Implementing Commission Systems - 6 step guide
- 1. Six Steps to Your Commission Implementation A Guideline for the Rest of Us
- 2. What are the six steps • Gathering Business Requirements • Understanding Your Users and Sponsors • Preparing for Success with Clear Project Goals • Know your Timeline • Who is Helping you • Documenting and Testing for Success
- 3. Gathering requirements • Prior to any vendor or solution engagement the following items should be checked off. If you don’t have them, you’re wasting time. • Important artifacts Print of all critical reports All existing compensation plan documentation, you know the legal stuff Org definition of affected parties •Who’s on your sales team
- 4. Gathering requirements • What you have to build oPlan Matrix oCurrent State definition oEnd state plan oRequirements document •This will be your final project check list oWorkflow analysis, what are your desk level procedures oProject timeline oROI Justification – Should include stakeholders and point points
- 6. Gathering Requirements: Current and End State analysis • Review question documentation
- 8. Understanding your business stakeholders • This is why the org chart is critical oExamples of end users not buying in •Implementation of pharma, did the implementation based on new plans, tried to roll out to end user and they hated it. Scrapped the entire project. oKey Stakeholders •Often in larger companies commitments to the street are made about efficiencies of the new system. •Smaller orgs will need this for improving retention along with forecasting.
- 9. Understanding your business stakeholders • What is your business sponsor agenda, it should be your number 1 requirements. If they aren’t satisfied, your project will be viewed as a failure oEngage them early in the project, update them frequently throughout.
- 10. Prepare for success • Project team kickoff agenda oSit them all in a room and reiterate the mission of the project oMost of these people have a narrow focus and won’t understand what the end goal is or what the expectations are oThe first items to convey are any promises made by key stake holders/commitments. oShare the ROI justification so people understand how it will benefit them and the company oThen share how it makes their life easier, the end user goals and objectives.
- 11. Prepare for success • Identify the rational people oThese people are the ones that ultimately will make the project successful oKnow your obstructionist, they are the ones who don’t want success for whatever agenda. Most the time it is misunderstanding which the kickoff should clear up oDetermine the best way to communicate to the team and to sponsorship. oEncourage communication, require documentation. I have yet to see a project that didn’t have it’s hard times, this helps you identify and fix.
- 12. Know your timeline • How long do you have before expectations need to be met. Most stakeholders have a specific idea of when they want to see the project implemented oYou can work back into functionality from this date or oDefine the date by what the functionality needs to be oRemember the three critical pieces, time, resources, scope. One of them eventually gives, lets be real. (Hint: it’s never time)
- 13. Know your timeline • General real estimates for how long things takes (remember, this is a generation, but I’ve also been doing this a while) oWorking into the three fold framework and determining how much scope is inside the box, out of the box, and configurable.
- 15. Assistance • Vendor managed o1 throat to choke (when it goes wrong there is no finger pointing) oHave access to engineering oHave breadth of knowledge of all tools that they sell oLooking to get you up quickly as possible (so they can recognize the revenue) oFocus on software
- 16. Assistance • Consultant managed oWill look at holistic picture and focus on desired functionality oMay only work on a specific application, such as commissions oCan engage in finger pointing (well, the product is subpar or doesn’t work) oOften less expensive option to the software company. oFocus on either billable hours or scope (if you set a fix bid)
- 17. Documenting and Testing • Requirements documents • Traceability matrix • Design documents • Mock Report • Change documentation • Testing plan • Handover plan and documents
- 18. Documenting and Testing • Testing oOften neglected oTesting should be a minimum 3 stage process •Dev/unit •System •UAT oKnow you should have two iterations at minimum for your timeline. This is where you can buy time with more hands, but you need to address this up front.
- 19. We covered! • Gathering Business Requirements • Understanding Your Users and Sponsors • Preparing for Success with Clear Project Goals • Know your Timeline • Who is Helping you • Documenting and Testing for Success
- 20. Workshops we provide: Selecting a software •There are ways to quickly weed down the list Is your company over or under 1000 payees? What business vertical are you? Who has IT worked with before? Is Gartner/Forrester, etc. report important to your Sponsors? Walking through the artifacts • Supplying the artifacts • Walking through the concepts and how to prepare