Why Investing in the Best New Technology for Your Team Skyrockets Productivity

New technology is created each day to augment life and business. Computing capability is becoming more efficient and powerful by the minute. This trend gives all of us, everywhere, access to incredible innovations and valuable information.

Many company leaders struggle to embrace new technology quickly. However, it’s important to understand that a computer can accomplish certain tasks better and faster than you can. This may not feel great, especially if you’ve spent years studying and preparing for the work you do. But like any exceptional boss, you’ll want to be ahead of the curve, implementing the latest technology fast.

Despite sometimes painful initial hurdles, investing in the best new technology for your company will skyrocket productivity in your teams. You’ll be creating a cohesive and sustainable business. Here’s why:

Technology lets employees allocate energy to more important, higher-level tasks.

Your employees already probably respect you because of your intelligence and leadership abilities. Good leaders don’t shy away from new tech; they embrace it and learn about it.

Pick technology that lets employees spend less time on tasks that can be automated. Instead of manually sorting through and organizing data, team members can query for the answer in your company database. Instead of tracking potential sales through a clunky spreadsheet, your team can succinctly follow a catered tracking system.

Know the companies and products that update software regularly so you stay cutting edge. When it comes to sales and customer management products, Apptivo, Zoho and Salesforce are among the more well-respected.

Once you’ve eliminated time spent doing busy work, your employees can devote effort to more strategic and thought-provoking tasks. Try allocating them ten extra work hours for creative marketing channels. What other useful expertise can they develop?

Investment in new tech demonstrates that you are invested in employee success.

Giving your team best-in-class tech demonstrates you care about their success. When you don’t supplement their work with any internal resources, it speaks volumes about your trust in employees. Workers may feel frustrated or demoralized when they interact with people from other companies using more powerful tools.

It’s just a fact of life that tech people sit in coffee shops and brag about their company’s cutting-edge software, gadgetry, and other tools. It’s motivating when the boss spends money on resources to help you succeed.

Years ago at one of the startups I worked for, my boss bought me and all the other marketing team members new iPads. This infused a great deal of energy into the team. Not only did we love our new “toy,” but the Keynote program on the iPad made it easier for me to demo products for clients we visited.

Updated technology helps you avoid becoming obsolete.

Continuously adopting new technology will help your company remain viable. There will always be competitors emerging who leverage innovative technology. Customers are fickle. It won’t matter how long you’ve been around — you have to innovate to stay relevant.

Keep modernizing your systems, products and services, because this helps your employees and customers alike. For example, use technology that matches the IP addresses of your website visitors and sends targeted emails, discounts or newsletters. Infusionsoft, Act-On and Hubspot are some of the better services I’ve used. Such growth-hacking methods make a difference in your bottom line over time.

New technology helps you boost your company’s culture.

Mindfully handling transitions to new technology helps implementation go more smoothly. Explain clearly why you chose the technology. It should show you have an understanding of your employees’ workdays and pain points. It shows you listen to them.

Demonstrate that picking up new skills is rewarded in your company. Reward whoever masters new tools first. Let them teach it to colleagues — giving them the opportunity for growth in their leadership skills.

To help improve your company culture, be flexible and let employees work from home. This has been shown to boost loyalty and heighten productivity. For example, use cloud-based technologies to help teams hold remote meetings.

Acknowledge employee development and success. “Performance recognition software” helps you set up recognition programs and show people the impact of their work. Top products include 15Five and Tap my Back.

Also, encourage workers to grow in their careers. Give them access to software that can help them see career paths of top employees as well as routes they might take. Examples here include Talentguard and PathSavvy.

Rely on your own people to help you find new technology.

One of your employees may be the best person to bring new technology to your attention. Let your own people bring you solutions to company problems and you’ll have employees thinking around the clock about innovation. They’ll trust they can integrate the newest technology in your company right now. That alone may be enough to boost enthusiasm as well as productivity.