The commercial property industry has been disrupted by the speed of technological advances in the last five years. Large national and international property advisors bought technology company start-ups to incorporate their software platforms in their businesses which allowed them to become more effective and efficient. However, for SMEs like Ryden, this can be difficult to compete with and to replicate.
I was brought in by Ryden to project manage the firm’s move from traditional business platforms to a fully digital model, changing the way people worked and introducing them to new skills to help them do their job. Having worked in the property industry for the last 15 years, I specialise in both internal and external consultancy advice, driving change in the workplace as well as advising public sector organisations on their commercial property and land portfolios.
Getting everyone in Ryden engaged in the project and understanding the vision was the key to success. I quickly immersed myself into Ryden in order to understand the ambitions, ideas, processes and concerns. This allowed me to realise the priority areas for intervention, software options and how different packages could be implemented to work together.
However, implementing software solutions is only ever part of the challenge. The majority of my time was spent on changing culture, habits and working practices. This is never easy and myself and the wider PropTech team really had to be relentless in pursuit of our vision. We had to take employees with us on the journey and continually reiterate the benefits the new systems would bring.
Ryden now has an impressive amount of internal data on properties, jobs and clients and is able to use this to make better decisions not only for ourselves but for our clients.
