All too often, installing technology-based tools doesn’t produce either the promised payback or the desired results. Instead of delighted customers, you get frustrated customers.
Three trends dominate the agency agenda today: Customers, competition, and change. In customer service, these trends have translated themselves into three key areas. To be competitive your agency must provide:
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One-stop and one-call access for every customer, whether they’re using the telephone, a personal computer, or the Internet.
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Faster and faster response times — customer patience is at an all-time low.
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Clear and understandable answers to complex questions, from both novices and experienced customers. This situation has created a tremendous need for technology-based tools to support customer service organizations in providing service that “delights” customers.
The “soft stuff” is really the hard stuff. Many people still believe that, in organizational change, issues dealing with the “human side” are fluffy and insubstantial, and should be an afterthought. The only things that really matter are technology and hard design. But we’re all beginning to learn that what we once considered hard or difficult is, in fact, the “easy stuff.” The technology issues are the easiest to deal with and don’t usually make the most difference.
All too often, simply installing these technology-based tools doesn’t produce either the promised payback or the desired results. Instead of delighted customers, you get frustrated customers. And, instead of high-performing employees you get frustrated and low-performing ones.
Introducing technology means introducing change. Change is about people. And the No. 1 obstacle to successful change is people issues. Dealing with resistance, fear, and anxiety is usually the most difficult aspect of ensuring successful change.
Although there’s no guaranteed solution on how to ensure the return on your technology investment, following these ten critical guidelines will increase the likelihood of success.
1. UNDERSTAND CONNECTIVITY
Technology usually forms only one part of a total solution to achieve improved customer loyalty. These tools can’t correct inadequate agency processes, ineffective management structures and systems, inappropriate jobs and roles, or out-of-sync values and beliefs. It’s critical to understand and address your entire agency system: Processes, technologies, management structures and systems, jobs and roles, and values and beliefs. Often it’s the intangibles that offer the greatest leverage.
2. IMPLEMENT CHANGE
Introducing new technology, even if you don’t intend to change your basic processes, still means introducing change in your organization. Change creates fear and resistance, as well as opportunity and challenge. People respond to change in a predictable pattern. often referred to as the “Change Journey.” This journey moves from anticipation through pessimism to optimism, acknowledging that people respond to change based on 30% logic and 70% emotion.
3. ENSURE SPONSORSHIP AND ALIGNMENT
Sponsorship is critical to success. Someone must articulate a compelling vision for the change, link it clearly to agency objectives, and ensure that it’s focused on solving a real problem. You must nurture executive commitment and sponsorship because this is often one of the hot seats in a project. Success requires active support from all levels within the organization, including senior management, middle management, and all front-line people. For technology-based tools to produce significant business results, the entire organization must truly “walk the talk.”
4. LET GO AND MOVE ON
As management guru Peter Drucker said, “In the knowledge society, managers must prepare to abandon everything they know.” What you “know” might well be limiting your ability to create new and powerful solutions. The introduction of new technology-based tools is more than simply the automation of a customer service process. It provides an opportunity to define a new one based on new paradigms. And, successful implementations might be more a function of effective change management and communications than of planning and training.
5. PLAN FROM RIGHT TO LEFT
Technology-based tools are a means to an end. To meet your agency’s goals, stay focused on the results to be produced, not on the activities to be accomplished. Start your implementation planning as soon as you begin your technology planning. Work back from specific agency targets and deadlines, rather than toward them. And, prepare to scale up rapidly from the initial implementation because once management sees what’s really possible they’ll want it fully implemented as soon as possible.
6. THINK GLOBALLY AND ACT LOCALLY
Think big and set demanding targets so that they’ll become key drivers for action. But start small and move quickly so that you can get early successes, maintain momentum, and apply what you learn as you go.
7. UNDERSTAND THE TECHNOLOGY
To be successful with technology, you must learn the language of the technologists. It’s necessary to be able to speak to and understand them in their own language. Resolve any technical issues as soon as possible for today, and keep the future in mind so that you’ll be well prepared for subsequent releases. Most importantly, focus on the interface design because “what you see is what you get” when it comes to technology. This is the key to performance.
8. PULL, DON’T PUSH
Communicate, communicate, and communicate again. Develop compelling messages that appeal to the emotions of the people impacted. Start early, say them often, and then keep repeating them. You can’t over-communicate.
9. REMEMBER, IT’S NOT ALL IN THE TECHNOLOGY
Although the technology is necessary to ensure business results, it does not guarantee you’ll achieve them. As you increase the use of technology-based tools, you also must provide easy access to people — the “high-touch” element. Human-to-human contact through hot lines, voicemail, and electronic mail systems often provides the critical element to overcoming resistance and gaining acceptance. Also, make full use of all the learning and support resources available. Print (i.e., job aids), multimedia (i.e., audio and video), and people (i.e., coaches) can still play a critical role in the success of any solution. The key is to integrate each of these resources into a system that supports on-time performance and continuous learning.
10. GET READY, GET CRAZY, GET REAL, AND HAVE FUN!
What good is a wonderful technology-based tool if it isn’t used properly or at all? Effective implementation is one of the keys to success. An effective implementation approach must ensure that your agency is ready, willing, and able — with the right processes and structures, the right culture, and the right capabilities. Implementation is full of surprises and challenges. Rarely does it go as planned, no matter how derailed that plan might be. It’s important to understand the “game,” appreciate the complexities, manage the conflicts, and keep your eye on the results.
A successful implementation strategy follows these basic principles:
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It moves from paper and into action quickly without spending much time and effort working and managing the plan.
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It anticipates resistance and is not surprised by it.
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It provides for learning along the way, rather than assuming that everything is taken care of at the beginning.
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It sustains focus on the agency’s results, rather than activities.
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It focuses on people, as well as things, because all technology projects are in effect people projects.
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It aligns the project with the organization’s strategic goals and objectives and accelerates the achievement of agency results.
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Finally, it produces lasting infrastructure redesign so that there is ongoing support for future releases and changes.
Applying the 10 critical guidelines to success will enable you to avoid many pitfalls while ensuring that your technology-based tools are used effectively, workers and executives remain committed and enthusiastic, and significant agency results are produced. In the final analysis, it all comes down to people. People — not technology —perform, provide service, solve problems, and deliver results.