Trying to reduce time-wasting, managers implement innovative software solutions, cross-platform applications and automation tools. Every single part of our jobs today is aimed at reaching higher results by reducing low-value tasks and automating the routine. Productivity is our obsession.
I`ve been managing teams for years. I understand how essential it is to make teams comfortable with the tools we implement for daily use. However, every time I launch some optimisation campaign within a department I face the same issue – time-consuming adaptation to a new tool or software. Despite adaptation of any length and intensity, we were constantly having mistakes – and new mistakes at that.
It`s not that team members are doing something wrong; in fact, they are trying hard. It is really not an easy thing to remember all Do`s and Don’ts of a new system all the time.
With an idea of accelerating and optimising the process I first tried, to keep my team under strict control; this resulted in a loss of initiative over several months.
After that, I provided them with more flexibility and freedom but again things went the opposite way to what I expected. They spent too much time self-educationing and although it seemed like a good thing it had an adverse effect on productivity – the team took twice as long to fulfil the usual tasks.
My next attempt towards productivity increase was to expand the number of Help files, FAQs and Tutorials. Wrong again! They got swamped by too many Help docs.
This situation was repeated with every new employee, regardless of the level of experience. Honestly, I felt hopeless. There had to be a solution! My dream was an“I-know-everything consultant” in the heads of my people. In earlier days that would have sounded strange.
However, about a year ago I read a story of a robotic consultant at MIT. Honestly, I couldn’t doubt the information and started a search for opportunities to implement something similar for my team. Since the time spent for internal questioning of simple procedures, software use, “how to this and that” was my personal nightmare, I desperately tried to do something about it.
After days of researching and mountains of information, the “Solution” became my personal light at the end of a dark tunnel.
The special thing about the “Solution” was that the tool provided every software user with automated instruction support. Practically, it assigns a consultant who stays with a user and advises the correct actions in order to proceed I felt like my old dream had become reality.
We were provided with an advisor right on the screen. The Solution sends comments and suggestions right in time and without the requirements of a fully formulated question. The software checks the content on the screen and suggests the best actions to take.
Apart from the above-stated facts, the main advantage of the system is that it actually acts like a personal “I-know-everything consultant”; it literally reads the screen and tells you what to do if you are stuck.
The first object we executed with the “Solution” was CRM. I guess you know how complicated these systems can be and how many updates they may need. Usually, when a new marketer came to my team, I ran a workshop on CRM functionality, properties and usages rules. The system was a nightmare for both the new employee and me since CRM is not the kind of system that you can learn in a few days and I had to explain the same things again and again.
However, things are different now. All the Instructions, How To`s, FAQ`s and Tutorials have been redesigned and are available as pop-ups and notifications.
Currently, we have created the next step; a process with the system in its core and the “Solution” finally got its name – “InTutor” A name close to intuition, intelligence and interaction. We finally got the “tutor” that covers our back.
Working with InTutor for quite a while, I noticed my guys not only coming to me with suggestions but also creating new approaches to fulfilling their tasks. They know how to quicken tasks processing and they also understand that those process updates can be quickly added to InTutor and become available to the whole team. Was this like a silver bullet or had we found the Holy Grail of marketing? Well, it could be if marketing and AI technologies stopped and took a look.
So far, automation is something that cures the world’s never-ending headache – the routine. InTutor gives me and the team an opportunity to exchange non-productive hours for efficient task processing. This is definitely an incentive to have a look at the tool.
Image by Tech Everyeye .
