by Gustaf Westerlund | Feb 16, 2015
The previous five posts on this subject, regarding how to use John P Kotters Change management method called the 8 steps of change have discussed the first 4 steps of the process. It is important to understand that each step in the method builds on the step before. So, to go throught the previous steps to where we are;
First we need to make the decision makers in our organization really aware of the urgency, this should be by being very concrete, what is the benift of using CRM, what is the cost of lost customers, how can CRM change this etc.
When we have gotten the attention of the organizations decision makers, we need to make sure that a guiding coalition is put together that has the right mandate for the job. This typically, from a CRM perspective needs to be people from both the business end, IT and Other related areas like architecture or information management.
It is then vital to create a vision for the CRM implementation that will resonate with the people that are going to be affected by the new CRM system.
Communicating the CRM Vision
Ok, so we have a great vision, should we post it on the Company Intranet and then Everything will be fine? If you have any experience of marketing you probably know that this is not true. When trying to market your Products or services, repeated ongoing and very deliberate action is required to make sure that the vision is properly communicated to all the people that are or will be affected by the new CRM system.
I would also recommend testing to see if the message has been properly received by a couple of the the people that were meant to receive it, as Communication is not so much about what is sent, more about what is recieved.
Empowering Change
Ok, so this is done, you show the sales people the new CRM and then a couple of weeks later you happen to be standing by the coffemachine at the Customer, some salesguys are standing there but nobody knows you as your a Consultant and one of the older and most senior salesguys starts bragging to the younger:
”Well I talked to the CEO during our latest golf round and we agreed that I don’t have to waste my time on the new CRM system”
Or you might hear this from a sales guy:
”The new CRM system is great, but I get bonuses for orders, not for posts and likes, so I know where my priorities are”
With opposition like this, in one case a senior sales executive and the other a bonus system that works against the implementation of CRM, the organization is going to have a tough time getting people to Work in CRM. It is vital for CRM implementations that anything stopping people from acting on the change needs to be removed, in the case of the senior sales executive, I would say it was a very bad decision from the CEO to let him slip, but I can understand it as well based on the amount of Revenue some of the senior sales people generate. However, he cannot be allowed to brag about it.
In the case of the bonus system, perhaps implementing some gamification to make CRM more fun or revise the bonus system to build on CRM might be better.
It is also important to elevate those people who choose to embrace the new CRM. Perhaps have an early adoptor competion.
Gustaf Westerlund
MVP, CEO and owner at CRM-konsulterna AB
www.crmkonsulterna.se
by Gustaf Westerlund | Jan 17, 2015
Why are is the organization implementing CRM? What is the vision or message that we want to communicate to the organization? Is this a vision that will resonate with the organization?
“The reason we are changing to Dynamics CRM 2015 is that the old CRM system was based on VB6”.
“We are moving to Dynamics CRM since the cost per seat is a lot better than Salesforce”.
How do you Think the two visions above will resonate with salespeople that need to take time out of their busy days to put a lot of time and effort into Learning a new CRM system, often with new processes. The thing is that the reasons above are both very logical, common and true, but when creating a vision for change it is essential for the vision to resonate with the people it is to be communicated to.
For instance, a vision for the CRM system can be that by centralizing Customer information and making it easily available at all times of Customer interaction, traversing previously impassable organizational division. By sharing Customer information across Corporate divisions the all Customer interactions, it is our strong belief that the Customer experience of our Company will be greatly increased, which in the long term will increase Customer loyalty and decrease Customer churn.
Other areas that are typical for CRM is increased business productivity, more time with customers, information at your fingertips with the mobile/tablet applications. It is also important to not use too much Corporate buzzwords, especially if the recipients of your vision are less formal as these people tend to not buy in to the lingo of sales and management. Why not try it out on a few representatives from each of the roles that your are targeting, and see what they Think. Try to ask the questions in an open manner, for instance “How should we improve this to make the most conservative of your colleagues buy into this?”
The example above is a short and general the vision is a bit longer, but not too long, maybe being divided into different parts. For more detail, please see John P Kotter’s Leading Change.
Gustaf Westerlund
MVP, CEO and owner at CRM-konsulterna AB
www.crmkonsulterna.se
by Gustaf Westerlund | Nov 29, 2014
”Yeah, I am your go-to guy for the CRM project. But Joe, the CSO, makes all the decisions and has the money, but is not really involved, he won’t really be using the system either, neither will Jill, our CEO.”
How do you Think this CRM Project will turn out?
The stories are many of CRM Projects run by individuals or Groups in organizations with more or less just influential power. All real decision power in these situations reside in individuals that are not directly involved in the CRM Project.
The reason for this can usually be found in the the first stage of this process, if you have been unable to create a sense of urgency in the top echelons of your organization regarding the CRM implementation, the risk is large that none of the decision makers from these echelons will be involved as sponsors to the Project.
In CRM Projects, it is important to get people from both thte IT and the business side of the Company to buy in to the Project and be an Active part of the Project. The CIO and CSO (Chief Sales Officer) or what you might call them, might be involved as sponsors and they might assign people from their organizations to be part in the actual week-to-week Project Group with more limited mandate.
But, the better you do your work with step one the more attention you will probably get from the decision makers, so in smaller organizations, some of the decision makers might even find the Project so important that they will get involved in the nitty gritty. For better or worse.
Dr. John Kotter in his book, Leading Change, in this chapter on creating a guiding coalition also outlines some of the people that you should try to avoid having in your guiding coalitions. If you are interested, do read it!
I ran this presentation, on how to user the Kotter 8 step method in CRM implementations, again this monday on the CRM User Group Global Chapter Meeting in Sweden. It was a great meeting and I really enjoy seeing users meet Other users. For more information on the User Group, check out www.crmug.com. If you are a user of Dynamics CRM, I am sure you will like it and the more people we get to the meetings the more value it will bring to all participants!
Gustaf Westerlund
MVP, CEO and owner at CRM-konsulterna AB
www.crmkonsulterna.se
by Gustaf Westerlund | Nov 6, 2014
This is the third part of the series of posts in the series where I am discussing how to use the Kotter 8 steps of change method when implementing CRM in an organization. The previous posts can be found here:
Part 1 – Justification
Part 2 – Overview
“Yeah, we had planned to bring up the decision for budgeting the new CRM system at the board meeting, but we had so many urgent issues that we just didn’t have time. Maybe next time…”
Organizations everywhere are choked, especially the successful ones, the ones that have the resources to invest in CRM systems. The effect of this is that everyone can only work with the tasks at the top of their priorities. The first step of Kotter’s 8 steps of change, is to create a sense of urgency. In the case of implementing CRM, this means that we have to be very specific about the effects of what will happen if do not implement this right now.
When doing this, we have to, as always, understand the receiver, understand this party’s values and goals and try to address these. For instance, if the CEO is a very numbers oriented person you might try to work out how much time each sales person might save by using the new CRM and hence be able to put into working with selling more and generating x-% more income. If the CEO is more of a strategy and visions person, you might show her all the abilities she will get with the system and describing all the strategic advantages of this.
The bottom line is, you need to get the people with the decision power and the money to understand the importance of the CRM implementation project, in order for the project to be properly prioritized. If not, you risk being prioritized as number 11 in the list of the 10 item on the board meeting. And that dial does not go to 11.
Gustaf Westerlund
MVP, CEO and owner at CRM-konsulterna AB
www.crmkonsulterna.se
by Gustaf Westerlund | Oct 30, 2014
Today I was informed that this blog was awarded among many other very great sites, as one of the 25 top Dynamics CRM Sites of the World by the site Dynamics101. It is of course a great honor that someone acknowledges the work that I and all the other people on the list have done and I would also like to encourage all that were not on the list that you might very well have been nr 26 so keep pushing and you will soon get there! I personally have been running this blog since May 2006 so it I will soon be celebrating 10 year and it is amazing to see that there are still posts from 2009 that are popular.
I was also very happy to see that my friend and colleague Rickard Norström’s blog was also on this list. My warmest congratulations to your achievment!
Gustaf Westerlund
MVP, CEO and owner at CRM-konsulterna AB
www.crmkonsulterna.se
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