Addressing the ‘what's in it for me?’ mentality

What’s in it for me?

Whether we like it or not this question fuels human behavior. If people don’t see the benefits of something, they aren’t going to get behind it.

The “what’s in it for me” mentality is drastically reducing the value of a lot of digital transformation projects. Organizations are struggling to capitalize on their investment because people are not adopting the software.

“70% of change programs fail to achieve their goals, largely due to employee resistance.”

McKinsey & Company

If digital transformation brings with it a multitude of benefits, why do statistics like this exist? Why are people resisting change when it can do so much for them?

This is because while digital transformation has benefits, it also creates fear, change, and challenges.

Why are people aware of the negatives but not the positives?

People do not need to be told the negative points of a digital transformation because they are naturally averse to change.

As a result of this natural resistance to change, negative points such as uncertainty and worries about upskilling outshine any positive aspects.

However, this is because either the positive aspects are just not being made clear, or the wrong communications methods are being used.

Make the benefits known

Successful digital transformation projects bring with them many benefits not only for the business but for the individual employees too.

However, while the C levels are aware of their benefits, e.g. high ROI and reduced training costs, most of the workforce have no idea how the transformation will benefit them.

While ROI and cost reductions are crucial to success, there are so many other benefits that would strike a connection with employees and get them to adopt the change.

For example:

• Time-savings
• Quicker task completion
• Automated processes

When trying to create a positive perception of change, it’s essential you make it clear to your workforce how it will affect them in their day-to-day lives.

If employees know that adopting this software will make their life easier, you will undoubtedly overcome the fear associated with change.

Update your communication method

Determining what messaging will work for your workforce is one part of the challenge, but ensuring employees receive the communications is another.

Organizations often rely on traditional communication methods/mass emails to communicate with their workforce. However, there a two major flaws with this communication method.

The first is that because people receive so many emails every day, employees either miss or do not register your message.

And secondly, traditional communication methods have no way for you to track their consumption. If you have a crucial message to get across, you must use better ways to send it.

By using support software such as a Digital Adoption Platform (DAP), you can target your employees both in-application and out-of-application. Targeting your employees from multiple angles helps ensure the message is received and to be certain, you should use analytics to measure the consumption. By measuring the consumption of your messages, you can determine whether employees have engaged with it and if not, you can resend that communication.

Adding these considerations to your message and delivery can make the difference between a successful project or a failure.