The data goal with a Flex Implementation is to create a centrally accessible source of customer data to empower the team within your organization.
Although there is usually some confidential information that should not be shared with everyone, consider this step as the uncovering of what information, when shared, will empower your organization to work more efficiently and effectively.
The discovery process uncovers the current status and structure of your data and determines a game plan on how best to go forward given the data circumstances.
If this is the first time you have looked at the data situation in your company for some time you may find things more complex than you realized. This is an important ingredient to success so expect to have to push through this step.
Where is the Data?
There is a variety of situations that can be uncovered, but typically we find that users have their own prospect lists in Outlook and Customers exist in an Accounting/ERP system.
The data will most likely be in an array of inconsistency inside personal Outlook files and decisions will need to be made on which data will be brought into Flex. [It’s important to make a clean start in Flex so sometimes may be required to deal with the data situations uncovered.]
Data Structure
Get a sample of your Customer data as soon as possible in order to identify any issues as soon as possible so that while you are working on Step Two someone can start working on the data cleanup job.
As you evaluate your Accounting/ERP data you will uncover the data structures being used, such as Customer Id systems and Bill To/Ship To’s and head office/branch offices.
Data Integration
It may be determined through this process that additional Accounting data is required – such as Current Year/Month Revenues. This will require a separate project with its own set of requirements, however, the discovery process will identify the steps required to solidify and execute.
Bottom Line on this Step is to look ahead to the future. Even if your situation doesn’t call for integration between ERP/Accounting information today, you may want to plan as if it does. It’s easier to remove un-required data than it is to connect data points that were never related in the first place.
Questions to Review with Your Team:
- Where is your Active Customer data stored?
- Do you have Customer data in other sources?
- Where is your Prospect/Lead data stored?
- At what point does a Customer cease to be Active (ie Lapsed)?
- Do you want to bring Lapsed Customers into Flex? If so, we need to ensure they are labeled prior to the Import.
- Do you want to identify all the Prospects that exist in Outlook Contact Lists? If so, who will take care of this potentially onerous database task? [cleaning, sorting, merging]
- What structure is the data in within the ERP/Accounting system? For example, how are Sold To’s and Bill To’s handled?And how will this be handled in Flex?
- Where are the Customer’s contacts? Too often there are no up to date and maintained Sales contacts in the ERP/Accounting system.If this is the case you will need to deploy a process to gather this information once you move to Step Three.
- Is there any data that we want to bring in from external databases that will require a constant update to be of value? If so, what does this mean to the first phase of the project?
This step is often massively underestimated.