So it’s Monday morning and you either arrive in the office or log on to your employer’s network from home.
You have some normal mundane tasks to do, open the usual data entry screen but everything looks different. Really different. Then you remember the email that went around a few weeks ago advising of IT system changes and that updates would be sent to everyone in due course.
Surprise surprise, you never got an update, but now you have to navigate your way around this brave new world of software before you’ve even had your first cup of coffee. It wasn’t broken so why did they have to fix it? Maybe that’s the thing about employees’ reactions to change – some people cope and adapt, others, who like certainty and routine, try to avoid using new software or make excuses why they’re having problems adapting to it.
Mixed reactions to software changes
Whether you’re a ‘change is bad’ type of person or a ‘let’s give this a fly’ sort – one fact remains – you’ve either got to cope with the change that’s been forced upon you or work for a different company.
The good news is found in artificial intelligence-driven hyper-personalised software training platforms called digital adoption tools. The idea behind DAPs (Digital Adoption Platforms) and Digital Adoption Software (DAS) is very simple; it’s the addition of a teaching layer that runs alongside the original software to help new users adapt to updates or brand-new packages.
Distance teaching and learning difficulties
DAS packages work particularly well with the advent of remote working post-pandemic, especially as it’s now more difficult to provide ‘mixed ability’ IT training to, say, 30 employees on a zoom call. Some people will not encounter too many problems, but some will just see a screen in front of them like a mess of hieroglyphic spaghetti.
Especially when it comes to training using distance learning, IT managers and professional trainers are going to find their lives made much easier by software that comes with its own training module. This is the real utility of the DAS being fuelled by artificial intelligence, in that it takes into account every individual user’s learning style. Some people learn rapidly, in which case the DAS would offer fewer tips than to a user who has been making the same obvious mistakes in erroneous workflow and showing repeated patterns. In the latter case, the DAS would alert the user with a prompt, for example: “Please remember, in the next screen, you can’t use special characters when creating a username…” When the learner gets into the habit of creating a username correctly, the DAS stops prompting them about that particular issue.
DAPs are just a natural extension of technological advancement.
We really shouldn’t be surprised that software is starting to be accompanied by its own bolted-on teaching packages. It’s only an extension of ‘tool tips’ and ‘help boxes’ that have been popping up for years. Just a lot smarter. What’s much more groundbreaking is the fact that soon we may even be able to affect the way we interact with software just by using our minds, as this interesting article shows.
Nowadays, everyone would probably agree that the internet and information technology has democratized almost every aspect of the way we live our lives. We can now do lots of things ourselves using a YouTube video for which we would have called a professional at one time. Even something as simple as changing a fuse in a mains electricity plug would confound some people, but Google it up and in ten minutes you’re all rewired! Just as DAPs are teaching people how to use software, similar technology is turning professions around in terms of how people earn their living. The well-known fashion designer Karlie Kloss explains here how computers have turned fashion designers into coders to produce new styles of clothing.
Slackers beware!
Finally, there’s no denying that whether you’re working from home or back in the nine-to-five grind, some employers are going to want to squeeze every ounce out of their staff. There’s a modern phrase called ‘quiet quitting’ which is supposed to mean doing the very least you can get away with.
But it’s nothing new, office slackers have been around since the office was invented. It’s just that now, working from home won’t mean that you can start a bit later, finish a bit earlier and swap screens to check your Facebook every 20 minutes, because the use of ‘Bossware’ is on the increase! Such surveillance tools can monitor just what employees are actually doing on their screens, as opposed to the fact they’re simply logged on to the system.
The use of A DAS platform will enable everyone to get better at their jobs, which should root out the slackers and provide a better work / life balance for everyone else. Long may it continue.
