Power Platform | Quick-reference guide on Adoption

Many CIOs can´t ignore the low-code motion any longer and therefore the amount of customers using low-code platforms such as Power Platform is consistently growing. Compared to classical software development in the past though, it seems adoption and scale-out being an issue for many due to a couple of specifics of low-code platforms.

Therefore, in today´s blog post I´ll try to provide a kind of a quick guide that is often found when you buy new IT hardware equipment that is combined with software – like I recently did with a new webcam, trying to fast forward you into the customer experience. Of course, Microsoft itself is providing a documentation of best practices around adoption of Power Platform. But honestly, I would call this the extended reference guide version. And I know many of you don´t have the time to read through all of this.

So, same as a quick-reference guide, let me start with above visual, that I use in my workshops with customers explaining the start of Power Platform adoption by initiating an internal accelerator program. Important, give your program a name to promote it internally, win sponsors and make it a gamification – employees should love to participate, not fear an administrative, restrictive program without any fun. As a bear minimum, your program should contain four main chapters. Let me drill-into those:

#1 Environment readiness

Many of you might think of Power Platform environments now – well that´s not completely wrong, as those are part of this chapter in terms of understanding the technical setup of environments, why they are important for security and what important role they play in a successful adoption. But the environment readiness also should be about the accelerator program environment readiness itself, meaning get an overview of tasks and activities, ownership, responsibilities and teams that should formalize as they might not yet exist – such as a Center of Excellence or Governance Team.

#2 Guided Transformation

What I mean by this is following a strategy and vision – why do you use Power Platform, what is it good for, what are you trying to achieve with it – think of an operational model to follow. Define journeys, milestones to achieve and ensure that you set yourself up for success, meaning to check and measure your adoption accelerator program with the help of defined KPIs. Maybe define „Hero“-use cases that allow for minimal viable product generation. As with each operational model, you should also identify the important stakeholders, responsibilities and roles, sometimes referred to as building a RACI matrix and execute on a plan. Employees want to be guided and educated. It´s more than just telling them – here´s Excel: You know how to use it from school or home work. You can use it. We´ve assigned a license to you.

#3 Up-skilling

Next, your program should contain a plan of how to build, raise and grow an internal community that should connect with external communities – for instance checking for people´s workload interests and then supporting them to connect with other Subject Matter Experts. There´re tons of communities outside, check them out. Ensure they are enabled and equipped to share their learnings with other internals through pre-defined channels. To even further support those activities and measure success you could implement regular workshops, sometimes called „Hackathons“ or Tech-Talks. It helps to share knowledge, cause no one can know everything, but they could become specialized and therefore „Champions“ and help to grow others. I prefer to recommend Ideation workshops to unlock digital innovation.

#4 Continuous Improvement

To ensure the success of your accelerator program, you should look after your pre-defined KPIs, monitor and measure them. You should also consider to adjust them when needed. Furthermore, take a look on how to improve with the help of other offers, such as bring-in external Subject Matter Experts to talk about their experiences inside one of your Tech-Talks. Check out new knowledge sharing technologies and try to figure out how people want to learn and improve. And finally, use this for reviewing your pre-setup on Governance and Admin tasks. You may find further actions to automate, processes to optimize or adjust.

This wraps-up my Quick Reference Guide on Power Platform Adoption and same as a piece of paper that I needed to unfold, follow and get my camera to work together with the software installed, I hope you now have an idea on how you could get started. Let me know your thoughts, comments and feedback – you know the channels.

Well, that´s not all. I couldn´t stop here and expect you´re good to go. So, above visual can be used as a walk through template. Based on a Digital Capability Maturity Model, you fill this template with content to build your Adoption Accelerator Program and if you feel the „need of a helping hand“, I am sure a Microsoft Partner specialized on Power Platform close to you or a Microsoft Agent will be happy to support.

That´s all for today. Hope you like it. Until then,…