Employers dread introducing new technology to their employees, but it’s often essential for preparing your business for the future. It is a given that there will be training problems, resistance to the new technology, and problems implementing the technology. There are ways to deal with these problems, usually by engaging your employees, emphasizing how the technology will help them, and training them properly. Keep these tips in mind and your employees may actually learn to love the new technology.

Introducing the Technology Tactfully

Introducing employees to new technology is probably the simplest step to deal with. At this stage, it is sufficient to just introduce the technology to the employees, usually through an orientation and then through workshops. The goal is to just familiarize the employees with the new technology and the train on it later. Make sure that you are tactful about introducing it by giving all the employees a heads up beforehand. If you spring the new technology on employees unexpectedly, they might get frustrated and resentful. Giving them ample time to absorb the news and process. This will help them to be ready to learn more about the technology when the implementation time arrives.

Getting Employees Engaged

You should then use engagement to get your employees interested in technology. Focusing on communications can be an important way to get them interested, especially if you can show them that it will make their jobs easier. You need to show that there are some problems that the company has that technology can solve. The issue to keep in mind is that they will resist learning anything that will not help them; you need to show them that the new technology will help them. Show them that it has value and they will be interested in learning anything.

Building on What They Already Know

Once engagement has been successful, the next step of introducing new technology to your employees is to relate the technology to what they already know. As most technology builds off already existing technology, it should be simple enough to show the familiarities between the old and new technologies and build on those familiarities. Make sure that you cater to different learning styles when you build on the knowledge they already have, as not all employees learn things the same way. This will help to make sure that they fully understand what the technology does and how to use it.

Making Experts Available

Lastly, make sure that your employees have some sort of experts on the new technology available. These experts can be in-house employees that are already familiar with the new technology or it can be contractors specifically brought in to teach your employees. It can even be a help number for troubleshooting. These experts should not only teach your employees how to use the technology but be around for questions later. This ensures that not only do your employees pick up the technology but also make sure that any problems can be handled as they develop. They may also be able to show some employees some great tips on how to use it.

Ultimately, introducing your employees to new technology is not difficult. Just introduce it, engage them, build on what they know, and make sure that experts are available, and the new technology should be part of the company in record time.