More than 60% of software implementations fail; more than 70% of change management programs do not deliver their expected results. The list goes on. Have you ever wondered why these statistics are so high? I remember that when I was at University the statistics were very similar.

Despite changes in technology and several new methodologies later it seems that we are not making progress as fast as we were hoping. One could ask what we and doing or not doing to maintain this not so favourable statistic? Users! Oh yes, they are the people that mess up our plans, always have something to say and always point to something that may not work. Why can’t we just develop software, systems or implement change! We have deadlines to meet and dealing with “them” is too time consuming.

Well, the reason is that one of the biggest failures of system implementation is “a lack of effective user adoption”.

By engaging users we will be able to:

• Generate data for pro-active decision making
• Reduce support costs
• Ensure system is optimally utilised

This post was inspired by the Whitepaper “Don’t forget users” released by Datango.

This entry was posted on Sunday, October 31st, 2010 at 7:58 pm and is filed under Business, Change Management, Coaching, Project Management. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.