Fostering Sustainable User Adoption

Objectives

After completing this lesson, you will be able to:
  • Illustrate ways to measure and influence user adoption after go-live
  • Outline different options to enhance user adoption and innovation adoption in the day-to-day business

The Run Phase of SAP Activate

After the successful go-live, the 4S project enters in the last SAP Activate phase, the Run phase.

The graphic shows the SAP Activate implementation methodology with the six phases. The last phase run is highlighted.

The focus of the run phase is to ensure that the solution is running at peak performance and to take advantage of the regular innovations that SAP releases for the S/4 HANA cloud solution. This includes ongoing system operations, continuous business process and system improvements, new scope activation, and onboarding of new users.

In the change management stream, Sandra and Paul concentrate on monitoring the user adoption based on the agreed metrics, methods and timeline. They conduct an assessment to evaluate the actual user adoption and derive measures to reinforce the use of the new system. Furthermore, they help the project team reflect on the project delivery during the first implementation wave and to derive lessons learned. Ending the last project phase for the BriscoBikes subsidiary and the holding also includes identifying and celebrating achieved successes and officially communicating that the project team is now starting the next implementation wave of the 4S project.

Manage User Adoption

Objectives of Managing User Adoption

Managing user adoption is an ongoing and crucial activity after go-live. The key objective is to ensure sustained user adoption throughout the entire software lifecycle. This means that the users not only accept the new software and business processes, but also consume the new functions and features provided with each release cycle. A systematic and continuous analysis of the user’s interactions with the new system, as well as their adherence to the new business processes, helps to identify obstacles and issues hindering user adoption. By combining objective data on system usage with users’ perceptions of the solution, the company gains valuable insights to identify key levers for enhancing user adoption.

Situation at BriscoBikes

Following the first go-live of the 4S project at both BriscoBikes subsidiary and BriscoBikes Holding, the hypercare phase is nearing completion. Technical, functional, and people-related issues and challenges have been resolved successfully, and the operations will soon be handed over to the BriscoBikes IT department. During this transition, Martin Dabrowski is working on implementing the activities defined in the user adoption strategy. He has already established procedures to measure three objective indicators: average user frequency, number of user handling errors, and number of support requests. He is now preparing the ongoing evaluation of the subjective indicator, user acceptance of the new system. Sandra has already given him a high-level overview on a research-based framework for measuring user adoption (see figure below).

This picture shows a high-level overview on a research-based framework for measuring user adoption. On the left are the management factors, which include content, process and context factors. The management factors influence psychological factors, which include social influence, performance expectancy, effort expectancy, facilitating conditions and behavioral intention. The psychological factors in turn influence the adoption behavior, which is measured by the actual system use.

In essence, the model postulates that management factors influence the psychological experiences of users, which shape their behavioral intentions, ultimately affecting their actual adoption behavior.

Note

The psychological factors within the framework for managing digital adoption are defined as follows:

  • Social influence describes the degree to which a user perceives that it is important others think they should use the new system.
  • Performance expectancy is defined as the degree to which a user believes that working with the system will help them to attain gains in job performance.
  • Effort expectancy refers to the degree of ease associated with the use of the system.
  • Facilitating conditions describe the degree to which a user assumes that an organizational and technical infrastructure exists to support the use of the system, leading to the belief of having the necessary resources and knowledge to use the system.
  • Behavioral intention is the perceived likelihood or subjective probability of a user to apply the system or newly deployed system functionalities.

Source: Kohnke, O., Nieland, T., Straatmann, T., & Mueller, K. (2023). How do management factors influence digital adoption in the case of a large-scale digital transformation project – A process perspective. Journal of Management & Organization, 1–21.

Martin is especially interested in the management factors, as those can be directly influenced to enhance user adoption. The management factors can be categorized into three dimensions:

  • Content factors are specific characteristics of the implemented cloud solution.
  • Process factors refer to change management practices during and after the implementation process.
  • Context factors contain organizational conditions that facilitate the change process.

It’s Your Turn: Time to Practice!

A wide variety of topics can be addressed during the run phase to boost user adoption. These topics are categorized into content factors, process factors, and context factors.

Do you know which topics belong to each of the three categories?

Take 10 minutes to complete exercise 37 in your workbook.

The picture reminds you to do exercise 37.

Improving and Sustaining User Adoption

Martin has scheduled a meeting with Sandra to get a better idea how to manage user adoption after the first go-live of the new cloud solution.

Provide Ongoing Support

Objectives of Providing Ongoing Support

During the transition from the deploy to the run phase of the 4S project, it is important to ensure a systematic handover from the project team to the IT and business departments. This handover, with focus on technical and functional aspects, ensures a smooth operation of the new cloud solution. Simultaneously, attention should also be given to addressing the people-related aspects. Cloud solutions are updated on an ongoing basis and, by assisting users in quickly adopting new functionalities and features, the company can prevent frustrations and uncertainties. Additionally, it allows the company to immediately benefit from the associated system improvements and innovations.

Situation at BriscoBikes

The new 4S solution successfully went live at BriscoBikes and BriscoBikes Holding a few weeks ago. The project team has started handing over the cloud operations to the IT department and is about to move on to the second wave of the 4S project. However, for Martin Dabrowski, it’s not clear how to hand over the change management activities. He schedules a call with Sandra to ask for her advice.

It’s Your Turn: Time to Practice!

Do you know how to provide ongoing change management support for the users after the go-live of a cloud solution?

Take five minutes to complete exercise 38 in your workbook.

The picture reminds you to do exercise 38.

Change Management Practices to Support Innovation Adoption

Sandra and Martin discuss how to provide ongoing change management support that leads to fostering innovation adoption.

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