Why we’re thinking differently about technology implementation

15 August 2025

By Kelly Hudson, CEO, Lilli

Technology has become (or perhaps always has been) a contentious topic in social care. A silver bullet for some, but for many approached with caution and quiet scepticism. At its core, social care is a human-first profession and so it is understandable that new models of working in the digital age may make people feel unsure.

The outcome of this has been numerous failed costly pilots across local authorities across the country. And where small-scale pilots have seen some traction, they have stayed as just that: small, often with low, siloed adoption by a specific team with no wider evidence for validation or plan for adoption at scale. This stagnation hasn’t allowed adult social care (ASC) teams to address their greatest challenges; meeting the increasing need of ASC services, the reduction in care resources and decreasing budgets in face of mounting costs.

Lessons learned

The continued focus on technology by central government and industry bodies acknowledges that technology does have a significant role to play in moving the sector forwards and supporting the increasing need. But there has to be lessons learned from where the traction has been missed in previously unsuccessful pilots.

Having worked with dozens of local authorities and ICBs across the UK now, we have learned how to implement in a way that allows teams to continue to do what they do best, while rolling out our solution in a way that works. We have seen what enables this and helps organisations build scale, momentum and millions of savings through tech – and what causes friction and delays.

Key challenges

For most local authorities, the blockers to successful deployment stem from:

Training:

Training generally needs to accomplish too many things. The objectives range from winning hearts and minds and establishing why this tech is different and how it will transform support for services users, how and when to use the tech and then how to explain the tech to a service user and their next of kin to obtain consent. This is simply too much to achieve in the time available for care workers to be trained.

Time:

There is time required up front in the process of technology implementation, including for getting referrals, consent and doing the installation. It is a challenge to convince teams that the investment of time is worth it up front.

Conviction:

Many care teams have “pilotitus”. They’ve been here before with a piece of care technology that rarely sees it through the pilot. How do we convince them that this one will be different? There is no incentive at the outset or buy in to support adoption and conviction to see the results.

Implementation:

This challenge stems from a lack of buy-in at a senior level to mandate the project back down through ASC. There must be a willingness to change some internal procedures and systems to streamline implementation and work collaboratively with all stakeholders including tech suppliers to benefit from previous learnings and suggestions.

Measurement:

It’s essential to move to a culture where we measure impact outcomes of technology. Instead of assessing the ins and outs of the nuances of the tech to decide value, measure the impact on the service users, frontline resources and savings.

Overcoming these challenges

To ensure technology becomes “business as usual” make sure the implementation process is planned first – with a dedicated partner to manage and drive the required process and culture changes.

We have learned that teams are too busy to manage the implementation of technology themselves – and work cross-functionally to drive and build momentum for a new programme. At Lilli, we now offer an upfront managed service to roll-out with a team already behind it. They review waiting lists, get consent, install the solution and monitor any data.

Once this the initial implementation is done, then train by presenting front line teams with the evidence and support from the initial implementation team. Have data gathered across a portfolio of relevant service users.

The benefit of this is two fold: care professionals see the real life example including the outcomes, the process and tech in a much more meaningful way without the burden of the up front process. Secondly, they are much more eager to start referring other cases into the scheme, now they can see the benefits.

Success in Medway Council

In Medway, by using this approach and having a dedicated delivery partner, with established processes in place and working across various pathways in adult social care, we saw almost immediate results of £40,000 a week in savings and significantly less referrals to residential or higher needs care for the council.

Once Medway ASC teams could see for themselves the impact Lilli was already having, they were excited to deploy it in their case loads too. They felt confident in referring Lilli to everyone they thought it would help, since it was already established.

It was this method of implementation that helped change the game in Medway, and allowed them to rapidly scale. By doing the groundwork and taking the initial teething challenges of rolling out the technology away from the team, the tech became less contentious, met with less scepticism, and rather a game-changing tool that already had full-backing of senior leaders across the organisation. This, coupled with the strong leadership from the team to commit at scale to the programme, allowed it to flourish. To date, they have saved more than 1.6m+ through Lilli alone.

Putting learnings into practise

This learning has led a lot of our thinking when it comes to implementation at Lilli in all the organisations we now work with. We start now with set processes, structures and accountability as this can be the difference between an uphill struggle to get it off the ground or an incredible case study within weeks.

In our Implementation Guide, developed with SCIE, we share more thinking around this topic. From managing the culture change to communicating senior buy-in and setting regular reviews, there are a series of learnings to hopefully help you on a smooth and successful journey to enable human-first, but tech-supported, care.

Transformation may not happen overnight, but with the right roadmap in place you will start to see the impact on people, outcomes and finances, as well as culture, much quicker.