CIOReview | | December 20149requires training for everyone to understand its use in your environment. Sales people are an interesting bunch, they want to be trained by someone who has walked in their shoes and can relate the system to them in their terms. Train the Trainer can be a good way to approach this, provided you have the time and resources to put a program together. Regardless of the approach, this system will evolve and training must keep up so that users can understand all the changes they have requested and your team has implemented. This means training is something that needs to happen regularly ­ think quarterly - just to keep up. In addition, most adult learners need to hear, see, and touch the material at least three times before they are going to "get it." Delivering training multiple ways through multiple channels (e.g. video/on-line, in-person training, and through manuals) can help people retain what they have learned and reach them in their learning style. A new training technology considered by me is adding to our mix is on-screen training. It works like this: inside the application the user can choose a Although Salesforce is easy to use, it requires training for everyone to understand its use in your environmentbusiness task/scenario they need help with and then get GPS like guidance through the task as they do it (for more info check out WalkMe and their competitors). It should be a great alternative to creating training videos and training manuals as the material will be right there on the screen so it saves the user from having to remember the content of the video or read a document as they go.Staffing considerationsIf training was not enough there is much more to keep your Salesforce team busy. They are the ones who must patiently answer the user support calls they get from all levels of users. They must ensure the input that was gathered from feedback sessions and support calls gets translated into a solution your users envisioned and is simple for them to use (harder than it sounds). Focus must then be turned to data management as duplicate records, record ownership, and all the other headaches caused by human data entry can be an issue ­ even if you take systematic steps to keep it clean. Another data centric task is integrating Salesforce with your other systems. This can be one of the more challenging technical aspects of Salesforce, but something your internal team will need to continue to stay on top of, especially as you add and change your other internal systems. Take other systems that your sales team has to look up information in and pull that information into Salesforce. If they are filling out information in Salesforce ensure that information transfers over to other systems. This allows them to take full advantage of the mobile functionality that Salesforce offers and prevent re-keying data into other systems. The more useful data you can surface in Salesforce and processes you can automate through it, the better your adoption will be. It is important to staff your internal team appropriately to ensure the continued success of the system. As a speaker at a recent Salesforce conference said ­ "Reduce the hate, automate" ­ make the system work for the people and not the other way around. When people see that you are making changes ­ their changes - they will become your champions which will strengthen the adoption of your CRM system. This will allow your company to start getting a better return on their software subscription.
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