Deployment. That magical, stressful period of an implementation where the rubber hits the road. You’ve done all you can to make this moment as smooth as possible. You’ve reviewed all the technical specifications, ensured that your assigned Implementation Project Manager has been on the same page re: your needs, even double checked that your numbers are ready to port on schedule. If there was a checkbox for a topic, you have triple checked it.
But then a sobering thought occurs to you: what about the people who will be using the service? Are they as equally prepared for the big go-live moment as you and your technical team? Have they been upskilled in their new primary communication tool? Have you somehow missed a critical component of the implementation burn-in process, something sure to send ripples through the organization as users grapple with unfamiliar resources?
In short, yes; you’ve had an unfortunate oversight in planning.
Training directly impacts the success of any technical implementation by eliminating adoption risks. From the relevant skills and knowledge needed by a frontline employee to the more demanding technical know-how of a system administrator maintaining the services post-deployment, effective training empowers your team to fully embrace and engage with the new system in short-order. Conversely, the absence of intentional training will inevitably have consequences, such as delays in the realization of ROI, or worse, direct, perceivable impact on customer experience due to cognitive overload as your team struggles to navigate an unfamiliar system while simultaneously trying to provide excellent service to your customers.
Where deployments often go awry is in focusing on the technical specifications and overlooking a critical system component: the end-user. Once the service is up and running, your team members will take this piece of sophisticated communications technology and use it in service of your organization and your customers. How confidently they use the technology is critical to your overall success. Ham-fisted usage will naturally result in dropped calls, misfired transfers, lost parked calls, and so forth. The gloomy scenario nearly writes itself.
There is good news, however. These failure points are completely preventable, if careful consideration for user-upskilling is intentionally built into the implementation plan. Here at CallTower, we make certain that training isn’t a bolt-on service; it is an integral part of the customer’s journey to deployment and adoption. It begins with a warm hand-off call between the project manager and a designated training resource. We engage with the customer early on to surface specific learner needs and propose best practice-backed solutions, based on our extensive training experience.
Armed with this knowledge and support, technology leaders can directly mitigate the potential threat that under-skilled users represent.
Arguably, one could simply provide all users with a one-size fits all, present-it-when-we-go-live approach to training, tacked on as an afterthought. This is true. However, to be truly effective, the team at CallTower positions training to be front and center in deployment planning discussions. What are the learner’s needs? What are the timelines within which targeted intervention must occur? What resources can be made available in an on-demand manner to reinforce the knowledge retention and skill acquisition?
The answers to these sorts of questions will deeply impact the ultimate success of the deployment efforts. Keeping those topics front and center helps to organically encourage user-centric design decisions in the broader project plans. This leads directly to better-abled teammates, ready (perhaps even eager!) to leverage the new communication tool you have provided for them. This thoughtful approach to skill application leads directly to improved customer interactions for your organization. ROI at its most fundamental.
Ultimately, deployments are complex, and too often the focus is almost entirely on the technical side of the endeavor. Training is what ensures the human component succeeds alongside the technical. If you are ready to empower your people to make the most of their tools, reach out to the CallTower Training Team at CustomerTraining@calltower.com.
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