4 Tech Tools Every Business Leader Should Know About

Business leaders face continuous challenges in this fast-paced world economy. Many difficult decisions must be made on a daily basis. And with ever-evolving technological improvements, the ways we conduct business are constantly changing.

To be a successful business leader in today’s technology-driven economy, one must utilize these resources in order to stay ahead of the competition and feel confident in making the most informed decisions for your business.

Workplace Communication Tools

Effective workplace communication is one of the most important parts of any successful business. Did you know that ineffective communication in the workplace can cost companies millions of dollars per year?

Based on a survey of 400 corporations, the Holmes Report estimated that workplace miscommunication costs organizations an average of $62.4 million per year? That comes out to the staggering cost of $26,041 per worker each year. By using more effective internal communications tools, you can reduce these miscommunication costs and increase employee productivity.

Technology plays an important role in workplace communication. Apps like Slack and Google Chat allow coworkers to send quick messages to one another. This keeps teams in the loop and fosters collaboration for group projects. These chat apps are useful for quick messaging and, naturally, email can be used for long form communication.

Both of these tools allow continuity and continuous communication among colleagues. More so, the virtual platforms allow employees to stay connected even when coworkers are on flex hours or working remotely.

Of course, chat apps and email should not be used to replace in-person communications. In a survey by The Economist Intelligence Unit, 65% of respondents felt face-to-face was “very effective” for sharing information with their teams and understanding it well.

The study pointed out that email and instant messaging is effective for connecting coworkers, but the reliance on technology-driven communication doesn’t allow for important cues like tone of voice and hand gestures, which help more effectively communicate what someone means.

Human Capital Management Tools

Businesses need a lot of assets to operate smoothly and efficiently, ranging from a physical workplace to the staples in the desk drawer. Your employees, however, will always be your most important asset. Implementing a Human Capital Management (HCM) system for your business helps ensure you find quality talent, and provides new hires with a central platform for onboarding, training, assessment, and goal-tracking.

Talent acquisition is one of the most important elements of any business model—recruiting employees with skills that meet an organization’s needs is integral to the success of any business. Acquiring quality talent is crucial for the health and growth of the workplace.

Without it, companies lose money in the long run by having to train employees longer, or simply not matching the right employee to the right job. The better the talent is when hired, the faster an employer gets an employee from the training stage to the profitable stage.

Finding new talent has long been the role of HR professionals, but with advancements in hiring practices the role of HR goes far beyond flipping through paper resumes. The advent of HCM software has changed HR’s role in talent acquisition significantly.

Now HR professionals can recruit new talent, gain valuable insights on those candidates, and onboard them through one platform. This allows HR professionals to find the right candidate for the job the first time, based on far more than what they can see on a resume.

By understanding a candidate’s skills beyond the workplace, businesses can better infer whether new hires are a good fit and will find fulfillment in the position, creating longevity for both the employee and employer. HCM software also bridges the gap between initial hiring and post training talent management, allowing businesses to gain valuable insights on how these business practices correlate to profits. Using an HCM system will give valuable time back to your HR staff so they can help grow your business more efficiently.

With the increasing popularity of flexible schedules and remote work, HCM systems allow workers to maintain productivity and management to efficiently monitor employee’s performance with the software’s talent management capabilities. By finding the right talent for the job, centralizing employee needs in one place, and giving managers an efficient talent management system, HCM software improves retention of quality talent and the overall productivity of your business.

Customer Relationship Management Tools

Maintaining a positive customer relationship is often the key to a successful and profitable business model. By utilizing a Customer Relationship Management (CRM) system, your business will have the cutting-edge advantage that comes with the centralized collection of customer data.

A CRM system will soon be a necessity for businesses; Gartner states that “CRM remains both the largest and the fastest growing enterprise application software category.” If you expect to maintain a successful business model in the coming decade, a CRM platform will be pivotal to your enterprise’s prosperity.

A CRM system gives your entire company access to crucial information about your customers. This includes: customer communications, purchases, the price they paid, and more—all in one central location.

This will give your workforce the information necessary to better manage your customer’s portfolio and draw important insights to better serve your customer base. The result is higher efficiency, better customer service, and overall satisfaction from your clients, which, ultimately, leads to higher revenue retention for your business.

A CRM system also provides a platform to run marketing campaigns, and in turn, improves your company’s ability to generate marketing materials geared to your customers. By centralizing your customer’s information into one system, the creation of marketing materials becomes more fruitful and true to your brand and customer needs.

Cloud Storage Tools

With management systems for customers and employees moving to the cloud, it’s only sensible that information storage migrates as well. Cloud storage can save a business an immense amount of time and money.

Information storage is something all businesses need, but the task of storing all that data often results in massive server rooms, expensive IT staff, complex regulatory compliance, and costly equipment updates. By moving to a cloud service, business leaders can save these resources for other expenses.

Servers are also vulnerable to attacks by ransomware and malware. This means businesses will have to spend even more on protective software to ensure their critical information is kept safe. Not only are sensitive data exposed when servers are compromised, but that information could also be held hostage until a ransom is paid.

By using a cloud storage service, all of the hassle of storing data on site can be avoided. The costs get put onto the service provider, and your company’s information will be far more secure.

On-site storage also limits employees to a physical space. With more remote workers and flexible work hours, storing information in the cloud allows for more mobility. The ability to access company information from any location will give your company more flexibility when it comes to hiring employees, too.