On the surface my Christmas tree, admittedly a work in progress, has very little to teach about Customer Relationship Management (CRM), But get into the branches (not the weeds LOL) and this tree is the meaning of life with respect to starting, owning and operating a business in the Small and Medium Business (SMB) space. Read on.
This week I had the pleasure of providing the first of a series of training sessions for my colleagues at the Well Done Foundation not-for-profit (NFP) on utilizing the new Microsoft Dynamics CRM instance. At its core,
CRM is easy for an SMB with a focus on leads, company accounts, contacts, opportunities and such. So is a simple holiday tree.
Progress or Perfection
So let’s tie it all together now. Scanning the social media holiday brags, it appears the vast majority of the Christmas tree posts trend towards perfection - a post card brag that my tree is better than your tree. Let’s call that perfection.
In my CRM training, I lectured that the organization goal is to use CRM and your experience doesn’t have to be perfect. We’ll take progress each and every day. CRM will never be perfect but a work-in-progress (WIP) journey. Translated - give me the best you got ‘cause its better than nothing.
Sans 100%
A popular phrase with my son and his Generation Z posse in the Silicon Valley is to casually utter “100%” in conversations like this:
- Me: With all those injuries and the late season record, I don’t think the 49ers are going to win the Super Bowl….
- Harry Jr.: 100%
Final thoughts
I know I’ll take some heat for this missive from the countless Managed Service Provider (MSP) coaches out there who pump giving 110% and challenge the outcome of the game of life, like a football game, when the final final whistle blows, the game is over. I’ve also seen the perfection pressure be applied in peer groups (although in all fairness, I think a lot of peer group members will articulate that life is a journey with progress milestones along the way).
I believe pursuing perfection will lead to a possible battle with the bottle and an early sad demise.
Feedback? Also love to have a dialog on this and other thought leadership topics. And no, my tree is not better than your tree LOL. And enjoy celebrating the holidays as you are able…