Don’t Use A Dartboard to Choose Technology

In a recent discovery session with a new client, we were discussing which of the many departments or tasks to redesign with an AI application.

Of course he had developed a long list over time based on employee complaints and his personal perspective of pain points.

The client suggested writing them all on little slips of paper and randomly drawing from a hat.

Or making a list on a whiteboard and walking up with a blindfold on and selecting the first one you point to with your wagging finger.

Don’t laugh. This is how many companies make decisions.

Where to start plays a big role in the ultimate success of any project.

There are several ways to choose that are better than random chance.

We always start with a look at the overall revenue impact and profit margin of each potential project. This is a required step in every project so that you can develop objectives and accurately evaluate the success of the initiative.

From there other considerations are the number of employees that would eventually use the solution. This also becomes a key measure as improving 5% of 50 is better than 5% of 5.

We also sit down with senior managers and employees that do the work. This provides an indicator of openness to change and if the employees that ultimately will be the ones responsible for execution are resistant to the effort.

Other criteria that can be part of the analysis include production and selling costs, marketing measurements, customer service scores, channel metrics and category or industry benchmarks.

We then blend all of these into a weighted scale tool we developed to rank potential impact.

After coming up with a top three, we go back and have more conversations. Communication all the way through is a difference maker. Trying to change with edicts from above never works as well as grass roots by in.

After the choice is made, the development of measurable and actionable objectives to understand and evaluate success is the next step in the process.

Taking the time to choose the right target for a new technology that will impact the future success or failure of projects that will be launched has benefits you can see in your bottom line.