Client
Large professional services firm
Background
The client operated in a matrix structure with many different tools in use to manage client accounts, contacts, activities and sales pipeline.
Without a consistent system in place across the organisation, it was difficult to keep track of client interactions, including meetings, key contacts and conversations that were taking place. This made it difficult to spot trends across clients and to take advantage of cross selling opportunities and relationship building.
The introduction of Microsoft Dynamics CRM was a critical step in the ongoing strategy for the organisation. Training was needed to get people up to speed as quickly as possible to ensure that the investment was worthwhile and the benefits were realised.
The user base was spread across a number of offices in the UK and India, so an eLearning approach was required in order to reach all users in a short space of time.
What did we deliver?
Lawford Knight was appointed to deliver an eLearning course for 8,000 users, along with supporting materials including videos and printable quick guides.
Adobe Captivate was chosen as the eLearning authoring tool, due to its strengths in building software simulations. After some initial work to design and achieve sign off for the template, work began on recording system functionality.
There were some challenges during this time, as changes were still being made to the system. We worked closely with the project team to identify changes early on and deal with them in an agile way. This meant some rework, however, the recordings were done in such a way as to minimise the impact of changes.
The training took a modular form, with an introduction module to explain the reason for the change and the benefits that could be expected. Additionally, there were modules for accounts, contacts and activities, each with its own objectives, learning outcomes and quiz elements.
In order to deliver the eLearning to the Learning Management System at the appropriate time, we liaised with the deployment team throughout the project, to keep them informed of timescales in relation to the roll out. This resulted in a smooth deployment of the training.
Support materials were created to help embed learning and to assist users who needed ‘on the spot’ help with a specific aspect of the CRM system. The first element of the support materials were short videos aimed at common functionality, such as creating accounts, capturing meeting details and adding contacts to the CRM system.
These videos were created in Camtasia, with captions and voiceover, to walk users through the system steps. The videos were very successful and were heavily used in the months following the launch. Users liked the style of the videos and the fact that they targeted specific processes, which meant that they didn’t have to trawl through long videos to find the things they needed to learn.
The printable materials were created in PDF format and again targeted specific functionality in the CRM system. These were broken down into manageable chunks so that users could follow them and complete the system steps at the same time.
The videos and printable quick guides were hosted on a bespoke SharePoint site that we designed in collaboration with the internal SharePoint team. The site was structured in a clear manner so that users could easily and quickly find the relevant support materials. This helped users to minimise the time spent looking for a solution, and also meant that they didn’t have to call the IT helpdesk.
What was the outcome?
The eLearning was completed by over 8,000 people within a few weeks of the system go live and feedback was overwhelmingly positive.
The additional support materials were also well received, particularly the videos, which helped people to keep going when they became stuck at certain points in the system or had forgotten how to do something.
Accounts and contacts were successfully moved to the new CRM platform and the legacy systems were closed. A successful foundation was laid for the next phase of the project which was managing the sales pipeline.