Tech Implementation Success – The Four Stages of Change Management: Buy-In
Barry Dyer is SVP of Services at Operative. As a management consulting professional, Barry has worked with many large enterprises as they implement multi-million dollar technology solutions. He has witnessed companies get ROI from mediocre software and companies lose millions from best-in-class software. The issue is rarely the technology itself. Rather, many companies fail when it comes to change management, before, during and/or after the process.
Successful software implementations are highly dependent on strong leadership, coordinated rollout, communication and training, which is required across 4 stages of tech implementation. In this blog series we will explore the following 4 stages and unpack the best practices for a successful implementation across your business.
- Buy-In – This early stage is when a company selects a technology.
- Implementation – This stage is when many projects can “go off the rails”.
- Training – This stage is when employees meet their new tools
- Ongoing – This final stage ensures that employees and technology work together to evolve the company successfully
Managing effectively through change is not a nice-to-have. We have seen the difference between media companies that manage change with a clear vision, strong stakeholders, a focused team and ongoing maintenance compared to a company that loses its vision and fails to get employees to adopt the new technology. The difference is dramatic, and the companies that manage change effectively are significantly more prepared for shifting advertiser demand and market evolution.
Committing to good change management not only helps a company get better ROI from their investment, it literally transforms the company. Media companies stuck in the past are slower, less efficient and less relevant to advertisers, which can create a downward spiral. Media companies prepared for change are more nimble and flexible, ready to capture demand and adapt to future changes quickly.
PART ONE – BUY-IN
The time has come for a change. Streaming is stealing audiences and advertisers from linear. The sales and ops teams are buckling under the firehose of manual work. Deals are lost because it’s too hard to pull together a multichannel proposal. The company doesn’t have the insights it needs to understand its changing business.
When these warning signs appear, there is usually a stakeholder that is the evangelist for more modern, agile technology. It could be a regional leader, a VP or even the CEO. An RFP is assembled and a technology partner is chosen.
From here, the tech implementation can go in very different directions. It’s critical for that original stakeholder to assess the situation, understand their company’s processes and politics and set a plan in place to make the entire experience that’s about to unfold a success.
Get the Right Stakeholder In Place – For Good
Even if the right tech is chosen, implementation success requires a great champion right from the start. The original champion – even if they led the RFP process – may not be the right stakeholder to lead the implementation process. If the champion is too junior, leaders of other departments that are more senior could block key parts of the project. It could be hard to get budget approval if the project scope changes. And it will be difficult to lead process change and training to secure employee alignment .
Ideally implementation is directed from the top-down. If the C-Suite is leading the charge, there is little that can stand in their way. If not a C-Level, the implementation stakeholder should be senior enough to have budget, experienced enough to direct diverse teams, and be able to work with leaders across teams. They should also have a C-Level champion that is in lock step for the length of the process who can clear hurdles and communicate to leaders as needed.
Communicate a Clear Vision
As part of the early stages of partnership with the selected vendor, the stakeholder needs to create a vision for the project. Too often, the vision is focused completely on technical capabilities. Obviously, it’s important to map out the technical vision, but without adding the process and employee changes as well, the vision is incomplete.
Take the example of proposal creation. From a technical standpoint, a vision might describe how a unified dashboard will allow a seller to create a single proposal, pulling data from a newly created product catalog. However, if employees are reluctant to stop using their old interface, the new solution is useless. The vision must include how sellers will be moved off old interfaces, trained, and required to adopt the new solution.
If this kind of vision seems detail-oriented, it is, and that’s the point. A detailed vision makes sure that there is no room for the project to go sideways.
Setting the Directive
Company leaders must make the change a requirement. People naturally resist change, and most will stay in their comfort zone indefinitely unless they have no choice but to adopt new ways of doing their job. The change management process needs clear expectations for employees that are communicated early and often.
Stakeholders should, at the outset, share the vision for the change, and discuss the process changes and training that will occur to move people from the old way to the new. Questions and concerns should be heard early and dealt with quickly. Leaders should make it known to employees that the decision is strategic, and small issues will not hold up the big project.
For example, the first version of the new system might not have a specific custom feature that a certain sales team wants to have – creating a small amount of extra work for that one team. While they are reasonable to bring up the issue, the stakeholder should show the team the math – losing a few minutes here and there for a workaround on a custom feature amounts to a tiny fraction of the total value the new system will create for the entire organization.
Of course, that same math should work the other way. If an issue is brought up that is considerable, the stakeholder should have the authority to rethink the approach. This can actually create more buy-in as people see that the decision-making process is a logical business decision.
Buy-in is not just the first step of implementation—it’s the foundation that determines whether a project creates transformational value or becomes a costly business failure.
Set Transparent Priorities
Using math can help create a priority list that’s hard to argue with. Stakeholders need everyone to agree on key metrics that matter to measure success. Some companies focus on revenue metrics like increased topline revenue, reductions in sales and operations hours spent per advertising dollar earned, increased strategic advertising sales, increased multichannel ad sales, etc.
Some companies will wait to set ROI goals and will focus on increasing sales operations efficiency, gaining cross-channel insight or simply modernizing their technology across a wide range of sales and operations teams to gain agility.
These key goals need to be agreed upon by stakeholders because they will drive priorities going forward. If there are decisions to be made, such as how the tech is configured, or how a process is designed, using key metrics to decide how to move forward keeps the conversation grounded, reducing friction and hold ups.
Consider a media company with a priority of centralizing their entire product catalog and making it available through a single UI to their entire sales organization across broadcast, cable, and digital. Having a clear prioritized goal can help the team make tough decisions throughout the design and development process and will serve as a “north star” if anyone tries to add to or change the project.
No Short Cuts During the Buy-In Phase
Buy-in is not just a preliminary step—it is the foundation for the entire implementation. Without strong leadership, a clear vision, transparent priorities, and a mandate for change, even the best technology implementation can become a business failure. Now is the time to lock in stakeholder alignment, ensure the right person is driving the implementation forward, and make sure every team understands that the future state is not optional. Setting expectations early, listening carefully, and leading decisively makes the rest of the journey much easier to navigate.
With a strong vision and a dedicated leadership team, it’s time for implementation. The next section will provide the pitfalls to avoid and best practices to embrace from kickoff to deployment.