage the technology themselves? Or will they always need IT support to help them? • Do you plan to withdraw assistance after a certain time-period? How will you phase it out?

Direction – What kind of usage do you want to encourage? • Will this be purely internal or external too? • Should this be front of mind at all times? E.G. should video collaboration be the standard above voice calls?

Convention – How much planning do you expect for each instance? • Will every use need to be scheduled or will it be ad hoc? E.G. is video collaboration only used for quarterly board meetings? Or for ad hoc, spontaneous and natural engagements?

did you know?

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Looking ahead to 2015, Simon Holloway, practice leader at IT analyst house Bloor Research, says the adoption of cloud technologies is almost certain to increase, as more on-premise solutions approach end of life.

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Over 80% of the respondents indicated that their video conference didn’t take too long to set-up.

Polycom’s Top 10 Tips for Driving Technology Adoption 1. Planning

3. Pervasiveness

• Consult users before, during and after changes are made to help you target training, support and resources

• Make solutions available to all employees, the wider the availability of the solutions, the more people can experience it and use it

• Develop an approach to the deployment that not only meets the constraints of the technology but also creates a planned experience for users

• Don’t limit access by hierarchy or function. At Polycom we believe in #VideoForAll • Make sure your solutions are available on key devices, especially mobile

2. Consistency 4. Pro-active support • Have a common user experience across all devices • Synchronise updates so that all users are on the same version for equal functionality

• Minimise hand holding – ensure you have mapped out all of the foreseeable challenges and have a support team visibly at the ready to assist users when needed

• Ensure it is integrated with other complementary technologies as well as business processes

• Inspire confidence in the reliability of the solution – this means extensive testing before the roll out

• Ensure the experience is as good offsite as in the office – that means optimising page load times, accelerating file upload and download times, and ensuring servers can handle peak demand

• Step back; over-involvement of IT often makes it appear more difficult than it is • Create a single point of contact – there should only be one number, webpage or email address for support services • Treat these new technologies as critical tools to the business in the same way you would email or phones

By 2017, Gartner expects 3 billion new device units to be shipped annually, bringing the total installed base to more than 8 billion connected devices by then.

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35% of digital natives – workers who are 25 years or younger and will define the future of work – use video frequently and from anywhere.

5. Comfort

7. Encourage, don’t enforce

• Make people feel comfortable using it

• Use the carrot not the stick – praise adopters but don’t berate those who aren’t there yet

• Make training and resources accessible anytime as a safety net – consider an online hub of materials including video tutorials

• Encourage casual and frequent use to normalise it, for example, chats by the water cooler or over coffee can be held on video for remote workers

• Start with the basics – don’t overcomplicate it, users don’t need to know every single function straight away

• Have a clear multi-channel communications plan in order to disseminate encouraging and positive messaging about the new deployment – think newsletters, posters, intranet, meetings, seminars, webinars, blogs, social media channels – ask yourself these key questions:

• Consider personal feelings about the new technology – for example older members of staff may be nervous about new technologies, or people may worry about how they appear on video calls

1. How do you handle the “awareness” messaging? • Agree to a standardised vocabulary for trainers and materials – using the same names and terms across the organisation will help simplify things for those nervous about the change

2. Who are your champions/evangelists?

6. Consider culture

3. What kind of launch events can you create?

• For global organisations barriers to adoption may not be the same in each region

4. How do you provide training materials for your identified user segments – each with different needs (one-on-one training, group training, Web instructions, on-demand video?)

• Age can be a factor – young people may be more comfortable/quicker to adopt, so have them lead the charge • Don’t foster a culture of remote working – focus on virtual collaboration across teams and continents

5. How do you continue to get your message out post launch? • Communicate relevance rather than technology – make sure people understand why it can help them be more productive in their role – less travel etc.

• Cultural integration of the solutions is key – they need to become the new normal to deliver true ROI

47% of companies with the highest adoption rates understand that training never ends.

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8. Processes not positions • Focus on building the technology into specific business processes – for example, make interviews over video collaboration the norm for HR • Don’t limit access by hierarchy • Think about how the technology can improve efficiency and productivity

9. Lead by example • The more people who use a technology the more general attitudes will change • Aim for a top down demonstrative approach, where the business leaders in each function show their teams how it improves their specific processes • Leaders need to demonstrate their commitment to, and investment in, the new solution

10. Jumpstart • Train new employees from day one so they aren’t influenced by others’ perceptions • Pick your digital natives out for accelerated training – they are early adopters of all technologies both at work and at home and can become advocates internally • Think about the new solutions in the hiring process – ask potential candidates if they are familiar/comfortable with these technologies • One of the most engaging factors for learners is a personalised experience. Creating custom content to target specific learner groups will keep your users engaged

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Have you successfully driven usage of a new technology in your organisation? Tweet us @PolycomEurope with your success story #VideoForAll!