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Change and people management: the key to ensuring the success of your company's CRM

Posted: Mon Dec 09, 2024 10:58 am
by ayshakhatun663
According to Gartner, “nearly 75% of organizations plan to increase the types of change initiatives they undertake over the next three years,” but “only 34% of these initiatives have clear prospects for success.”
If a change initiative fails, it's not just a waste of money; it also puts your organization's relationship with its customers at risk.

To ensure the success of your company’s CRM investments, it’s imperative that change management is a priority. Ultimately, the effectiveness of CRM tools and technology depends on how their users use them.

In a recent study by loan phone number data Forrester in collaboration with CustomerThink, the results showed that “a successful CRM implementation requires a balanced, multifaceted approach across four critical areas: processes, people, strategy, and technology.”

For CRM software to be effective, it must be introduced with a change management program that includes training, adoption rewards, and people engagement.

Maximize results by driving changes in employee culture
To drive success in any organization and achieve maximum return on CRM investment, application development and delivery teams must be able to anticipate challenges, which requires careful planning and processes for improvement and user influence.

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According to Forrester, senior managers must always be prepared to adapt to changes in normal work dynamics. This, in turn, requires flexibility from employees, who may be reluctant to use new CRM technologies. The success of these tools can be determined by customer management initiatives.

When an organization changes its work processes, it may need to redefine employee roles to align its strategies with its customer service goals.

One of the main problems that companies face is the difficulty of changing work culture; however, this can be avoided by continuously collecting feedback from employees and implementing improvement initiatives to keep them interested.

In the words of Forrester: “From a people perspective, enterprise change management integrates three phases: preparing, effecting change, and reinforcing change.”

Develop a management plan
Change can be overwhelming, especially when traditional methods seem to be working, but by developing an effective change management plan and sticking to it, you can greatly increase the chances of success for your company's CRM software.

According to Forrester, “Change leaders must be able to formulate and communicate a vision that serves as a guiding principle for the organization and defines how it should behave in the future.” Committing to that vision will allow your employees to envision the end goal and work toward achieving it.

Implementation should only go ahead as long as members of the management team legitimize the change. These managers must be fully empowered to make decisions and employ the necessary resources to resolve disagreements.

Change management teams need project leaders who are experienced in leading changes. To drive results, it is advisable to involve all project leaders in the planning process. This way, they will be prepared for each phase and can coordinate with each other more efficiently.