How to Approach, Implement, and Succeed With, Smart Automation Technology

Making the decision to implement a smart automation platform like Accelo can be a daunting experience for many service professionals. While it might feel like you’re taking on more work or simply asking for more headaches, it’s important to realize how simple and rewarding it will be - not just for you, but for your entire business. 

With so many businesses and teams still relying on outdated tools to get their work done, we thought we’d take a moment to share with you this first-hand account of someone who took a chance on smart technology and never looked back. 

Enter Delia Gill.

Delia has been the Managing Director of IT Engine, a New Zealand based software solutions company, for almost two decades and loves everything about the industry; the gadgets, the trends, and the constant change of pace. But being an expert in her field, Delia knew that if she didn’t keep up with the rapid change, she’d get left behind with her competitors.

Delia and her team had been using an in-house business tool that they continually customized to suit their needs - but there was just one problem, it didn’t integrate with any essential business tools or automate their busywork. To put it as simply as Delia did:

“This was driving the team crazy!”

She shopped around for a smart automation platform that suited her business needs, and after a month of perseverance and great support, she's up and running with a cloud-based system that manages all of her client work, in one place.

We asked Delia to share some helpful tips for service professionals who are desperate for a solution but intimidated by change - here's what she said:

1. It will be overwhelming, but not for long.

Switching to a smart automation platform will be overwhelming at first, but bear with it. We kick-started our implementation process with an hour and a half session with a support representative - so that they knew how we worked. From there, we had ongoing training calls to understand how to approach the different parts of our new software, at our own pace.

2. Pick a good month to make the change.

We chose to implement our smart automation platform in January as this is generally a quieter period for many service businesses - so that helped us a lot as we had time to digest all the training and familiarize ourselves with new workflows.

"We literally leaped in with both boots and haven’t looked back!"

3. There's no such thing as a stupid question.

Rather than stew on a problem that was stunting our workflows, we called our support rep at Accelo and had an answer to our problem within minutes. How? Because they understand the platform more than anyone else. Anytime we came up against something that we couldn't figure out ourselves, we’d just make a note to go over that in our next training session and ‘wha lah’ - problem solved.

4. Take notes.

Our engineering team struggled with the implementation process because they were the ones who didn’t have enough mental space at the end of the day to focus on learning a new product. But, being the engineers that they are, they wrote themselves they’re own ‘cheat sheet’ which has gone a long way in helping them (and newcomers) get their head around smart automation technology.

5.  Experiment, streamline, and have fun with it.

Once we’d all adjusted to our new business software (after just a month), we began to experiment with integrations. For example, we now integrate with Xero and Exchange to further simplify our workflows and take full advantage of the platform - and already we can see that it’s ‘ticking all of the boxes.’ 

"Bottom line, If we’d known in the early days that there was a solution to our problems we would have invested in smart automation long ago."

But in saying that, it does take time to find the right smart platform and one that works for you, not against you.

If Delia’s experience is something you can relate to or if it makes you curious about learning how a smart automation platform like Accelo can help you run a more successful business in 2018, click here to start your free trial today.