How to Help Employees Adapt to New Technology

Every year, new and improved technologies emerge that have consistently proved to be beneficial for our everyday lives. Owing to the positive impacts that these tools of technology bring to the businesses, more and more organizations are adopting these to improve efficiency and productivity.

Various technologies like cloud computing, smart data storage, video conferencing, wireless networking, BYOD (Bring Your Own Device) and so on have helped in automating certain tasks and made the businesses processes simpler and smoother.

While staying updated is a cornerstone of every successful business, it is equally important to ensure that your employees can adapt to the integration. Only a fully functional team that is ready to move towards innovation can help in taking your business forward.

Let's take a look at a few ways in which you can accomplish this.

Introducing New Technology to Employees

Ensure That IT Teams Understand the Company's Goals

The first step to making a technology work for your business is to ensure that the IT personnel handling the integration is completely aware of the company's goals and objectives and are providing the right kind of support. Additionally, they should collaborate with the department heads to guarantee that the technology is aligned with the requirements of the company before bringing the team members onboard with it.

Working out the potential flaws and the inefficiencies of the technologies will ensure that employees do not encounter any glitch while using these tools. Any obstacles faced by the employees at the beginning can demotivate them and can turn out to be a hindrance to their enthusiasm for embracing the technology.

Encourage Education

Adequate training is one of the most crucial components in enabling your staff to adapt to new technology integration at the workplace. With every new adoption, employees should be retrained about how to utilize these in their tasks.

Some employees do not have a knack for technology and may feel intimidated with the integration. You would need to provide additional support to them to ensure that they attain a level of comfort with these tools. The idea is to ease the workflow with these tools and not make these turn into a burden for your employees.

Listen to Their Feedback

For your employees to be receptive to new technologies, you should create an environment in the workplace that is conducive to learning. Your employees should not hesitate to talk freely about the problems they are facing, any inputs that they might have about the integration and so on. This will help them feel involved in the integration and would enable them to learn more.

You can consider setting time aside for addressing these concerns. Department heads should be open to new ideas. Interactive sessions, hands-on training activities, weekly meetings, seminars and recurring training sessions should be conducted to ensure that employees' doubts are heard, discussed and cleared as they move ahead with the integration.

Create a Culture of Progression

User experience is one of the primary aspects that make the integration of technological tools successful. People usually gravitate towards a tool that is fluid and easy to use. Therefore, it is important to make learning about a technology fun and engaging. To accomplish this, you should make your team understand how the implementation will optimize workflow and reduce their burden.

For example, using wireless technology helps in fueling the concept of a mobile workforce. WiFi connectivity reduces the usage of a cluster of cables, which can pose a hindrance to collaboration and workflow. Making your employees aware of these concepts can help in swifter adoption.

Track Results and Make Adjustments

The idea is to ensure that the implementations of the tools do not become stagnant with time. Therefore, it is crucial to measure the results, the return on investment, the impact on the users and so on. These metrics can then be utilized to identify the problem areas and ways to make the technology work more efficiently for your business procedures.

You can consider asking your employees to present new ways to use the technology. Viable solutions should be tested to make the necessary adjustments. This can facilitate regular learning for your employees.

These steps will ensure that your employees become more receptive to the integration. You would also need to plan financially for the upgradation and the adjustments. This will help in avoiding any financial setbacks.

Helping Employee Photo via Shutterstock

This article, "How to Help Employees Adapt to New Technology" was first published on Small Business Trends