How to switch care workforce software without disrupting your operation

Why care technology transitions fail

The graveyard of care technology implementations is filled with products that were technically adequate but introduced into organisations that were not ready for them, without the right preparation, at the wrong time, with the wrong people leading the change.

The technology is rarely the problem. The process is.

The conditions for a successful switch

Get the timing right

There is no perfect time to switch software, but there are clearly bad times. Avoid transitions during peak business periods, immediately before or after major audits, or during significant organisational change (leadership transitions, mergers, rapid growth phases).

The best time is a relatively stable period with stable staffing, when your senior coordinator has bandwidth to lead the implementation.

Identify your champion

Every successful technology transition in a care organisation has one person who owns it — not just nominally, but genuinely. This person understands why the change is happening, believes in it, and is the first point of contact for everyone else during the transition.

In a care organisation, this is usually a senior coordinator or operations manager. It should not be an IT person (if you have one). It should be the person who understands the rostering and coordination work most deeply.

Do not try to migrate everything at once

The temptation is to switch everything on day one — all clients, all carers, all data, all workflows. This maximises disruption and minimises the team's ability to handle problems as they emerge.

A phased approach is almost always better. Start with a small group of carers and a subset of clients. Learn what breaks. Fix it. Expand. Repeat.

Run parallel for two weeks

For a two-week period, run your old system and your new system simultaneously. Yes, it is more work. Yes, it catches problems you would not otherwise find until they caused something to go wrong.

Two weeks of parallel running typically reveals the edge cases — the recurring job that did not import correctly, the carer whose qualifications were in a format the system did not read, the client with a standing instruction that nobody thought to mention. Better to find them during the parallel period than after you have turned off the old system.

Train before you go live, not during

Training the team on a new system while they are also trying to manage their usual workload is a recipe for confusion and resistance. Block time for proper training before the go-live date.

For coordinators, training should cover the core workflows they will use daily: creating jobs, assigning carers, handling conflicts, and sending communications. For carers, the onboarding is usually simpler — the mobile app, how to confirm shifts, how to check in and out.

Managing resistance

Some team members will be resistant. This is normal and predictable. The most effective response is not to mandate adoption but to make the benefits visible as quickly as possible.

Find the early adopters — the coordinators who are frustrated with the current system and excited about a better one. Let them demonstrate the benefits to their colleagues. Peer credibility matters more than leadership directives in most care teams.

Address concerns directly. If a coordinator is worried about losing visibility, show them what they gain in return. If a carer is anxious about using an app, set up one-on-one time to walk them through it.

The 90-day mark

The clearest indicator of a successful implementation is the 90-day mark: is the team using the new system in preference to the old one? Are coordinators solving problems in the tool rather than reverting to email and WhatsApp?

If yes, the hard part is over. If not, something in the implementation has not landed and needs to be revisited.

*Teiro includes hands-on onboarding support as part of every plan — not just documentation. We work with your team to get the implementation right. [Talk to us about onboarding](/demo).*