For most organizations, your CRM program is successful and doing well. Now, it’s time to take your program to the next level. A Center of Excellence is an important model to adopt because it breaks down your CRM program into several elements each with a particular area of focus. This competency center will be able to ensure your program is running smoothly and driving effectiveness internally.

5 Ways You’ll Benefit from a Center of Excellence

You’ll have a clear understanding of who’s doing what and the rules of engagement within your CRM program.
Having dedicated Governance encompassed in your Center of Excellence ensures that the correct decisions get made faster. You will have a broader view of the overall organization to make informed decisions at scale. A layer of value is provided with overarching governance that ultimately assists your CRM strategy.

Organizations that have a Center of Excellence have a higher success rate for their program overall.
Within your Center of Excellence, you’ll need an element of Architecture in place. Architecture ensures you have a unified standard to drive consistent solutions to your organization. You become adept at innovating solutions with streamlined architecture to move you through the process and you can effectively translate requirements for solutions.

You’ll be prioritizing the value you’re deriving from your largest technology investment.
Another element within your Center of Excellence is Delivery. Experience and standards aligned with executing delivery improve the speed of solution delivery, the success of enhancements, and the incorporation of support of the CRM platform. For the delivery element, a successful model contains three subelements: scaled application delivery, continuous application delivery, as well as application maintenance and support.

You’ll realize the full capabilities of your CRM program.
An important dimension within your Center of Excellence is Value Realization which will oversee that Governance, Architecture, and Delivery are coming together to ensure all elements are functioning properly for success. This focus includes the identification of metrics, which define success for the CRM program. Monitoring those metrics and taking action when the numbers demand it, are at the center of the Value Realization component of the Center of Excellence.

You’ll have peace of mind that everything that is happening within your CRM program is successful when it all comes together.
You’ll be increasing the likelihood that you are going to accomplish your past, current, and future business requirements. To begin building out a Center of Excellence, you need to develop a plan which starts with understanding how Architecture, Governance, Delivery, and Value Realization are necessary to ensure the investments you make in your CRM program are being upheld on your roadmap to long-term success.

Define Your Center of Excellence

Businesses have many decisions to make within a complex program such as CRM. There are a lot of moving parts and one key to success is to define the roles and processes within the structure of the program and the rules of engagement that guides who is doing what. This is ultimately what the Center of Excellence provides. To begin building out a Center of Excellence, you need to develop a plan which starts with understanding the elements that are necessary to ensure the value of your CRM program is being upheld on your roadmap to long-term success.

Interested in defining a Center of Excellence for your organization? Watch Silverline’s webinar: Excellence Drives Value: Salesforce Success Through Ongoing Enhancements.