(This article was updated on Aug, 22nd, 2024)
There’s a hidden enemy lurking in your office.
It’s so subtle. So quiet. So seemingly smart, you won’t recognize it as an enemy but it’s in front of you every moment of your working day.
It’s called app congestion.
And it’s creating an unholy traffic jam in your ability to respond quickly to clients.
The average small business uses over 100 different applications to run its operation.
Think that too many to believe?
Stop now and count in your head the systems you --as a promo professional-- use every day:
App congestion is the new traffic jam. One report by Pega revealed that by studying over 5 million hours of live desktop activity, employees switched between 35 job-critical applications more than 1100 times a day. Pega dubbed it the “virtual swivel chair.”
Cal Newport called it attention residue: when you switch from one app or activity to another, your full attention doesn’t immediately follow, “a residue of your attention remains stuck thinking about the original task.”
Context switching and app congestion are costing you and your team upwards of 80% of their productivity loss a day. That’s not efficiency, that’s insanity.
In our industry it’s not just a problem, it’s a raging inferno that slows sales.
We already have a complex supply chain with a million products and a billion variables, add to it the complexity we create with too many bolt-on tools we use to run our business and you’ve got a Frankenstein system for your company’s engine: It moves slow, groans loudly, and requires lots and lots of oiling to make it work.
As a consumer, consider how many apps and digital services do you sign up for that once sounded cool but you’ve long since abandoned. I recently saw a recipe that I wanted from the NYTimes and thought, “it’s only $4.99 a month for the recipe app and I could use a recipe-saving service, so why not?”
And that’s how it happens. That small decision adds up to a behavior pattern that results in a lot of wasteful spending. The average consumer (ie, you and me) spends $237 a month on apps, games, digital newspaper and magazine subscriptions, meal services, entertainment, and more. How many times have you looked at your bank statement and thought: I’ve got to cancel that subscription.
And this consumer behavior bleeds over into our business behavior. While the average consumer spends nearly $3,000 annually on these services, the average company wastes around $135,000 annually on software tools they don’t really need or tools they vastly underutilize.
The solution? Consolidate the number of tools that power your business to simplify your business.
As the leader of your org, it’s crucial that you give your team the best-in-class tools to do their job, but that you also don’t simultaneously burden them with so many tools that you’re inadvertently giving them a part-time job ... learning 20 different tools.
So, the magic question to ask when you consider the software that powers your ops is: Will it simplify your world?
Three things people say they’re never ready for: kids, marriage, and taxes.
And maybe one more thing: consolidating (ie, changing) your internal ops software. It’s never the right time. Never the right season. Never the right moment. Why?
Your business will never pause long enough so that you can make all the changes you want. (If it does, you’ve got bigger problems than dealing with software change).
What not to do: Sit through the problem with a system that’s “good enough.” Or add one more bolt-on app that bloats your service and costs you clients.
I was talking with the owner of a $20+MM distributor about their experience as a large organization implementing new software and when I asked him his advice to others about how to make a big change he said simply, forcefully, “you just have to push through.”
You just have to do it.
The good news? The number one comment we hear from customers is “it was m-u-c-h easier than we thought.” So, whatever changes you have to make, whoever you choose to simplify your ops software, make the change now.
Yes, we’re a tech company and we’re telling you not to buy too much tech, but we’re a tech company telling you this because we do so with confidence. (Our system consolidates all the systems that power your system into one sleek design).
Reduce the overwhelming number of tools you and your team use. Lighten your workload and unburden their work.
Because if you consolidate your ops, you'll simplify your world.
Want to learn more? Join us for a webinar with the one and only Tony McNally from Vanguard!