Imagine…
One of the things I enjoy most about working with business owners in Ipswich and across Suffolk is that our conversations rarely begin with technology.
They usually begin with customers and how the business owner recognises the incremental refinements they might make that would have a huge impact.
What should your business look like?
“If you could change one thing about the way your customers experience your business, what would it be?”
This is the question I’ve often found myself asking business owners.
The answers are varied but connect with ‘faster, better, more efficiently’. Needing to respond to enquiries more quickly. Aligning to their customers’ expectations using seamless workflows. More time helping customers, by ensuring their team spend less time finding and collating information.
Interestingly, none of them directly mentioned technology.
With a landscape of seemingly ‘me too’ MSPs, the real value for how you chose your technology partner comes from how they understand what you want to achieve and how creative use of technology will support your ambitions. Our conversations naturally develop from my question to the one change they would make, by applying the experience of me and my team to how we can comfortably maximise technology as an integral part of their business evolution.
What is the difference that makes a difference?
The difference comes from working with the best technology partner who helps you create a strategy that defines how solutions are applied, adopted and developed to support the way your business actually wants to work.
How did we get here?!
In my experience we can end up with disjointed workflows, because of a series of small ‘work around’ fixes and short-term initiatives that made sense at the time, but ultimately result in a tangle of mediocrity and frustration.
Even without a ‘fix’, how many small frustrations have we’ve simply accepted as part of everyday business?
Rarely appearing overnight, they creep in gradually. A report takes a little longer to produce than it used to. Information ends up stored in different places. Someone has to copy data from one system into another because the systems don’t quite talk to each other. Perhaps only one person knows where something is or how a particular process works, so everyone else must wait until they’re available.
None of these things feels like a major issue on its own, so we naturally work around them. We find shortcuts, adapt our processes and carry on because, after all, “it’s only five minutes.”
The trouble is that those five minutes don’t stay as five minutes for very long.
Multiply them across a team, across a week or over the course of a year, and they become hours of lost productivity. More importantly, they gradually change the way an SME operates.
Your team spends more time managing processes than helping customers. Managers find themselves solving operational issues instead of focusing on developing the business. Customers wait a little longer for responses, projects take a little longer to complete, and everyone becomes so accustomed to these small inefficiencies that they simply become accepted as “the way we do things.”
It’s only when someone looks at the bigger picture that you realise just how much time and energy is being absorbed by work that adds very little value.
Imagine…
I enjoy a conversation that brings a fresh perspective and a creative point of view.
Helping identify things they’ve simply stopped noticing. Not because anyone has done anything wrong, but because every business evolves over time.
Processes are adapted. New systems are introduced. Teams grow. Customer expectations change. People create workarounds to keep things moving. Before long, the business can be operating in a way that no longer reflects how you would design it today.
Imagine the best version of your business, and I’ll help you use technology to create real value.
Not because it’s new or the latest trend. But because, when applied correctly, it helps remove unnecessary effort, connects people with better information and gives your team more time to focus on the things that make the biggest difference.
Looking after your customers. Supporting your colleagues. Finding new opportunities. Achieving your ambitions.
Your evolution.
Our clients know our role isn’t simply to provide technology. We have detailed, creative and solution led conversations to understand how they want to differentiate themselves. It drives solutions for how they want their business to work, evolve and, crucially, how to unlock high value to their customers.
We don’t disrupt your workflows, as it often means simply making better use of the systems you already have.
So, imagine connecting information more effectively by integrating new tools, automation or ways of working that allow your business to move forward.
The important part is that our conversation starts with your business, not the technology.
I’d love to have that exciting conversation that transforms your thinking, and your business. If you want to unlock your customer experience, simply call 01473 350444 and ask to speak to Colin or email enquiries@heronit.co.uk.
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