Standardisation is taking shape in place of cusomisation as organisation move to reduce exponentially cost in technologies. The mindset to customise is outdated and not cost effective. Digital Transformation is driving these standard approach in the form of Agile Templates.
Resistance is Futile
The efforts to standardise will be met with a lot of user resistance. This is a normal human behaviour that must be taken into consideration for all standardisation project. There will be a lot of comparison between customised featues and the standard ones. Often, lots of behavioral efforts will be expected to resist and lament against standard features. Ultimately, benefits outweighs customisation in terms of cost and maintainability. Users must be educated or be realised that resistance is futile.
Tips to Standardise
There are a few tips to smoothen your standardisation project easier. Many of the tips will involve mindset and behavioural acceptance.
- Find a strong sponsor and champion to drive the user acceptance.
- Remove or deny users as key stakeholders if they are too negative or unsupportive for standardisation project.
- Assign a SME (subject matter expert) with deep knowledge of change management and business process re-engineering.
Standardisation projects are not technically challenging but more on change management and business process changes to accommodate customised features. Strong user resistance must be broken down or removed as a key critical success factor for such projects. Good champions can help drive the success and gain management confidence in your standardisation approach.
Danny Kwok 