Change is hard. As human beings, we get used to our comfort zone and we resist a lot when someone or something tries to take us out of it. As a business, it can be even more difficult to face changes, because we have to take through the process many resistant people at the same time. Therefore, we want to help you by sharing how to prepare your freight forwarder to go through a change.
It is a law of life: change is inevitable. We are constantly facing changes to be able to evolve. If our predecessors had stayed the same, we wouldn’t live the life we know nowadays. So, why resist it?
We should all be embracing changes like digital transformation and aiming to be part of this new era. It actually brings a lot of benefits to all businesses and, instead of taking the best out of it, it’s being neglected, at least by most freight forwarders.
So, how can you prepare your freight forwarder for change and make it evolve?
We know it’s easier to say it than to actually accomplish it. But still, we think you can start with some little steps to get there eventually. We recommend you to:
1. Embrace technology:
It’s not a secret that technology has been revolutionizing our whole world. With newer and better technology coming out every day, we need to adapt to it in order to keep up with the market. This affects especially the team in charge of all operations because they have to change the way they work whenever there’s something new. However, it’s important to reinforce with them the thought of new tools as a way of making their job easier, rather than seeing it as an extra load to deal with. Digital tools, such as Cargofive, were born as an answer to a need detected in the business operations. So, if they are going to optimize the resources used into a task, why not embrace it? Talk to your team to help them understand why the change is necessary and go for it!
2. Work on your change management:
Every change in any business needs to have a clear plan to be successful. Otherwise, there’s a big chance that it will create trouble instead of solutions. Make sure you have mapped all of the aspects involved, define roles and responsibilities, communicate the steps to follow to your team and keep a close follow up to ensure the plan is executed as expected. Communication is key to guarantee the success in a transformation process: before, during, and after implementation. Everyone has to clearly know what their role is, how it will affect them, and how their job will be after the change.
3. Train your team:
Every member of your freight forwarder should be trained and qualified to face the change you intend to make. Training can mark a big difference in implementation success. If someone is not well prepared, it can cause a delay or it can complicate the transformation process, increasing the execution costs. You should be including then training into your plan; what does your team need to know, how will it be taught, by who, when, where, etc.
4. Start trying out new tools:
If change is inevitable, and you know now how to prepare your freight forwarder to face it, then what would stop you from trying out new tools? Evolution can’t occur if you stay the same, so give new technologies a chance to help you optimize your processes. For instance, using Cargofive could help you reduce 80% of the time employed to create quotes and increase your sales by at least 5%. Imagine all you could do with your team in that saved time, your freight forwarder may experience a major boost!
You should be aware that not all changes will turn out well, but you can always prepare your freight forwarder to aim for the best, right? It’s important that you really look for all of the options and choose the one that suits your business better. Then, start taking our recommendations listed above, work on all of the aspects needed to face a change, and let’s make your freight forwarder evolve!
