The ideal setup for any business is to have every single unit or function, work together like clockwork, towards achieving the organizational goals. And to realize this, the Director of Strategic initiatives works closely with IT and Business leaders.
Since the new normal, the job of the strategic implementation function has become very difficult. They have to manage the programs and other initiatives in such a way that it contributes to both the short and long-term goals of the organization.
There are numerous hurdles that one can expect with this, as they have to incorporate new technologies, applications, and processes while managing the funds of the company.
Strategic initiatives usually have three major parts at their core. The first one is the vision and mission of the company which sets the tone for the organizational goals that a business is looking to achieve.
The second one is geographical expansion, product release or update, and initiation of a new project that the organization will follow to realize their aspirational goals.
The third one is the stitching of multiple initiatives with the financials of the company to drive desirable results within available resources. This helps organizations to manage budgets that will help them achieve their long-term goals without hampering the short-term results.
The job of the Director of Strategic Initiatives is becoming increasingly difficult as they have to work on stringent budgets to generate elaborate business outcomes.
Related Read: The Biggest Barriers for any Director of Strategic Initiatives
In this article, we will discuss the pain points faced by strategic implementation executives and how Apty can help them to overcome those challenges.
Top 4 Strategic Initiatives Pain Points:
- Slow Deployment
- Difficulty in Managing Cascading Effect
- Inability to Track Key Indicators
- Delayed ROI
1. Slow Deployment
Often the deployment of new projects gets delayed because of variables like resource crunch, inter-departmental communication, delay in product implementation and digital adoption, etc.
Among all these factors the implementation of a new digital product could take longer because of the infrastructure that’s needed and poor adoption rates in the initial phase.
To counter this, you would ideally need a solution like a Digital Adoption Platform that could help you steer through the digital adoption process and help you make the implementation successful in record time.
Apty is a Digital Adoption Platform which has several robust features that can help you counter the hurdle of slow deployment.
How Apty Solves the Problem:
- On-screen guidance: This includes contextual walkthroughs that guide users from one step to the other, seamlessly.
- Customized onboarding flow: The onboarding flows are another important aspect of Apty. It is created for a particular user group where a set of onboarding flows are launched the moment a new user lands on the application. Once the user completes all the onboarding flows, they get a basic understanding of the application and can easily navigate through the product.
- In-app guidance with multiple contents: To make most of any tech investment, users need to master the application. Well, for that Apty has in-app guidance where the relevant knowledge content is housed. The knowledge content consists of PDFs, PPTs, Videos, Walkthroughs, and knowledge base links. If a user is facing any problem, then rather than spending unnecessary time by going to the knowledge base and looking for help content, they can easily access the in-app guidance. It saves valuable time and helps them understand the application better.
Takeaway:
Software deployment can take longer. The biggest hurdle is the delay in software implementation and adoption. A Digital Adoption Platform like Apty can accelerate the adoption process which will solve the major issues associated with software deployment. Apty has walkthroughs, in-app guidance, and onboarding flow that makes the user feel at ease with using the application from day 1.
2. Difficulty in Managing Cascading Effect
When you expand into a new geographic location, hire a new team, or implement the new software, the pressure on the support team skyrockets as a lot of man-hours are being invested to onboard employees on the new application.
If the application onboarding does not go as expected, employees tend to look for help and ideally, in cases like these, the support team comes to the rescue. If the support team starts to invest their valuable time addressing repetitive queries and simple questions it hampers their productivity and could reduce the efficiency with which they could have addressed major issues.
This doesn’t mean that the support team needs to stop helping the employees. No. What we’re suggesting is that tools like Apty can be used to simplify the job of the support team which will help you reduce the support tickets drastically.
How Apty Solves the Problem:
- Onboarding checklist: Apty help-deck also has onboarding checklists that consist of the minimum number of onboarding flows to ensure that the employees are onboarded smoothly and understand the application without depending on anyone else.
- In-app help-deck: The help deck within the application consists of several documents, videos, knowledge base content, and workflows which users can access as and when they want without relying on the support team. This helps to reduce the support tickets and enable employees to be self-sufficient.
- Launchers: It is a link embedded within a button, which can take a user to a document, video, or even launch a workflow. You place these launchers across the application where users need help. Launcher grabs the immediate attention of the user so they need not find the workflows or any content in the in-app help deck rather they can click on the launcher and it helps them take the desired action without any hiccups.
Takeaway:
During expansion, or deployment of new projects or when employees are onboarded on a new application, if the training and onboarding are not on point, employees tend to look for support or guidance.
To make this process easier for them as well as the support team, an end-to-end solution like Apty can be used to reduce support tickets drastically and also empower employees to independently learn and master the application.
3. Inability to Track Key Indicators
After creating a spectacular strategy, you might expect the same level of excellence in the execution stage too. But not keeping track of key indicators and the progress could derail your strategic initiatives.
It is necessary to track where the initiative is heading, how many employees have adopted the new application, how effectively the new business processes are being followed, are they able to execute their job efficiently without any hindrance or not, where they are struggling to use the application and more.
Once these contexts are addressed, you will be in a much better position to manage the strategic initiatives in the desired manner. Apty helps you to gain insights and help you to stay on track with your strategy.
How Apty solves the problem:
- Analytics powered with historical and current data to examine the potential trends to analyze certain events, decisions and applications to evaluate the overall performance.
- Once the knowledge content is deployed, you can analyze how it is helping the users and based on the analysis, you can improve the gaps.
- You can filter the data based on the user groups and analyze which group of users are struggling, and where.
- User onboarding statistics help you to identify where the user is dropping off and understand what the task completion rate within the application is.
- You can track the user’s behavior prior to creating the final business process and could also stitch the training content based on this analysis.
Takeaway:
Tracking the key indicator is crucial to ensure success with the strategic initiatives. You need an all-in-one enterprise adoption tool like Apty to understand how effectively the employees use the application, if there are any issues and where they are. Eventually, the strategic goals can only be achieved once you analyze and improve the gaps.
4. Delayed ROI
Developing the course for the employees in an enterprise takes a lot of time. For creating 1 hour of eLearning course material it takes more than 45 hours of manual effort.
To put this in perspective – Let’s say your employees need a basic course of 9-10 hours to get started and for creating that course it would approximately take 360-400 man-hours.
You can use better methods that can help you save time, effort, and money. A Digital Adoption Platform empowers you with several options to not only onboard and train your employees but also speed up the content creation process.
How Apty solves the problem:
- Powerful features: Intelligent walkthroughs, announcements, tooltips, and validations can be created in a matter of few hours.
- Multiple content format: All the above-mentioned workflows can be easily converted to PDFs, PPTs, Videos, and SCORM compliant content with just one click.
- Ease of deployment: The converted SCORM complaint content can be easily deployed in any LMS system and PDFs can be used in a knowledge base content.
- Automation: You can use the Apty chatbot to automate mundane tasks. It saves time for your employees by helping them complete tedious tasks in no time at all, without even opening the application. Also, it opens up more time for them to focus on tasks that are crucial to their roles.
Takeaway:
Delayed ROI could cost your organization big money. To maximize return on your enterprise software investments, it is important to use a tool like Apty that not only helps you create content quickly but also helps you to onboard employees smoothly from day 1. As we’ve already discussed, your support cost goes down and all these factors contribute to achieving your goals by managing the financials effectively.
Ensure Strategic Success with Apty
Creating a strategic plan that helps you achieve your organizational goals is challenging. There are numerous variables involved which could create roadblocks in the journey. Identifying it and removing those gaps is the only way to achieve success and Apty helps you do just that without hurting your bottom line.
