How can you make sure your staff have the right skills and competencies


If you implement CRM at your institution it is essential that you consider the training of your staff based on their individual needs and the roles they will undertake. Your training should focus on taking a customer-centred approach, which is the basis of CRM.

 

Training on CRM System

 

As an institution if you decide to use a CRM system then you need to ensure that all users feel empowered to use the system. This can be done through effective training. There are two options available for  training staff on the system; either in-house training or training delivered by an external company. Some universities undertake a mixture of both these techniques, with the external provider providing initial training and in house being delivered at a  later stage to ensure process-orientated training.

 

For those  institutions that choose to undertake their own specialised training, this can vary between group training and one-to-one training. Some prefer their training to be delivered by external providers, this can be due to a lack of resource at the institution or if they have a large group of stakeholders/users already in place.

 

In all cases the levels of ability and requirements of the users need to be taken into account and training should be tailored accordingly. The amount of training a user requires depends on the individual, but good practice dictates that no user is allowed access to a CRM system without some form of training.

 

Good Practice Example

During the implementation of the CRM system at Teesside University an extensive training programme was developed by Teesside staff; consisting of an introductory module that was compulsory and then further modules, depending upon the staff member’s role, if they needed to use the system for e-marketing, project management etc. More than 700 people-sessions were delivered in the second year of the implementation and these were all followed up with phone calls, one to one support. Documentation included detailed training manuals and laminated quick guides.

All training was delivered in the context of the particular business process. This sometimes involved training all members of a functional team together and allowing discussion about how the CRMS fit with their current process. For new processes, additional process documents were prepared, which explained the whole process, including the how the CRMS is used within it. For some processes it involved co-delivery by two people, one explaining the process and the other the wider process.

Teesside University

The good practice standard that the majority of institutions apply is that no user has access to the CRM system until they have had proficient training. Another standard that institutions adopt is to undertake refresher training for users on a regular basis. This will lead to improved data quality across the system. Some institutions provide drop-in sessions tailored to users across the institution. 

 

Good Practice Example

At the University of Huddersfield they employed an external group of consultants to help them develop MS Dynamics as the CRM system for the University and BCE, but they decided to undertake the training in house. They made the choice that they would undertake a nine month pilot on the live system with key stakeholders, this would ensure that changes and tweaks could be made to the CRM system before they brought any more users on board. As the pilot involved a small amount of users, their CRM manager undertook one on one training with users, this helped users understand how the CRM system could work for them. An integral part of the training was the code of practice for using the system so that people understood the underlying principles of the CRM system. All users were provided with written procedures following their training to guide them through the basics of the system.

University of Huddersfield

It is essential that you provide procedural documentation for users, so that if they struggle in using the system that they feel enabled by this written documentation. As an institution you should also provided details of who they can contact if they need help when using the CRM system.

 

CPD for BCE professionals 

 

There is currently a programme of work led by AURIL and JISC that focuses Continuing Professional Development (CPD) for BCE. A number of useful tools have already been developed, these include: 

 

 

PraxisUnico also run a number of courses that BCE professionals will find useful.