Last week, a student of mine told me about a situation with one of his Salesforce clients.
It’s a small client, with two main user groups: an executive team and the end users.
The executives are the product sponsors and they are paying the bills. They won’t be using the system other than occasionally checking reports and dashboards.
The end users are “just” the individuals who will be using the system day in, day out. This includes a handful of admins, sales and service.
My student was trying to understand why the end users were not in any of the design meetings. Instead, the executives were making all the decisions on their behalf. They believed they knew what they were doing, and what the end users really needed.
Plus they needed to feel important in this process. And this is dangerous.
Part of your role as a Salesforce consultant is making sure everyone that touches Salesforce has a voice. One could argue the more you touch the platform, the louder your voice should be. At the very least, getting buy-in from all user groups is critical.
- How else will you know where the real pain points are?
- How else will you know the result is fit-for-purpose?
- How else will you tackle user adoption early?
The takeaway
One of the worst things you can do is build a system for someone that has to accept it as is. Getting the end users in the design meetings is a pivotal way to ensure success, or at least reduce the likelihood of failure. Be sure you have everyone at the design table.