76% of workers do not feel prepared for working in a digital-first world, Tim Hughes

New research, provided by this Brian Solis, in this Forbes article here, "shines a light on the development of digital, within an organisation."

Over the last 5 years and especially during the "Covid years" we have seen a perfect storm of mobile, social media, internet and Covid-19 changing how we live, how we work and how we play.

Back in March 2020, when the first lockdowns happened over Europe, people said that work, church, piano lessons, doctor visits, couldn't take place online. And now, of course they do.

Against that backdrop, this reports states

"In a world of employers still reeling from the “great resignation,” another wave of workforce disruption appears on the horizon. Next up, is a “great digital divide,” one that exposes the expertise needed to thrive in a digital-first world and those who largely possess pre-pandemic skills. And that divide will upend work sooner than we might think.

76% of workers do not feel prepared for working in a digital-first world."

But there is more

Measuring the Digital Skills Divide

"As part of the research process, workers also took part in a Digital Skills Readiness Index. Out of a possible 100 points, workers only scored 33 in fundamental areas such as preparedness, access to learning resources, skill level, and participation in training. Of the included 14 workplace digital skills in the survey, only 17% consider themselves “advanced” in workplace digital skills, while 49% consider themselves “beginner.”

Since the future of work is expected to shift to a hybrid model, the digital skills divide isn’t going to close on its own."

How are we as a business going to close this digital skill gap?

The only way that the gap will be closed is by training and coaching your team.

I've used the word coaching on purpose as for many people, sitting in "hints and tips" sessions, Powerpoint presentations or watching videos or computer based training (CBT) is not going to hack it.

Digital is a fundamental change in how people work, this requires mindset change and habit change and this requires coaching. Back to the salesforce article.

"In a separate, earlier Salesforce study, 54% of workers believe technology will advance faster than the skills of the workforce. The only way to bridge the gap is to assess the existing divide within the organization between current skills, skills in development, and skills needed in the next five-to-10 years."

This starts at the leadership

Brian's Forbes article also quotes.

"A recent article in MITSloan Management Review explored C-Suites and the glaring lack of “digital smarts.”

Only 23% of CEOs are considered digitally savvy. And just 7% of large companies currently employ digitally savvy executive teams."

Brian closes the salesforce article by saying

"This is a unique CTRL-ALT-DEL moment, an opportunity to rethink work, employee engagement, and employee experiences (EX) to better connect with employees, customers, and communities, to drive collaborative growth and reshape the future"

What is social selling?

Here at DLA Ignite, we define social selling as

"Using your presence and behavior on Social Media to build influence,
make connections, grow relationships and trust, which leads to
conversation and commercial interaction."

It's not witchcraft, it's enabling your salespeople to work from home, (or the office) and create conversations with prospects and customers. Conversations on social media and conversations that convert.

The problem with the name "social selling" is that people think that this is selling on social. All these pitches that you get on social are not social selling, they are spam.

The other thing you need to know about social selling is that this isn't about "putting out some videos" or "putting flowers on your profile" or "going viral" this is about revenue, EBITDA, you winning business from the competition and having a competitive advantage.

With anything you do on social there are two questions you need to ask

1. How many leads / meetings / conversations will I get from this post / blog / activity?

2. How much revenue / EBITDA am I getting as a business?

So who's social selling?

In case you missed it, the Bank of America’s Merrill Lynch have banned cold calling and have moved all their people to social selling. This isn't some trendy tech company that might have decided to do this on a whim, this is a very conservative financial services company that has made a decision based on data.

But surely cold calling has a better ROI than social selling? Not according to Merrill Lynch.

"They will also be encouraged to contact prospects over LinkedIn, which has a higher hit rate than cold calling"

The CRO (chief revenue officer), Richard Eltham of Namos Solutions, of one of clients posted a comment on LinkedIn about social selling. See here.

“Social selling is not an option now it is the way of the world and you either learn and execute it or fear getting left behind”

Kevin Murray who is the Head of Sales at MacArtney Underwater Technology recently posted about his success with social selling here and wrote an article about the transformation that has happened in sales here.

Andrew Ferrier who is the CEO of Display Technology Ltd and in this article it talks about why Display Technology have adopted social selling. His team have also created a social media strategy with help from our partner, Crux.

Their social media mission statement is

“We want to position ourselves as a forward-thinking, knowledgeable team of individuals who are all experts in our own right, therefore, collectively awesome!”

Andrew also says in that post

"Adopting this (social selling) strategy has taken all of us well outside of our comfort zones but the rewards we have seen in a short period of time have created an excitement within the business development team (new term for sales team).

Because of the nature of social media, quite often you can get instant results. Even if that is just a comment left on your post, or a like, or someone taking the time to want to connect with you.

The excitement around the sales team is infectious, it’s no longer a chore to reach out to the market place because the results can be instant and are there, right in front of you."

What sort of results can you expect?

If you check out this video of Chris Mason CEO at Oracle reseller Namos, fast forward to 19 minutes 55 seconds. Chris talks about a $2.6 million win from being on social, after completing the DLA Ignite social selling and influence course.

Here at DLA Ignite, we work with our partners such as Crux, Little Bird Marketing, Funnel Amplified, Accelery, EDPE Consultants, etc. We are the only social selling and influence company in the world to offer a certificate provided by an independent qualification body (OfQual) and sponsored by the Institute of Sales Professionals (ISP).

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In a world of employers still reeling from the “great resignation,” another wave of workforce disruption appears on the horizon. Next up, is a “great digital divide,” one that exposes the expertise needed to thrive in a digital-first world and those who largely possess pre-pandemic skills. And that divide will upend work sooner than we might think.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/briansolis/2022/02/09/from-the-great-resignation-to-the-great-digital-skills-divide-the-rise-of-empathetic-leaders-in-a-digital-first-world/?sh=3c41e4326d77