You don’t stay competitive by standing still.
Market trends and the ability to deliver on customer requirements are fluid constructs that need reliable innovative partners.
Business-critical technology investments such as print MIS software will have various levels of multi-function, and often multi-location, stakeholders. Ensuring all parties have a clear understanding of what the objectives, expectations and targets entail will be the key to everybody’s success.
Large scale MIS software applications can be complex implementation projects which often have a disruptive operational and personal impact when implementing change across an organization. Choosing the right partner is key, though there are fundamentals to consider before making a big software investment.
BUY-IN. SIGN OFF.
You don’t need employee approval to make strategic or organizational changes. What you do need is their buy-in to be committed to the changes and engaged in the process so you retain a team who can execute.
- Be transparent: communicate the strategy.
- Set expectations: build out timelines and what success looks.
- Assign personalized tasks with milestones for accountability.
- Document processes, onboard and track progress.
- Be prepared to course correct. At the beginning of every large-scale project, you don’t know what you don’t know. Get set to update as data is revealed.
While managers and executives may eagerly grasp the business decisions and changes that move a company forward, the individuals may fear and unwittingly sabotage it. By engaging your entire organization, communicating the progress — both the wins and challenges — you’ll get your employee buy-in and be able to sign off a successful implementation.
SET EXPECTATIONS. NOBODY LIKES (BAD) SURPRISES.
Working from home or remotely is no longer a novelty. More than ever, businesses need to ensure that they can effectively manage employee engagement to keep the day-to-day operations running, maintaining strong customer satisfaction while still be able to work towards a ‘what’s next roadmap’ for the organization.
Adding in a major organizational change and the chasm threatens to get wider between what is expected and what is being delivered.
By setting clearly defined expectations there is less ambiguity on the impact each contributor is making towards the company’s goals.
When the manager and employees align on clearly defined expectations and measurable feedback is provided, there is little room for errors that can’t be corrected.
ASSIGN A CHAMPION. BE A TEAM.
Every team needs a champion. Somebody to lead, to stick their neck out, rally the troops and believe in the goal. This is the person who will wave the flag and hold us all accountable, but they can’t execute on the goals alone.
At a former organization I was working at the President once gave a speech on teamwork and gave an example on how he had played with Magic Johnson ‘back in the day’. Ok so it turned out they both went to the University of Michigan and Magic came out for their weekly pick-up game a time or two but the moral of the story stands. The point was solid and serves as a reminder on any team — when Johnston went to the NBA he was named the MVP in his rookie year but was never the top scorer. He maintained he was only as good as his team let him be and, in the end, they all won.
You don’t have to be the star to be on a successful team. As long as you have a role to execute with clear expectations to meet, your roll in the win will be noticed and appreciated.
In a competitive market, it’s the innovators that gain the advantage. At printIQ we understand that a print MIS, ERP or MWS investment is a big one. We take our partnership commitment seriously to help our customers gain that advantage. Together we create a plan with expectations and metrics for success, with transparency, through our end-to-end process focused on your success.
Originally published at https://printiq.com on May 2, 2021.
