The Campbell Academy Blog (73)

Human Technology

Faster, it goes faster and faster and faster.

New technology arrives, and we get FOMO, integrate it into our life, personal or business move along, next one comes, and it comes to move along.

I am and have been, for a long time, a huge advocate of using technology to make things better at home or work, but there comes a point when enough is literally too much.

At work, we have a philosophy regarding the introduction of technology 'to make us more human'. That's an easy thing to say, but it's a harder thing to do.

So, the consideration of new technological inputs and instructions to our business (and really to life overall) is to allow you the opportunity to have more time to spend being a human being, not more time to spend being on the technology.

A simple example of this is the practice management system you have if you have a dental practice (this can be any CRM or customer communication system).

The point of that system is to provide automation of the highest possible standard so that when someone walks into the clinic, the reception team have all the time in the world to talk to them, to make them feel welcome, to make them a drink to find out how they are.

The introduction of our practice management system took that to a new level in our clinic and is an example of using our technology to make us more human.

We use Slack extensively through our practice and our education business and have done so since about 2017.

It was a complete game-changer for us.

Perhaps it's not an overstatement to say it saved the life of the practice during the pandemic.

We've recently integrated Slack communication with external with one of our external laboratories as a trial, and the same philosophy applies.