Funding Alone Won’t Drive Assistive Technology Adoption: Managing the Seven Influences is Critical

Hubert van Dalen
Jul 2
4 min read

Technology adoption in aged and health care rarely fails because the tech isn’t good enough. It fails because care is complex — and the systems, people, and environments into which technology is introduced are even more so.

The 7 Key Influences Behind Care Technology implementation Success — or Failure

While the introduction of a dedicated Assistive Technology and Home Modifications (AT-HM) funding stream under the Support at Home program marks an important step forward, making technology more financially accessible within Home Care Packages, funding alone is not enough.

To move beyond pilots and avoid the all-too-common patterns of non-adoption, abandonment, and failed scale-up, care providers must actively manage the seven key influences that determine whether technology will be:

Adopted by clients, carers, and staff
Scaled across services and contexts
Sustained over time in real-world care delivery

These influences (or domains and subdomains), ranging from the nature of the client’s condition to the adaptability of the organisation and the surrounding policy environment, are often underestimated or treated as secondary. In reality, they are determinants of success.

Even with increased funding support, technology will continue to underdeliver unless providers build capability in understanding and addressing these seven interdependent domains and subdomains.

Let’s have a look at the 7 influences/domains and how each one reveals why care technologies succeed, stall, or fail to scale.

1. CONDITION – The Nature of Care Needs

Success begins with understanding who the technology is for. The older population often has multiple health conditions, cognitive decline, and varying levels of health and digital literacy.

1A Care Needs – Complex, chronic, and variable
1B Comorbidities and Sociocultural Factors – Cultural, linguistic, and social contexts shape adoption

Designing for a homogeneous user base is a key cause of failure. Read more >>

2. TECHNOLOGY – Fit for the Environment

Technology must work in the messy, time-constrained, and relationship-driven context of care.

2A Features and Functionality – Must be reliable, accessible, and purpose-fit
2B Data Generated – Should be useful, timely, and interpretable
2C Knowledge Required – Must be usable without specialised training
2D Supply Model – Consider sustainability, vendor support, and integration

If a tool demands more than it gives, it won’t be used. Read more >>

3. VALUE PROPOSITION – Clear, Tangible Benefit

If the value isn’t clear, the effort isn’t worth it—for providers or users.

3A Organisational Value – Quality, risk, revenue, compliance, and market edge
3B Patient/End-User Value – Safety, health, ease of use, cost-effectiveness, connectedness

Technology must prove itself in practice, not just theory. Read more >>

4. ADOPTERS – The People Who Use (or Reject) It

Technology is only as good as its uptake by its key users.

4A Care Staff/Clinicians – Must see it as improving their workflow or outcomes
4B Patients/End-Users – Need to trust, understand, and benefit from it
4C Carers/Loved Ones – Often essential in enabling or resisting adoption

Technology without empathy fails. Read more >>

5. ORGANISATION – The Engine of Implementation

Organisational readiness determines whether technology is integrated or orphaned.

5A Innovation Capacity – Leadership, governance, digital maturity
5B Change Readiness – Infrastructure, priorities, and alignment
5C Adoption Model – Interdependencies, metrics, funding
5D Disruption to Routines – How workflows need to change
5E Implementation Work – Training, onboarding, support

Technology needs a system to support it, not just a budget line. Read more >>

6. WIDER SYSTEM – External Enablers and Blockers

No aged care organisation operates in isolation.

6A Policy Environment – Reforms (e.g. CDC, Medicare) can enable or constrain
6B Regulatory Framework – Privacy, data use, safety compliance
6C Professional Environment – Sector attitudes, peak body endorsements
6D Societal Expectations – Public trust, equity, and access considerations

Great solutions still fail when the system isn’t ready. Read more >>

7. IMPROVEMENT – The Ability to Evolve

Even successful tech will be abandoned if it becomes obsolete.

Continuous Embedding & Adaptation – Programs must learn, evolve, and grow
Implementation is not a one-off—it’s a living process

Scalability depends not just on initial success but sustained relevance.

The NASSS model (for Non-adoption, Abandonment, Scale-up, Spread, and Sustainability)

From Pilot to Platform: Managing the Influences that Matter

These seven domains are not checkboxes—they are dynamic, interdependent influences. Managing them well is the difference between a promising pilot and a widely adopted, sustainable solution.

Care providers that can systematically address these influences will:

Increase adoption
Reduce abandonment
Achieve scalable, repeatable innovation
Deliver better care outcomes — and better business results

Recommendation: Use the NARI Implementation Framework to Guide Success

A practical starting point is the Implementation Framework for Enabling Technology-Supported Aged Care at Home, developed by the National Ageing Research Institute (NARI).

This practical framework offers practical guidance on:

Enabling technology design and usability
Addressing privacy, trust, and client confidence
Building digital literacy
Organisational and workforce readiness
Aligning implementation with care routines and values

It doesn’t solve everything, but it provides actionable levers across many of the seven key influence domains.

Explore the framework here: NARI Implementation Framework

In another series of 7 articles I will focus on the subdomain details of the 7 influences (or NASSS model Domains) that are not or partially covered in the NARI framework that will influence Care Technology implementation Success - or Failure.

To successfully strategise, implement, and govern aged care technology adoption, I recommend using the NARI Implementation Framework and NASSS Framework in conjunction.

The NARI framework provides practical, frontline-oriented enablers. NASSS adds strategic depth by mapping the broader complexity across condition, tech, users, organisation, system, and sustainability.

Together, they offer both the what and the why—essential for real-world, scalable implementation.

Hubert van Dalen is Managing Director of eHomeCare, where he advises on the strategy, governance and implementations of smart care technologies across the health, aged care, and disability sectors.