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← Quick Start BriefsStrategy · Technology adoption · About 3 minutes

Getting a New System Used, Not Just Installed

The system went live. The logins look fine. And the old spreadsheet is still running the job. This brief is about the gap between a system that's installed and a system that's how the work gets done.

1. The signs

  • Adoption is reported as logins or course completions.
  • Workarounds are everywhere, and everyone knows them.
  • Support tickets keep getting filed under "needs more training".
  • The same team is absorbing its third rollout this year.

2. Why it happens

The wrong measure. Logins and completions tell you people opened the system, not that the work moved into it. GOL-ADP-01

A workflow that doesn't fit. On two hospital units, barcode scanning stayed below 30% despite several rounds of staff education; observation found the workflow didn't fit the work. More training wouldn't have fixed it. GOL-WKA-03

Too much change at once. When several rollouts hit one team, morale and learning fall across all of them. GOL-ADP-08

Supervisors left out. The people who decide what "normal" looks like on a Monday morning were briefed last, if at all. GOL-MGR-01

3. What good looks like

  • Adoption measured in the work: tasks done in the new workflow, rework, cycle time and workarounds. GOL-ADP-01
  • Readiness proven by a behavioural test, such as a pilot, a dress rehearsal or a parallel run, not a survey. DGN-RDY-03
  • Every support ticket sorted into defect, data, process, training or access, and sent to whoever can fix it. GOL-HYP-02
  • Workarounds treated as requirements: the top three each month go into the change backlog with an owner. GOL-WKA-02
  • Supervisors with four jobs: spread it, translate it into their crew's tasks, resource it, and sell it. GOL-MGR-01 · GOL-MGR-02
  • Relapse planned for. Skills fade and workarounds come back after the project team leaves. GOL-ADP-03
Adoption by logins

"92% of staff have logged in." Meanwhile, RFIs still go by email, the schedule lives in a spreadsheet, and the new system is a place to file things afterwards.

Adoption by work done

"Seven in ten RFIs were raised and closed in the system this month, up from four; the two biggest workarounds are on the backlog with owners."

4. Your first three moves

  1. Choose one adoption measure in the work, and record where it starts before you change anything else. GOL-ADP-01 · DGN-BSL-01
  2. Draw a change map: which changes hit which teams, and when. Move one if a team is overloaded. GOL-ADP-08
  3. Brief supervisors before their staff, and ask each for the top three workarounds on their crew. GOL-MGR-01 · GOL-WKA-02

5. Stress-test it

Adoption fails in specific moments: the first busy week, the first exception the system doesn't handle, the first time a supervisor has to choose between the new way and the deadline. A TPC Stress Test runs your team through those moments before they happen for real, and the 90-day re-check measures whether adoption actually moved.

The short version. Measure adoption in the work, not in logins. Test readiness with behaviour. Sort every ticket. Turn workarounds into requirements. Give supervisors a real job in the change, and don't land three rollouts on one team at once.

Stress-test it. See how a TPC Stress Test works. Go deeper: Go-Live Without the Hangover · Adopt · The Ten Stages