Part III: Prioritize & Strategize
In the first two series, I covered how to get started and identify processes, as well as reviewing the back end of your existing org. You still have some more information to collect before planning to make changes to your org. In this article, we will discuss how to complete the intake of information and how to prioritize and strategize what to work on so you can create an actionable plan.
Complete your Intake
So far you have collected pieces of information that will give you insights into the company and org to give you the holistic picture you need to be successful and mitigate risk over time.
- Company Information & Processes
- Intake of some important back-end metadata (tech debt, data, installed packages)
Now it is time to take it to the next level and get deeper into the weeds with your users. When I first started at a tech company in Seattle, WA, I followed the process outlined below. I saw great success in building rapport with my leaders, and users and increased my time to value within the organization.
Define an Intake Team
In some companies, you might be a one-man team, whereas in others you may have more resources. Your intake team will vary depending on how large your user base is. I will use my tech start-up in Seattle as an example. We had over 100 Salesforce users. I could not meet individually with all of them, so we used the approach below.
I was able to leverage multiple people within sales operations with run sessions with users and leaders. I met with this team regularly to make sure they were prepped with the questions to ask and how to format the responses.
Define your Stakeholders/Leaders
In any successful project, you need to get buy-in and participation from your leadership. Identify what leaders can help you prioritize and strategize based on your overall intake of what needs to happen in Salesforce.
Complete Intake Sessions
This was one of my favorite ways of building rapport with my leaders and users. Set time aside to meet one-on-one or in groups. I positioned these meetings as “therapy sessions”. The intent is for the intake sessions with your end-users and users of Salesforce data to understand:
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- What is working well?
- What hurts (your users will love this therapy time)?
- What do you think we will need in the future to help us scale?
- What does your utopia look like?
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If you are sharing the workload with others, it is important to keep the questions consistent. Ensure to consider everyone, including those that are not “users” but maybe care about the Salesforce data for other systems.
Consolidate Everything
Now that you have collected information from your users, leaders, and stakeholders, it is time to consolidate everything into one repository. This took me a few days and I used the format below.
| Item Name | Level of Effort | Priority | Impact/goals | Change impact? (department) |
| Item | need to have | |||
| Item | nice to have | |||
| Item | ||||
| Item | ||||
| Item | ||||
| Item |
As you input this information, input some key information that will help you prioritize.
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- How important is this?
- Nice to have? Need to have? Absolutely critical to success?
- How big of a lift is this?
- Low hanging fruit (1-2 hours). Climb the tree (3-8 hours), Need a ladder (1-5 days), or cut the tree down (1 week+).
- Understand Impact
- Will this save users time (which is $ as we know)? Will leadership be able to streamline board reporting?
- Who will this impact?
- This will help you understand a discovery, testing, and rollout plan
- How important is this?
Prioritize & Strategize
Once everything is consolidated, you can begin to prioritize items and define your approach. I recommend starting with the highest impact items with the lowest amount of effort and working your way down from there.
You should present your prioritization at a high level to your leadership/stakeholder team, prior to creating an action plan. Getting the buy-in from leadership will help with your overall success with adoption.
Up Next: Now that we have how to create an actionable plan and how to manage your ongoing requests!
Part I
Where to Start Understanding the Business & Identifying Processes
Part II
Part III
Prioritize and Strategize So You Can Properly Complete Your Assessment
Part IV
Let’s Create an Actionable Plan and a System to Manage Ongoing Requests
Candy Goll
Solution Architect
Unraveling challenges, overcoming obstacles, and exploring what's possible on the Salesforce platform.
Challenges on the platform are no hurdle for Candy, she clears hurdles on the Snowboard and on the Salesforce platform, like no other. Candy is your go-to Salesforce Solution Engineer. After inadvertently falling into the Salesforce ecosystem as an administrator, spending time at several consulting partners, and even working at Salesforce as a Solutions Engineer, she excels in solving large challenges. She is most commonly known for tackling complex situations and breaking them down into bite-sized pieces, to create a path to success. Candy is a Salesforce expert who thrives on partnering with companies to build scalable solutions by leveraging the Salesforce platform.
About Roycon
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