Why is the WHY so important?

Who, What, Where, When and WHY… the 5 W’s we all learned in grade school. The questions we ask when solving a problem. What the teachers didn’t tell is how important the WHY is.

I know when I was younger, anytime I asked WHY, it was the hardest thing for adults to answer. “Because you have to”, “Because I said so”, “You need to do it or else”, were some of the answers I received. Not fully understanding the power of Why, sometimes I would do what I was asked to and sometimes I decided not to do it to see what would happen. There were times things didn’t go so well and I didn’t know why? What I have learned is how important WHY is.

I have learned over the years that for a project to be successful more focus needs to be put on the WHY. If your company is currently on or thinking about starting a Workforce Management (WFM) journey I urge you to stop and think about the WHY. Not only the WHY regarding taking the journey but the WHY for everyone affected by the journey. Answering the WHY means knowing the end result. Knowing what the goal or target is will be important to obtaining it, but why the goal is set is what connects all the pieces.

Here are 3 C’s that helped me articulate the WHY when executing corporate initiatives.

Communication, Culture, Change Management

Communication of the WHY needs to happen at the start of the journey. It then needs to be communicated throughout the journey with regular re-enforcement. Two-way and bottom up communication is needed in case anyone loses sight of the WHY.

Culture in a company is like the heartbeat of the company. A strong, honest and open culture with no sacred cows is most likely to succeed. They have the culture that everyone and everything matters.

Change management – this is arguably the hardest part of any project. Identifying the change needed (the WHY) is much easier than instituting the change. Stay the course… Long term sustainment… the stickiness of the change… Call it what you want but it is hard to accomplish. Why is it so hard?

Time try something fun. Everyone fold your arms in front of you. Everyone has their way to fold their arms. There is no right or wrong way to do it. But everyone does it their way every time. Now I ask you to fold your arms the other way. The hand that is tucked under now must go over the arm and the one that is over must be tucked under. Sounds simple and it is simple when you think about it. You are just folding your arms a different way. I bet some of you struggled and some of you may have had to try it a couple of times before you got it right. Once you were able to do it I’m sure it felt weird or unnatural to you.

How many of you went back to folding your arms your natural way already? I bet most of you did because I didn’t give the reason WHY you needed to fold your arms differently. This is what happens to projects that fail. Without the WHY everyone goes back to what’s natural to them or how they have always done it.

If you are thinking about your WHY think about it as your motivating factor for everyone involved.

Some would say there is no difference between the two. I would disagree as there are many differences. Every company starting an engagement process for new software or new technology has heard one or more of the following phrases:

  • Out of the box solutions: Sure, you can use the software right out of the box. However, what they don’t tell you is the only way you can use it is to change one or more of the following: Your corporate go to market strategy, policies, procedures or processes to use the software.
  • Customizable software: Core functionally is in the software that then is customized to your company. The catch here is that customizable leads to costlier. You must pay for every change big or little that is added to the software for your company. While you could end up with software that would work for your company today, changes needed in the future will always cost you more.
  • Completely configurable software: Take “out of the box” and “customizable,” mix them up over many years and clients and you end up with configurable software. This is software that solves issues and allows your company to configure the way you want to use it to meet your goals.

There are good reasons for why a company might select any of the software types above since every software company can sell one or all 3 types of software. In my experience, if you use out of the box software you often won’t use more than 15 percent of the software purchased. That percentage increases to around 25 percent with customizable software. The usage percent could increase higher, but the customization is so costly companies often run over budget. The highest percentage of usage is with the configurable software. Companies can get as high as 50 percent usage until they become overwhelmed with configurations. Why are most companies not even using 50 percent of the software they purchase?  That’s a good question and each company will offer different reasons.

So, what are the benefits of selecting a software solution partner you ask?  To start, in my experiences, a company’s utilization of the software they purchase can get as high as 90 percent. How is that possible?  Software solutions providers work with your company to find the best fit of their offerings to merge/integrate with your current software. They allow you to continue capturing benefits from your current software investments while enhancing your capabilities with new software. While the solutions company’s road map contains many modules, some may be redundant to what your company is happy using, you have the option to purchase just the modules that fill your gaps. That’s what happens with out of the box solutions; you end up with redundant unused software.

Another benefit of having a solutions partner is they will ask what your company’s desired outcome is. What problem are you trying to solve with software?  They work with your company to develop a road map of current and new software. They build integrations and develop new functionalities that will help your company to reach the desired results. Partners work as a team with a single goal and that is achieving your company’s desired results. As partners they work with your company though configurations and implementation while closing any gaps uncovered. You won’t hear “Us versus Them,” but instead, “How can we do it?.”  They provide training, coaching and experience to your company. They transfer their knowledge to help you reach your goal with continued support.

You always want to find the right software solutions partner as working together makes it easier to reach your company’s goals.