The time has come, and you are ready! Having analysed your company’s situation, contractor management needs and various solutions available in the market, you have concluded that Cognibox is the tool for you.
A great step in the right direction. Now comes the hard part: convincing your boss to implement Cognibox across the board. Not easy, considering that your needs and expectations may differ from those of your boss.
Hence the importance of pondering different strategies to rally your boss to your point of view and dangling the prospect of tangible benefits certain to resonate with his or her primary business considerations and goals.
Following are six arguments to help you turn the tables in your favour.
To succeed in convincing company decision makers of the value of Cognibox, you must speak their language, the language of business.
You may not be fully versed in the subtleties of the language of business, and that is entirely normal. Just accept that the five top-of-mind issues for decision makers are as follows:
- Risk
- Revenue
- Cost
- Time
- Quality
If you can successfully build your case around these five key considerations, you will command the attention of all decision makers concerned. And if, in addition, you can skilfully deliver your case, you will almost certainly succeed in securing their support.
1. Choose your Battles
All too often, when field managers get the chance to address corporate decision makers, they seize the opportunity to churn out a lengthy list of pet projects. This approach results in information overload and dilutes the importance of each of the initiatives.
Do not fall into this trap. Be concise. Choose to focus on just one issue. Do not allow yourself to stray. By sending a clear message, you will create a sense of urgency and increase your chances of securing approval.
2. Play the ‘Risk’ Card
Regulatory compliance. These two words will resonate powerfully in the ears of your superiors. If you can demonstrate that contractor management software will considerably enhance risk management and reduce the likelihood of lawsuits, fines and reputational damage, you can be certain that they will sit up and listen to what you have to say.
The same applies to work or production stoppages. Facilities obligated to close their doors temporarily owing to an incident, accident or matter of regulatory non-compliance run the risk of suffering revenue losses of colossal proportions. Your superiors will want to avoid this at all cost and be ready to consider the purchase of Cognibox to safeguard the company against such risks and their potentially disastrous consequences.
3. Establish a Link Between Safety and Revenue Stream
Most executives associate worker health and safety with costs, not with revenues. For them, the close monitoring of activities outsourced to an external contractor means additional human, material and financial resources.
What they tend to forget is that when they adopt a solution such as Cognibox, they can free up qualified resources formerly responsible for contractor compliance and assign them to positions more in keeping with their skill set. In so doing, they help create real value for the company.
Better yet, given enhanced health and safety performance, the company can henceforth focus on building their customer base and generating additional revenues by winning over a customarily elusive clientele.
4. Do Not Talk Cost, Talk Return on Investment
Return on investment, the famous ROI, is one of the most common measures of performance employed by executives. If you can succeed in demonstrating that the purchase of a contractor management software solution such as Cognibox generates a positive return on investment much more quickly than your superiors might imagine – and this is indeed true – you will more readily obtain their agreement.
Ask for the relevant figures with which to make the calculation and then demonstrate to them on paper. You will be surprised to see how quickly your request deemed unrealistic, if not downright preposterous at the outset, suddenly metamorphizes into an entirely logical solution.
5. Switch Around Talk of Deadlines
More often than not, when you solicit a meeting with your superiors to address deadlines, the news is not positive. What if you were to switch this around with talk of moving deadlines up in place of pushing them back?
With contractor management software, you would be poised to standardize management processes and secure rapid gains in time, enabling you to meet and perhaps even shorten production deadlines. Tangible improvements of like translate into enhanced profit margins.
6. Assign Value to Quality
Quality represents a critical element for differentiating one brand from another, and company officials delight in stressing this fact in sales pitches. Opting for a lesser quality item may make for short term gains, but any initial savings will almost certainly be voided by greater maintenance, repair and replacement costs over the longer term.
With the acquisition of a contractor management solution comes process standardization which begets enhanced rigour and improved quality. As a consequence, your company is better poised to retain customers and attract new ones.
There exist a number of different angles from which you can state your case. No matter how clear the benefits of an intelligent contractor management solution appear to you, company decision makers may perceive the situation otherwise.
You need to modify your approach, speak in terms of tangible benefits for the company, and stress that implementation of a software-based solution would help the company meet key business goals. Indeed, by presenting what you have to say in a manner intended to ensure that all stakeholders view the idea as a win/win solution, your message will be received in an entirely different light and almost certainly guarantee a successful outcome.
