Detailed Analysis

CRM stands for Customer Relationship Management. The customer, in this case, can be a
citizen, business representative, intermediary or partner. CRM is the discipline of improving the
way customers are managed through changes in business processes, people, organization and
technology. The key drivers for a CRM programme within the public sector tend to be the
improvement of services to customers, together with some real expectation of improving the
efficiency and the effectiveness of the organization.
Other drivers could be to focus limited resources on those in most need or to maximize
revenue from customer facing activities. Improvements in customer service from CRM can range
from a more rapid and focused response to enquiries through to proactive contacts with
customers to anticipate and manage potential issues.
CRM is a key enabler for customers wishing to access local government services,
improving the efficiency of traditional channels i.e. phone, face to face, and mail and providing
innovative channels such as Internet, SMS and DigiTV.
The central component of a CRM solution is generally the creation of a single shared
customer database allowing information to be collected once but used many times. The sharing
of this customer data across the authority, in conjunction with the functional tools provided by a
CRM solution, allows the authority to make gains in both efficiency and effectiveness e.g. by
improving the ability of front line staff to resolve issues at first contact or dealing automatically
with enquiries that originate over the web.
CRM projects can vary considerably in their scale and scope. A simple CRM
implementation may encompass a single Contact Centre or website supported by standardized
forms and documentation, with no integration to back office systems. A more complex
implementation can include a common customer database, a content management tool (to ensure
consistent information is published through all channels), provision of new communications
channels (PDAs or even Digital TV), a document management system (to improve the speed and
accuracy of handling of paper applications) and integration with, and redesign of, back office
processes and systems.
The CRM National Project has identified two common strategies for implementing CRM
in local authorities wide and shallow, offering a broad range of services to customers through a

single point of contact, with (initially) little back office integration, and narrow and deep,
offering a selected number of services but with full back office integration.
CRM has been implemented through partnerships with other local authorities, with
private companies and with other public bodies. There are several examples of county councils
and district councils working together to provide a single point of contact for citizens for all
council issues.
The process of business analysis and design is similar with many
different software implementations. Experts in the business meet with
experts of the technology and they collaborate on the best design of a
system to support business processes. Below are the steps to successful
implementation of CRM.
1. Identify Critical Success Factors : Often phrased like, This project
will be successful if, critical success factors are goals that guide the
project along. During the design phase, they help determine whether
something should be included or not. At the end of the project, critical
success factors are used to determine whether the project was a
success. Organizations may identify long-term success factors that
may be measured some duration after deployment.
2. Determine Scope : Scope may be most easily understood in terms of
teams and processes. Which teams will be using CRM? Which processes
(within a team and across teams) will be supported by CRM. At the onset,
you may also know that certain sub-processes may be completed inside or
outside of CRM, as well.
Many organizations might also call the scoping of a project requirements
gathering because the scope is phrased in terms of what the application
must do in the short-term, and what the eventual functionalities must be in
the long-term.
Since the implementation of Microsoft Dynamics CRM is focused on the
design for future-state processes, it is common for organizations to have a
business analyst document current processes and pain points before the
scoping of a project.

3. Conduct Future-State Analysis : Comparison of current-state to futurestate processes is helpful for incorporating change management into the
implementation process. However, the design of CRM is focused heavily on
the future state processeswhat the application will do. Process analysis
has three elements to it:

Measurement : First and foremost, Microsoft Dynamics CRM must be

a system that produces actionable business analysis. Leaders must be
able to make decisions based on critical business data coming out of
CRM. Analytics must be surfaced for end-users to help them prioritize
customer-facing activities and plan out their next actions. Therefore, the
process analysis should drive towards how to best surface this
information, as well as how and when it will be consumed.

Processes : Microsoft Dynamics CRM must help users complete their

jobs. It creates efficiency by centralizing information and providing
visibility of the right information at right times. It must automate
processes that can be automated. In order to design CRM to do this, you
must determine and discuss the future state processes. This is done by
discussion the process from the beginning to end and possibly returning
to discuss sub-processes in more detail. You must also understand the
day and the life of users and how their work flows.

Data : A big part of designing CRM is understanding the specific data

elements needed to support processes. The process analysis looks at
where data is coming from, how and when it is updated, and if and when
it flows to other business applications.

4. Gap Analysis. After processes have been analyzed and documented, a

gap analysis is done to determine what can be done with Microsoft Dynamics
CRM out-of-the-box and what may involve custom code or add-ons. Much of
this may be visible at the onset from just doing scoping; however, until the
detailed process analysis is complete, the final gap analysis cant be done.
The gap analysis may be documented or simply reflected in the design and
architecture.
5. Architecture and Design. Based on the process analysis, a system
design is created demonstrating what build-in features will be configured, as
well as how Microsoft Dynamics CRM will be extended. This will include

Users and security

Configuration of CRM entities (fields, forms, and views)

Configuration of processes (workflows, dialogs, and processes)

Reports and dashboards

Data migrations and integrations

Custom development

This chart explains the process of designing the CRM system to match your
organizational processes.

Key Risks
All projects which involve organizational, people and technology change face a number of well
documented risks, which must be identified, monitored and mitigated, throughout the life of the
project. However, a CRM implementation project is subject to specific risks due to its complex
nature. Some of the key risks that need to be considered are: Insufficient Stakeholder
Management. The implementation of CRM requires the involvement and buy-in across the
organization to ensure success. There is rarely one single sponsor of CRM. Ownership is
typically shared by several Departmental Directors, who each have their own financial and nonfinancial targets. Failure to Recognize the Degree of Change Involved. The implementation of
CRM requires substantial process and skill change to deliver benefit. Cultural change is also
likely to be required. Lack of Measurement of Benefits. Delivered benefits need to be measured
over the duration of the project. It will be essential to demonstrate some quick wins to ensure that
all stakeholders remain committed and engaged. It is also necessary to report on and adhere to
one or two tried and tested metrics that can demonstrate the service is improving, once accurate
baseline measurements have been established. It is important to note that, following many CRM
implementations, service levels often deteriorate temporarily while the technology and processes
are bedding in. Scope Creep. CRM projects are often the casualty of an ever-creeping scope,
because the organization is tempted to add on nice to have requirements to keep improving the

customer experience. Improvement to customer experience must be done in a controlled, focused

and planned way to avoid scope creep and overstretching of limited resources.

6. Conclusions and Future Work

Customer/member information is vital to any organization. We have presented two patterns that
handle specific aspects of customer relationships and a composite pattern that combines their
functions and adds a few other functions. These patterns can be used to build conceptual
application models for this domain. Business information may be highly sensitive; for example,
it contains financial information that is subject to regulations, such as credit card information or
purchasing records. Proper security is needed to handle this information. We are working on an
extension of this pattern where role rights and other security constraints are superimposed on the
functional aspects, according to our secure development methodology

Consequences This pattern has the following benefits: A Customer Relationship analysis
pattern promotes broader reuse; it can be reused in many 9 different domains, such as retail
companies, financial institutions, educational, public or government sectors, etc. It addresses
business, non-business and user-defined relationships. It includes most of the information
needed for efficient customer relationships management. It provides a complete view of a party
and all of its relationships with the company, and its relationships with other members of the
trading community. It keeps the status of accounts. The pattern has the following liabilities:
It may be too complex for small businesses.