OREANDA-NEWS. April 14, 2016. Having worked on and around CRM implementations throughout our careers, we’ve seen it all – good implementations, bad implementations, and even good implementations gone bad. With so many moving parts, it’s no wonder that some organizations don’t get it right the first time. More often than not, when implementations fail, it’s because companies have a myopic view, laser-focused on the technology. Obviously, technology is a critical component, but it’s only one piece of the puzzle. Companies that achieve successful CRM implementations think more broadly in terms of transforming their sales force, considering the people/change management aspect to both motivate initial usage and drive adoption.

In our recent book, 7 Steps to Sales Force Transformation, we outline six key levers that can help to support and drive the sales transformation that should accompany a CRM implementation. While these levers help to amplify and sustain change across almost any organizational effort, they are particularly valuable with sales teams who can be highly resistant to change.

The following levers should be assessed before implementation and throughout the initiative to ensure alignment and focus.

Lever #1: Perspective

Sales teams need a perspective to understand why the CRM implementation/change is happening. An outside-in perspective provides leverage, because you are listening to the needs of those who will buy more from you if you get it right. It is also one in which the company elicits feedback and listens to what their current and prospective customers want, need, and value, and then develops or modifies its offerings accordingly.

Lever #2: Alignment

Sales can’t be an island when it comes to successful transformation and CRM implementation. Gaining alignment early on in your sales transformation provides significant leverage to your implementation, because your sales team (and customers) can immediately benefit from the support and resources offered during the transition, and specific requirements can be integrated (rather than waiting to see what sticks).This might include revising recruiting profiles and compensation with the support of HR, and updating messages and sales kits from marketing.

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Lever #3: Leadership

Strong and engaged leadership is essential for any change initiative. In almost all of our interviews for our book, the importance of leadership came up. In short, most said that if the key leaders weren’t committed to the change and helping to drive it, it was not going to happen. Ultimately, the vision and commitment must be top-down, and they must go far beyond new coffee cups or trite slogans.

Lever #4: Sequence

According to Jim Collins’s classic bestseller, Good to Great, to become a great company not only must you get the right people on the bus, but you also have to get them in the right seats: “First Who, Then What.” Perhaps counter-intuitively, many of our interviewees echoed this theme, but in the opposite sequence. In order to recruit, select, and hire the right people, you first need to know what they will be doing—what knowledge, skills, and abilities will be needed to support a new sales process or way of selling with your customers that might accompany your CRM implementation.

Lever #5: Measurement

The metrics you use to quantify the CRM implementation and sales transformation should focus on the vital few things that will determine success or failure. In our research we found that the number one predictor of success was whether or not a company measured progress. But keep in mind, it’s a big world filled with data, and you can’t measure everything. In fact, if you try, you’ll end up measuring nothing.

Metrics are a lever as they are a proxy for what is important to the company and sales organization, and they focus leadership on what measureable targets they need to reach and exceed. Almost all clients we’ve worked with have been interested in benchmarks and target setting so they can measure themselves against others and against a goal or target.

Lever #6: Communication

The greatest vision (or offering for that matter) in the world is useless if no one knows about it. Communication may be the most essential piece of what leaders do in conveying their vision, commitment, and ongoing sponsorship regarding an implementation.

Our research is clear:  for a sales organization to reach its “ideal transformational advantage” and recognize a successful CRM implementation, it needs to pull the right levers in the sales force -- and across the entire organization -- to drive meaningful and significant improvement.

Warren Shiver and Michael Perla are the authors of 7 STEPS TO SALES FORCE TRANSFORMATION: Driving Sustainable Change in Your Organization (Palgrave MacMillan). Warren Shiver is the Founder and Managing Partner of Symmetrics Group and has more than 20 years of sales, management and consulting experience. Michael Perla is a Principal with Symmetrics Group, and has more than 20 years of sales effectiveness consulting and strategic marketing experience.

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