We're not live on CRM yet, but some of the benefits are starting to be visible. Our staff lives in Outlook all day long. Now, with ProVision CRM, membership info is right there, without having to open another application. Happy Days!
In my "If We'd Done Our Homework" post, I may have over-stated when I said we've been waiting 2 1/2 years for ProVision. We've been *looking* for 2 1/2 years, but actual development on the CRM base didn't start until February of 2007, and really didn't start on what's now ProVision until June or July of 2007, so we're not even to the one year point yet. Still not where we want to be, but I don't want it to sound like our vendors have just been sitting around doing nothing! Not at all....
Today we did our first real *user* training on ProVision. I was kind of surprised (mostly pleasantly :-) that Whitney went way beyond just a showing, and actually let the 25 or so users get into the product and do hands-on! Most of the focus today was on one of the keys of ProVision: familiarity.
In years past, I used the term "easy," and then tried "friendly." OK, those are both good terms, but not necessarily accurate. If you're an Outlook user, you might think it's easy or friendly. However, there are plenty of other Outlook users who use it all the time, but think it is very UN-friendly. Both of these groups still use it, and have learned to work within it. Our claim (and it's proving to be mostly true) is that if you are familiar with Outlook, then using ProVision will also be familiar. (Interestingly, a few people are learning features of Outlook during our ProVision training - hopefully that's a bonus)
Much of the day was focused on very basic things. (do you retrain your staff on basics, often?) Basics of navigation. How to search. How to search in a way to actually find somebody. Searching on first AND last name at the same time, or pieces of each name. These are basic, yet worth some focused time. Some people saw this as a great benefit of our new system. Dare we tell them it worked in the old system too?
After the break, Jim took over, touching on a lot more basics, like Internet Explorer toolbars. It seems we can never over-train on the basics. Then he continued, drilling into more details, like the way to look at families, and then members of families. A bonus: according to Steve Bauserman, if you call Microsoft and mention that you're using CRM from the ACTS group, Microsoft should refer to the "C" in CRM as Congregation. Even if they're just thinking about doing that, wow!
It was exactly one year ago today that we announced our ChMS decision. A lot has happened since then. Development...A Code Name...Installations...Demos...Scope Creep...Schedule Delays...Change in Subcontractors...Press Release...Change in Name...We even had a User's Group Meeting! A few weeks ago, we did our first conversion of data, and then just over two weeks ago we started our IT and Super-User training.
This week, we start the training for our first group of "regular" users, and have a second group next week. Then we do one final data conversion, set the bi-directional connector to our live database, and then give the big "GO" signal, and take it live. Our most optimistic schedule has that go-live date the week of December 10. And yes, we do have some fall-back plans in case our next couple of weeks turn up more than a reasonable number of surprises.
What's most interesting is that the go-live date isn't the end of the road -- it's the beginning. After we get the basics up and running, there's quite a schedule of enhancements that will keep us quite busy for at least another year. When is that slow time that people talk about?
For our ProVision Training, we needed some special training facilities. Our normal training room is good for maybe 6 to 10 people, but we needed 20 or so stations all at once, and in a somewhat quieter space. We considered a lot of off-site locations, at least until we looked at costs. What to do?
Well...we're fortunate that we have a "mid size" auditorium very close to our IT area and we were able to secure it for three full days. Then, through what I can only call a miracle, we had some machines ready to be deployed, but not yet committed. Between those machines, an assortment of WinTerms, and by raiding our regular training room, we came up with 20 systems, including monitors. Then, our wonderful Viant team, along with some other friends, spent a late evening AND an early morning bringing everything together. Lots of cables for network, power, keyboards, etc., fairly nicely organized, so not much of a tripping problem.
A raised floor and wiring troughs would have been nice, but all things considered, this came out looking great. Here are a few different views:
After almost exactly a year of planning and development, today was the start of our staff training on ProVision CRM. Today's focus (and a couple more days this week) is for our IT staff and a select group who will become our early adopters, or MVPs. These are the trail blazers who will break the system in, work through the likely kinks, and then be available to help others on the staff as we do the wider deployment over the next few weeks and months.
We did two parts of training today. A fairly large introduction for about 40 people (below), then some hands on training for about half that group, with plans for the others to go through hands-on time after Thanksgiving.
Steve Bauserman (ACTS group) showed off lots of features of Provision. There were [at least] three major recurring themes:
Training continues Tuesday and Wednesday. It's going to be a busy week!
No, not that kind of PUG. PUG as in ProVision User Group. Even that's stretching it just a bit, since ProVision isn't actually a shipping product yet, but several of the good people from Houston's First Baptist and Covenant Churches of Carrollton joined Steve Bauserman and our team at Perimeter to take a look at the ProVision product and to discuss ideas to make it even better.
Maybe this would better be called an Advisory board. We spent two days digging into the product, looking at features, and in some cases, challenging the way it worked. As Steve said, sometimes it's worth throwing away 20 hours of previous development to re-implement a better idea, and especially if that only takes 4 hours of development. Two steps back and only one step forward can be a good thing! As a result of our time together, a few things changed, and I think we all agree they were changes for the better. Collaboration -- what a concept!
We're excited about what Provision is shaping up to be.
I'm having an interesting dialogue (debate? Argument? No -- of course not) with Steve Hewitt of Christian Computing Magazine. The September edition of CCMag has a couple of articles about Church Management Systems, and Steve likes to use the acronym CMS for that. I'm trying to convince him to use ChMS. His side of the discussion is that many in the business are used to CMS and don't want to change. (my extremely short paraphrase of his comments)
Of course, there's no "definitely right answer." I'm just interested -- what does CMS mean to you? What does ChMS mean? Do you care? Does context resolve it?
(ever so slightly edited -- primarily a loss of formatting)
Announcing the launch of ProVisionCRM
(Houston, TX): Today, September 1, 2007, Advanced Church Technology Systems Group, Inc. (The ACTS Group), announced that their Microsoft Dynamics CRM customization, ProVisionCRM, an affordable new Congregation Relationship Management solution, is in final testing and will be available for October implementation.
ProVisionCRM is a totally integrated software solution for faith-based organizations using Microsoft Dynamics software. ProVisionCRM is customized to combine the power of Microsoft Dynamics CRM, Microsoft Office, and Microsoft Dynamics GP and many other accounting software packages. ProVisionCRM is already compatible for use with Microsoft Windows Vista operating system.
ProVisionCRM includes member relationship management, attendance and check-in, volunteer management and scheduling, and event, resource and facilities scheduling. In addition,
ProVisionCRM affords customizable automated process and workflow management in its unparalleled list of features. ProVisionCRM is fully integrated into one platform and may be custom connected with other software packages without extensive additional programming. ProVisionCRM is fully functional as it comes from ACTS Group or is affordably customizable for the needs of any church congregation.
ProVisionCRM provides permission level management of records. The user can provide total or limited access to each record stored in the database. ProVisionCRM provides easy-to-use screens that look like and operate within Microsoft Outlook. This makes it easy to bring paid and volunteer staff up to speed quickly on the system’s use. Relationship of records is made very easy even for the novice user. ProVisionCRM makes it easy to keep track of members and their interests, communicate with staff and churchgoers, and manage financial records. There is nothing like it on the market today.
“Microsoft is committed to providing CRM solutions that work the way people and organizations work,” said Brad Wilson, general manager of Microsoft Dynamics CRM. “The ACTS Group shares this vision, and is providing truly integrated solutions tailored to meet the unique needs of faith-based and non-profit organizations.”
“We have been in the process of finding and developing a management program for our ministry. When we heard about Microsoft Dynamics CRM and its’ using the familiar Outlook format, we selected it right away. The comfort we have is it is simple to use and easily learned.” According to John Welch, Vision San Diego Associate Executive Director, North American Mission Board, Southern Baptist Convention, “Not only is the (ACTS Group) customization creative and user friendly, but also the ACTS Group staff has presented it in a simple professional way that is a credit to Microsoft. I recommend ACTS Group, their customization and Microsoft Dynamics CRM without reservation.”
“Perimeter believes that The ACTS Group has the winning combination of qualities that can cast ProVisionCRM into the world-wide church marketplace”, said Tony Dye, Technology Director of Perimeter Church in Atlanta. Perimeter Church is the first “beta” church for the new ProVisionCRM product and has been an enthusiastic part of the development process. Said Dye, “We see ProVisionCRM as enhancing the way we fulfill all of our ministries”.
The ACTS Group, with headquarters in Houston, Texas, is a technology and infrastructure-consulting firm focused on serving churches, schools, and non-profits with affordable leading-edge technology solutions. ACTS Group is a Microsoft Certified Partner and Charitable License Reseller and offers a full line of hardware and software solutions, along with complete data hosting services.
For information contact:
Douglas R. Miller
rmiller [at] actsgroup.net
Toll free 877.564.8300
I wasn't expecting such a delay between part 1 and part 2. Vacation has a funny way of changing things :-)
In Part 1, I claimed the three keys of acceptance for software (particularly a ChMS) are Trusted, Friendly, and Used. I'm certainly not expecting universal agreement that these three things are all it takes to develop successful software, but I think I've talked with enough people to have general buy-in that they all three matter, or at least that failing significantly on any of these is going to lead to some pretty big challenges.
Now I have to challenge my own claims. Some of the major players in the ChMS market miss on these key points, and yet these companies have been in business, serving churches for years. What's wrong with my model? Without using names, I know I've heard statements like the following about several products:
So...if a ChMS product is NOT trusted, NOT friendly, and NOT always used, then doe sit matter if there are thousands of churches using it? Does that mean the product is successful? If you count success in terms of sales, or number of installations, then I guess it does. If you measure success in terms like "satisfaction," "empowerment," and "productivity," then I'm not so sure.
So...without trying to badmouth any particular products, let me simply ask: what do you consider the keys to ChMS success? Are you satisfied with your ChMS?
Recent Comments