As companies grow, different departments develop their own processes and use applications that meet their departmental business needs. This can lead to disparate and overlapping systems with no accurate view into the organization’s sales, operations, and finances. In this blog, we will discuss how we came to use FinancialForce for project management.
With rapid growth, three separate practice areas, and staff working remotely, Revolution Group was faced with just such a challenge. We needed a single platform in which everyone – project management, marketing, finance and executives — could readily access and share accurate information. We began looking for a central system that would enable us to collaborate and was both convenient and reliable.
We were already using Salesforce as our CRM, but our projects were managed in a separate system. As a Salesforce consulting partner, we knew that an app running on the Force.com platform would be the logical and practical choice to manage projects. We ultimately chose FinancialForce because it integrates closely with Salesforce and has good ratings on the AppExchange and G2 Crowd.
Implementing FinancialForce for project management has had a huge impact on Revolution Group. We now reap the benefits of a unified CRM with all of our data in one place. All of our divisions and team members have the same real-time data with a single view of customer information. Another added bonus of moving to one platform is the ability to run analytics that were previously inaccessible because they were in disparate systems.
Our employees are able to be more mobile because the FinancialForce app easily integrates with Salesforce1 (Salesforce’s mobile app), and employees are able to see customer and project information on any device.
With Chatter, our finance division is able to easily communicate to project managers regarding a customer’s accounts receivable status. Our support teams use Case Management and Service Console to efficiently work support cases for customers.
With everything on one platform, we have the analytics that help our executives and management teams make decisions. Users have individual dashboards so they are able to measure their own performance. Another dashboard shows how each practice is performing, and a high level dashboard shows how the company is doing as a whole. Our executive team strongly believes in transparency, and analytics has allowed us to do that for our users.
Here are few tips when searching for any add-on solution for your Salesforce org.
Tip #1
Something we tell our clients during implementation is to “stick to the app’s standard features”. Try not to do too many customizations at first and embrace how the app was designed. You won’t know what the app has to offer if you don’t try out all the original features first. We did make a few customizations where the app did not fully meet our business needs, but we were able to easily adapt the majority of our processes to the standard app.
Tip #2
Utilize the Salesforce Community. There are users of all types: MVPs, super users, other admins, and Salesforce employees that are all willing to answer your questions when searching for a solution or troubleshooting an issue.
Tip #3
Communication is key. Working with different types of users, it was vital to our success everyone is informed of deadlines and their assigned tasks. We treated this implementation just like we would treat an implementation for one of our clients.
Having first been a new Salesforce customer to now being a Salesforce Partner with dozens of implementations, we know Salesforce from every angle. Call us today at 614-212-1111 or fill out the form below to learn more about how you can leverage FinancialForce for Project Management.
