How digital adoption is transforming the role of the CIO

by Team Userlane

2 years ago ・ 8 mins

What is the Definition of Digital Adoption?

Digital Adoption refers to the process an individual takes between being introduced to a new piece of software and the moment they actually master it. Only when they are leveraging technology to its maximum potential have they finished their quest – bringing businesses the highest possible return on investment.

What is the Role of a CIO?

Chief Information Officers (CIOs) are responsible for ensuring that an organization’s people, processes, and technologies can work together to create the best possible outcomes.

Typically, CIOs would have a business goal in mind that they are always working towards. In order to achieve it, they’d always be looking to fix weaknesses along the production chain, using data to their advantage.

What is a CIOs Role in Digital Transformation?

As companies onboard more and more software platforms as a part of their digital transformation, CIOs will find themselves directly responsible for overseeing the smooth onboarding of such systems. 

1. Driving a “Foolproof” Digital Transformation

When staff members (people) are unable to complete their digital work tasks (technology), it’s the CIO that suffers. Therefore, it’s in their best interest to create a comprehensive plan for introducing platforms to every employee and supporting ongoing digital transformation.

2. Creating Innovative Training Methods

As a core part of this, Chief Information Officers will often plan and design an extensive employee training strategy that will provide support and guidance to anyone who has to learn new systems. They’ll have to consider the different learning styles of each individual to give everyone the best chance of mastering digital skills.

3. Managing Resistance to Change

However, before they can start training employees, CIOs have to challenge the mindset of those unwilling to spend time learning new software. This can be a tricky achievement and will most likely require many of the basic principles of change management.

The Impact of Digital Adoption on the Role of a CIO in a Company

Chief Information Officers will often find themselves fixing the mistakes employees have made on different software platforms, even if they’d rather focus their attention elsewhere. 

As such, digital adoption could prove crucial to them in a future where the majority of businesses are so deeply integrated with technology. 

Rather than wasting time answering questions that could be easily be fixed by more extensive training, digital adoption would allow a CIO to influence the process of software onboarding. 

Why? 

To ensure every staff member receives the support they need in the early stages of their learning journey… so they can be left alone in the later ones.

If a Chief Information Officer can be confident their team can efficiently learn how to use software (and all it has to offer), then they can rest assured that they are one step closer to achieving business goals. 

Sounds like a relief, right? That’s not all.

Digital adoption will safely eradicate the majority of IT challenges for CIOs, reducing the number of time-wasting and costly mistakes that are made by unintentional actions. Then, they can actively use their time on creating competitive business advantages that lead their company into a digital future.

The Overlap of Digital Adoption and the Role of CIOs

Ultimately, digital adoption strategies and CIOs are working towards the same goal; sharing a lot of commonality between the two. 

Each wants both technology and people to cooperate together in order for a business to achieve its absolute highest potential, resulting in impressive productivity and incredible customer satisfaction.

Therefore, all CIOs should aim to implement digital adoption best practices across the entirety of their organization. When it’s time to introduce a system, they should provide training opportunities, create support channels, and be patient while employees learn.

Is Digital Adoption Transforming the Role of CIO? – FAQs

Are all the puzzle pieces starting to click together in your mind? If not, there’s no reason to panic. 

Perhaps these helpful FAQs can point you in the right direction, reassuring you just how useful digital adoption is to the role of CIOs in a company.

What challenges do CIOs face?

Not having enough digital skills within their organization. It’s hard enough to introduce software to business processes. Without people who can use it, the role of a CIO becomes impossible.

Why is digital transformation important?

Customer expectations and purchasing habits have evolved. Businesses now need to use the internet to reach their target audience, selling online to remain competitive and secure their future.

What are the benefits of digital adoption?

There are multiple. However, the main one is to allow businesses to increase employee productivity and efficiency, ensuring the technology they’ve invested in is being used properly.

What is a digital adoption solution?

An automated, useful system that allows you to use software to conduct digital training for your employees when they need to pick up a new skill. This way, you can save time and money to protect your bottom line.

Manage CIO Workloads with Userlane’s Digital Adoption Platforms

Guess what?

There’s a really easy way use digital adoption to your advantage as a CIO, significantly cutting your workload.

How? By using Userlane’s platform to offer real-time automated software support to your team members as they learn a new system.

This way, instead of dealing with getting distracted from your plans to provide training or fix issues, you’ll find yourself with more time for other duties.

It’s really that easy.

To find out more information, request a demonstration today.