Enterprise software adoption

Extracted Attributes

• Key Success Drivers

  User Experience (UX), stakeholder alignment, clear communication, and ongoing support

• Technological Enablers

  AI copilots, autonomous agents, Digital Adoption Platforms (DAPs), and Hybrid AI

• Modern Adoption Framework

  Dual process (top-down strategic initiatives and bottom-up transformation)

• Estimated Productivity Loss

  17% (due to end-user struggles during adoption)

• Primary Implementation Strategies

  Big bang adoption, Parallel adoption, Phased adoption

• Digital Transformation Failure Rate

  70% (attributed to poor user adoption)

Timeline

• Multimedia Plus releases white paper outlining 10 best practices for driving enterprise software adoption, noting a 17% productivity loss during poor rollouts. (Source: Web Search Results (Multimedia Plus))

  2014-10-07

• Satya Nadella discusses the business revolution of AI and the dual process of enterprise software adoption at the Davos fireside chat. (Source: Document 4e50eb82-56c2-4d20-910f-9a43912c1cd7)

  2024-01-15

• Jagdish Mali publishes research highlighting that user experience is the primary key to successful enterprise software adoption, citing a 70% failure rate for digital initiatives. (Source: Web Search Results (UX Matters))

  2025-02-17

Software adoption

In computing, adoption means the transfer (conversion) between an old system and a target system in an organization (or more broadly, by anyone). If a company works with an old software system, it may want to use a new system which is more efficient, has more work capacity, etc. So then a new system needs to be adopted, after which it can be used by users. There are several adoption strategies that can be used to implement a system in an organization. The main strategies are big bang adoption, parallel adoption and phased adoption. "Big bang" is a metaphor for the cosmological theory of the same name, in which the start of the cosmos happened at one moment in time. This is also the case with the big bang adoption approach, in which the new system is supposed to be adopted wholesale on one date. In the case of parallel adoption, the old and the new system are run in parallel initially, so that all the users can get used to the new system, but still can do their work using the old system if they want to or need to do so. Phased adoption means that the adoption happens in several phases, so that after each phase the system is a little closer to being fully adopted by the organization.

Web Search Results

• User Experience: The Key to Enterprise-Software Adoption

  ## Best Practices for Successful Software Adoption Enterprise software can provide powerful tools for business success. However, their adoption hinges on the user experience. A well-designed user experience aligns with users’ expectations and drives employee productivity. Focusing on user satisfaction is crucial to ensuring that the software becomes an integral part of users’ daily tasks. Best practices for successful software adoption include the following: [...] Toggle navigation Show search Insights and inspiration for the user experience community Home Top Articles Topics + Business + Code + Community + Design + Experiences + Process + Research + Reviews + Strategy Columns Authors Glossary Top # User Experience: The Key to Enterprise-Software Adoption By Jagdish Mali February 17, 2025 No Comments Poor user adoption causes 70% of digital-transformation initiatives to fail. Despite their making heavy investments in enterprise software, many organizations struggle with user adoption because employees find their systems too complex or hard to learn and use. [...] meeting users’ expectations—To increase user productivity and, thus, employee output, you must meet users’ expectations. conducting usability testing—To derive valuable insights for the design process, test the software with actual users. gathering user feedback—To ensure that you can make informed decisions and improve the software, take advantage of every opportunity to get user feedback. Factor | Benefit || User satisfaction | Higher engagement drives adoption rates. | | Users’ goals | Alignment on users’ goals ensures business success. | | Return on investment (ROI) | Enhancing the user experience drives a higher ROI. |

• End-to-End Guide for Enterprise Software Adoption

  Digital transformation has impacted every aspect of business and with it comes new enterprise software and technology. From the day that new software is implemented, L&D and IT teams have to make sure that every employee leverages the software for its intended purposes and that the enterprise’s software adoption journey is on track. Enterprise software alone doesn’t drive value—how your people use it does. That’s why many organizations are turning to AI-powered digital adoption platforms (DAPs) like Apty, which provide in-app guidance and real-time analytics to maximize adoption and productivity. [...] There is a reason why the organization invested in the new software. It can be to increase efficiency, speed up processes, or reduce error. Effectively communicate these benefits to your employees and help them understand the reason behind the change. #### 2. Insufficient Onboarding and Training To speed up software adoption, you need effective training and onboarding for your workforce. Poor training leaves employees confused about the new software and drastically reduces your software adoption rate. Traditional classroom-style training is proving to be ineffective in the long run as it removes the employees from their work environment and separates them from the tools that they use for their work. [...] Enterprises have to find ways to effectively overcome resistance while implementing new software. This resistance could be due to a fear of the unknown or a change in the status quo. They may dread the process of learning new systems. Whatever the reason is, leaders need to understand the causes of resistance early on, before it hinders adoption. Apty addresses this head-on by providing just-in-time, context-aware guidance that helps employees feel confident while using new software—greatly improving user satisfaction and reducing frustration.

• Software Adoption: Driving Value for Employees

  Effective adoption strategies address both human and technological factors. This means clearly communicating the value of the new software, anticipating resistance or uncertainty, and offering timely, relevant employee training that supports employees at every stage of the transition. In addition, long-term success depends on ongoing support - through knowledge bases (KB), in-app guidance, and responsive help channels - to ensure that employees feel confident and capable as they navigate new systems. ## Key Drivers of Successful Software Adoption Effective enterprise software adoption hinges on several interconnected factors that influence how quickly and confidently employees embrace new tools. These include: [...] What is software adoption? Software adoption is the process by which employees within an organization begin to actively and regularly use a new software product or feature in their workflows. ## Why Software Adoption Is More Than Just Implementation Enterprise software adoption is a complex, ongoing process that spans far beyond initial rollout. It begins well before deployment - with careful planning, stakeholder alignment, clear communication, and robust change management strategies. The process must account for the diverse technical skills, learning preferences, and responsibilities of different employee groups, making a one-size-fits-all approach ineffective in most cases. [...] en  English German Contact us # Software Adoption: Driving Value and Empowering Employees Software adoption is the process through which employees and other key stakeholders within an organization successfully learn, embrace, and consistently use new software to support strategic business objectives. More than simply deploying a tool, adoption ensures that the software is fully embedded into daily workflows - boosting employee productivity, enhancing operational efficiency, and generating measurable return on investment (ROI). In enterprise environments, successful software adoption is a core enabler of digital transformation and a decisive factor in realizing long-term business goals. What is software adoption?

• [PDF] 10 Best Practices for Driving Enterprise Software Adoption

  Stakeholder adoption is key to any new software roll-out, especially one introducing a new touch point, such as the tablet, for user interaction. When the new roll-out delivers new enterprise-wise training and com-munications focused on key brand and customer-driven strategies, its adoption must be vigilantly planned and executed. End users’ personal, social, psychological and motiva-tional needs must govern the roll-out from discovery through to life cycle maturity to assure the deep-root-ed adoption that brings customer- centric software goals to life. To that end, retail organizations must completely rethink the “adop-tion phase” of today’s fluid, curated retail learning, content and perfor-mance management systems: Tra-ditionally a finite event, yesterday’s “adoption phase” must [...] that new and broad functionality requires. In addition, enterprise-wide end users typically won’t embrace a “one size fits all” solution. Their workflow needs differ greatly from one person, department and store environment to the next. To secure end user adoption, the enterprise software must address this challenge with the flexible customization and content curation that generate a tailored, influential and engaging implementation. Often the retail C-suite unwittingly blocks user adoption of innovative enterprise software by delaying or minimizing its investment. For example, many leaders champion only those roll-outs deliver-ing immediate ROI, such as operational cost savings. In doing so, they overlook important ROI benefits - such as unified associate, brand and corporate goals that [...] Best Practices for Driving Enterprise Software Adoption 2 cused practice of starting with/after deployment.” Survey participants also revealed end user produc-tivity losses of roughly 17%. “ At 17%, the econom-ic value of user losses outweighs 100% of total IT spend,” Dowse stated. “How could any IT organiza-tion possibly declare deployment success when the software’s promise is so heavily overshadowed by end user struggles?” CHALLENGES TO ADOPTION Enterprise software adoption is a multifaceted chal-lenge presenting diverse obstacles. The scale and cost of creating enterprise software typically requires broad functionality to make the product marketable. Unfortunately, employees at every level typically resist the change that new and broad functionality requires. In addition,

• The business of Enterprise Software: The Hard Truths That ...

  Though we’ve seen recent innovations in this area, it’s usually a complex process to help a company onboard. This is where many software companies earn significant revenue from implementation services — helping companies adopt the software, customizing it to their requirements, and providing ongoing support. However, faster onboarding always benefits the software seller because real pricing and retention metrics only start mattering after the new software is actually being used daily. Most companies could use service design principles to optimize this process, but it’s still largely time-consuming no matter how well you design it. The smart move is building implementation services into your pricing model from day one, rather than treating lengthy onboarding as an unfortunate reality. [...] This isn’t because they’re legacy systems — it’s because scaling design is incredibly hard. The more complex your software becomes, the more difficult it is to maintain one scalable design philosophy. Having design systems and design languages can improve the situation, but enterprise software will likely always feel somewhat clunky. The fundamental problem is that enterprise software has to serve multiple masters. Marketing wants lead scoring, sales wants pipeline management, customer success wants health metrics, and IT wants security controls — all in the same interface. Each stakeholder has different mental models, workflows, and priorities. What feels intuitive to a sales rep confuses a data analyst, and vice versa. [...] ## The Feature Checklist Trap Wannabe enterprise software companies usually end up chasing a checklist of features that competitors have. I witnessed this at a company where our roadmap was just filled with features that our competitors already had. We didn’t know why, what, or how these features connected to our ecosystem. We just viewed each solution as standalone, with no systems thinking applied.