System consultants? Recent incidents should serve as sufficient motivation: UK National Health System – 16 hospitals’ systems were completely shut down by the WannaCry virus, tallying a cost of 100M in 2017. Atlanta – the city government was crippled by ransomware, disabling the city’s ability to operate or fund services in 2018. Marriott/Starwood – 500 million customer records breached in 2018, including birthdates and passport details. Capital One – 100 million customers credit card details and histories were breached in July 2019.
Executive leadership, does your sales team suffer from significant churn? It all comes down to human nature. (Good luck fighting that). It may take a bit of time and education, but in the end I think we can count on smart people to figure out how to act in their best interest. The question for leadership becomes this: is your company culture setup to ensure that your salespeople will believe that collaborating on a CRM platform is in their best interest? It is possible that your salespeople’s resistance to using the CRM system has nothing to do with the system, and everything to do with their plans (or general expectations) that they will be leaving your company in the fairly near future. When that happens, they know that if they have their own spreadsheets or outlook notes or big chief tablets, they can bring very valuable information along with them. If it all exists in the CRM, THEY CAN’T.
Every business should aim to have an IT consultant! One of the greatest concerns when adopting new business technology is data security. IT experts can advise a business on the safest technologies to use. The experts can also help businesses identify loopholes in their current systems that may lead to a security breach. Hiring an IT consultant is the right move whenever a business experiences or suspects a data security breach. Internal IT professionals may be too busy managing daily operations to monitor data operations keenly.
This is not the main driving problem though. The top CRM systems (Salesforce, Dynamics, SAP, Oracle) have been designed with sales input, design thinking and user experience experts coming out their ears. I find several of the top systems really elegant in their combination of simplicity and power. It’s hard to imagine these systems being much simpler while still achieving their intended goal. Neither is the tech IQ of sales staff the major problem. Never before have salespeople had the level of technical skill that today’s sales professionals possess. Read additional details on Technology consulting.
Trust is a universal Human Need Turbo-charger! Although we apply this approach to IT-driven transformation, it is truly in effect in every aspect of our lives. Myriad leadership studies have proven the connection between success/efficiency/effectiveness and trust. And each of us can confirm in our own lives the “difference” between situations where trust was absent vs. present; it is not difficult to recall in which situations we were at our best. As with many things, the impact of trust may be seen more clearly by examining what happens when it’s absent. There is something deep in human nature which causes us to hold back, maybe in subconscious self-preservation, in these situations.
A simple info any CEO should know about cybersecurity: To achieve real information security and data resilience it is vital to combine managed Monitoring, Detection, and Response services with comprehensive disaster recovery and business continuity plans. Historically, cybersecurity has been an area that is housed solely in the technology department of a company, whether that consists of one or twenty employees. But more and more executives are understanding the importance of being not only knowledgeable but also involved in the conversations and decision-making process when it comes to protecting their data. Explore additional details on Tech consulting.