How to Close The Gap on Low Microsoft 365 User Adoption
Watch our on-demand webinar: The High Cost of Low Microsoft 365 Adoption
If you’ve struggled to reap real ROI on your software investments, you’re not alone. A mere 37% of organizations feel like they’re achieving the full value expected on their Cloud investment.
But why is that?
It’s partly because many organizations roll out new tech and hope that users figure out the value of their own. Other organizations provide training resources and assume employees will teach themselves what they need to know. However, a whopping 84% of software users are unmotivated to learn new tech / skills. It’s no wonder organizations don’t yield the adoption rates they want; but they’re still quick to blame the tech.
Here’s a secret: it’s not the technology. To see a return on your Microsoft 365 software investment, you need to do more than a technology deployment. You need a solution that activates change, empowers your people, and transforms your organization.
How does low Microsoft 365 user adoption hurt your business?
Companies invest a lot of time, resources and money into tech, like Microsoft 365. When you have low adoption, you’re simply not getting back what you’ve put into it which no longer makes it a worthwhile investment.
Nearly two-thirds of organizations report not achieving expected Cloud outcomes and only 18% of companies report accomplishing their Cloud tech goals. That means there’s a huge number of people that aren’t experiencing all the benefits of Microsoft 365 and therefore aren’t seeing its true value.
The good news is we can fix it and close the gap between low adoption and realizing ROI.
Using the right Microsoft 365 tools for the right tasks
First ask yourself which tools you should be using for which tasks. Identify what those necessary tools are so you can better understand the technical environment and business problems. From there, you can identify the resources needed to move ahead and focus your time, energy and resources on the right priorities. In order to evaluate if your move to the Cloud has been successful, first establish a baseline that you can measure success against and see your improvements.
Improve Microsoft 365 collaboration with empowerment
We’ve established that implementing new tech isn’t enough. You must empower your users if you want high adoption rates. Provide ongoing education in the form of classes, workshops, training sessions and more so that users are left to their own devices to learn. It’s important they know what to use and when to use it. Empower your users to get the most out of this tech.
And as your organization grows, so does your tech. It’s important to offer this training on an ongoing basis, rather than it being just a one-time thing when the tech is first introduced.
Mitigate the risks of technology failure
One of the main reasons we see technology fail is because of low adoption. To mitigate this risk and ensure your new tech is highly adopted, map technology goals to higher, specific objectives. For example, if one of your goals is to reduce all-staff emails and boost your SharePoint adoption, you can make SharePoint the home to all company announcements. Users can check out company news there vs. sending an all-staff email with the announcement in it.
Improve how employees work remotely with Microsoft 365
Tech has become instrumental in making remote work successful. Especially during the pandemic when many employees had no other option but to work remotely. Having high adoption rates is even more important for the remote workforce.
Not every user is on the same playing field when it comes to tech. You must meet users where they are in their tech journey, deliver learning opportunities and tie technologies more closely to simplify and unify.
For a deep dive into the high cost of low Microsoft 365 adoption, watch our on-demand webinar!
Presenters Bill Morton, VP of Microsoft Consulting at CollabPoint, and Jared Lord, Enterprise Account Executive at BrainStorm, will discuss the high cost of low Microsoft 365 tech adoption, and how you can close that gap.
Live Q&A From The Webinar
We were unable to answer every question live, unfortunately, due to running out of time. But we added all the questions we weren’t able to get to with answers below.
- Can you still take the Journey once you’ve already migrated to the Cloud? Or is it only for those planning to do it?
Whether you are planning a migration or already migrated, JOURNEY can help with your success. If you are just planning your migration, we can help guide you from both a technology and adoption standpoint to ensure you hit the ground running. If you have already migrated – we will review where you are, any remediation that needs to occur, and assure you are on the right path going forward.
2. What is the best way to ensure users are up to date on new features/releases as the product continues to evolve? Is there continuous training I should be doing?
As part of our JOURNEY service, we will continually monitor the Microsoft Roadmap and ensure your organization is aware of upcoming features and/or changes that would have an impact on your organization. We will then partner with QuickHelp to ensure the necessary training is up to date and deployed.
3. Interested to know who is usually involved with QuickHelp? Is it end users, or for admins?
QuickHelp is there for users at all levels within your organization. The ability to define group or job specific SkillPath’s makes it relevant for all. You even have the ability to add your own content for things like, supporting your onboarding process or specific job functions.
4. We already have a managed services partner. Does CollabPoint help organizations with adoption and engagement with an existing partner?
CollabPoint is not a replacement for your managed services company. We partner with a number of MSPs across the USA to complement their services. Our unique JOURNEY service is not something most MSPs have the expertise and experience to deliver!
5. How can employees and contractors best present these questions “upward” for serious consideration and exploration with you?
Any employee or contractor who is aware of our JOURNEY offering can contact us to begin the basic discovery process and conversations. Afterwards, we will be happy to engage with leadership at your organization about the potential to empower your teams.
6. When improvements are certain, should IT depts survey the company’s end-user population for possible new or upgraded software?
With QuickHelp, each user with take an assessment to determine their personal benchmarks. In addition, they will be surveyed to determine any additional (shadow IT) applications that they are currently using. Any new versions of the company sponsored tools will be updated along with the appropriate supporting QuickHelp SkillPath. However, any non-supported applications identified by the organization should be removed, to eliminate additional license expense, reduce IT support costs and to maintain all collaboration on company sponsored tools.