To introduce something new

When you are going to use a new IT tool in your company, it is important that you get off to a good start. If not, it could end up with people dreading using it. Being at the forefront is therefore a key word. The most important questions you will find answers to are therefore: How will this tool simplify my everyday life? That way, the people you are going to introduce the tool to can find extra motivation for when the process starts.

Point 1: Simplification

It is said that hiring lazy people is an advantageous affair, especially because they find the easiest way out and solution to challenges they face. We don't know if that's true, but we do know that simplification helps. A tool that actually simplifies helps too.

Simplification is what can take you from convoluted and frustrated to automated and straight forward. It can make it easier to achieve your goals, save you valuable time and prevent mistakes from happening.

When you have to simplify something, it has to be explained in a language everyone understands. In addition, you must provide good information. Often, a tool must be introduced to more than one person, and then you have to be aware that the need for information can be anything from minimal to max.

Therefore, you must answer:

  • Why should we use this tool?
  • How should we use this tool?
  • When should we use this tool?

If you find good and clear answers to this, then employees will already potentially be more positive about the change. In addition, the tool must be something that actually simplifies itself. It does not help that you introduce something more complicated than the current solution.

365 Workplace is an example of a tool that simplifies. There you can save all your files, have control over all user access at any time, interact with your colleagues in the way you want, find auto-saved notes and share what you need externally.

Basic security is also built into 365 Workplace. This means you can experience fewer human errors in the face of digital attacks. What is most required of you when you are going to emigrate to 365 Arbeidsplass is your habits. How do you improve the processes you do today?

I am passionate about simplifying everyday working life through good and correct tools, smart use of technology and a well-thought-out structure.
Karl Andreas Røsth
Team leader contract sales, Braathe

Point 2: Improvement

Starting with a new tool also gives you the opportunity to establish good habits from the start. You start with blank sheets of paper. It also means that, to ensure improvement, you decide how to use the tool right from the first minute. This means that you have to make some decisions on behalf of the rest of the organization or together with the others.

You need to talk about things like:

  • Folder structures: Which files should be stored where?
  • Communication: Which calls should be made where?
  • Access: Who should have access? Who can grant access? What periods of time should x or y have access?
  • Automations: Should we create automation for approval? For completed projects? Or should it be clarified by email? (There may be a lot of mail).
  • Project vs. individual tasks: What is to be done, where and who is the owner of that task or project manager?

Why Do you have to talk about these things?

That's because you have to establish habits that are possible to maintain and that improve everyday working life. This means that you must create new habits or continue habits that for leads to misunderstandings, more emails than necessary, files astray or frustrated employees who once again do not get the clarification they need to move forward.

Many skip these conversations. What happens then? We have an example: Do you know a person with a cluttered desk? So, pictures, folders, documents, videos, notes and private things all over the desktop? Imagine a person like that, times the number of employees you have. Do you think that sounds like a company with steel control?

Because even though companies need different personality types with very different degrees of the structure gene in them, it is important that the company sets up a basic and coordinated structure. So that if a person goes on leave, suddenly falls ill or, in the worst case, disappears during the day, you still have everything you need. You may not have someone to train the replacement, but you have everything else!

Point 3: Anchoring

When points 1 and 2 have been completed, anchoring remains. To anchor something (from a business perspective) is to create an understanding of what process you will go through, to have expectations clarified about what the process will mean and what benefit the new tool will have, and what effort each individual must contribute.

This point is the most important, and it is also the one that will take the longest. In this part, you have to give people time to get to know the new tool, play with it and discover features they didn't know about. Good training sessions must also be included here so that people have time to understand why you are doing this.

For some, the love for the tool may come immediately, or for others it may take some time. Therefore, you have to check in with the people all the way, and ask a few control questions.

Here are examples of control questions:

  • How do you think it is to work in the tool?
  • What habits have you developed?
  • Have you had any surprises?
  • Is there something you find difficult?

Use tools that work for you

Learning new things as an adult can be incredibly difficult. An example many people recognize can be when you change jobs. Then you are more tired after work for a few months, but then it can loosen up again. Because then the brain has had time to make some new connections that make processing easier.

It is exactly the same with digital tools. It is therefore very important that the tool is made in a way that is fundamentally good, and together with you can become even better. We are big fans of Microsoft's services, and one of our warmest recommendations is therefore our service, Digital Workplace.

If you are curious about the tool we recommend, you are most welcome to a workshop with our very own improver, namely Karl Andreas Røsth. He is passionate about simplifying everyday work through good and correct tools, smart use of technology and a well-thought-out structure. Just like in the three F's above here. He is a man who can get you through the transition to the Digital Workplace.

do you want to know more? Check out when Karl Andreas has a workshop next here: https://braathe.no/explore/ms-workshop/