Utilizing fractional teams to improve your salesforce implementation
Obrázok od Joseph Mucira z Pixabay
Implementing Salesforce can be such a tough task for most businesses, in part because it takes a lot of time, money, and people with the right skills. Many companies have a hard time putting together full teams to handle the complicated work involved. But there’s a better way to do it. Fractional teams can make your Salesforce rollout go smoothly from start to finish.
What are fractional teams?
Fractional teams supplement your existing employees with specialized contractors only when you need them. You pay for only the time you use these Salesforce implementation services. Carefully choosing fractional team members with the right expertise can steer your Salesforce project to success without issues.
Finding the right mix of skills
As we said earlier, rolling out Salesforce requires many abilities. Some of the key roles for fractional teams include:
Salesforce administrator
Their role is to configure and run Salesforce day-to-day and to keep improving how it’s used.
Salesforce developer
Builds custom additions for Salesforce tailored to the business. The goal is to customize the tool to help the company in unique ways.
Salesforce consultant
Plans out the overall Salesforce setup, guides big decisions, and manages the rollout. Their experience is especially priceless for complicated projects.
Salesforce trainer
Their role is to get employees to adopt Salesforce through teaching it to them. Essentially, they help to make sure staff understands how to fully use Salesforce on the job.
Setting up a fractional salesforce team
When constructing your team, you first must identify current gaps on your team. An honest skills assessment will reveal where you most need to augment capabilities. Avoid the temptation to hire “generalist” contractors who claim expertise across all Salesforce domains.
Next, define the scope and timeline of your Salesforce rollout. The project roadmap will dictate what types of fractional resources are needed and when. If performing a major migration, for example, you may want several months of developer help leading up to launch.
Finally, you will need to match contractor capabilities to the work required in each phase. Be selective in finding fractional team members with proven expertise in the desired specialty. Also, be sure to verify their experience by screening resumes, portfolios, and references.
The hours invested upfront in sourcing quality fractional talent will pay dividends throughout your implementation.
Effective project management
Smoothly orchestrating a dispersed team of fractional contractors takes finesse. But effective project management will keep everyone aligned and engaged.
Begin by clearly defining responsibilities between team members. Using responsibility assignment matrices and work breakdown structures helps avoid duplication or confusion about who owns what tasks.
Next, you need to provide access to project tools like Asana or Trello for tracking assignments and sharing status updates. The goal is to consolidate key documents like requirements, spreadsheets, and design artifacts into a shared workspace like Salesforce Files or Google Drive.
Set clear deliverables and timelines for each phase, along with quality criteria for acceptance. Ask for tangible work products like solution docs, code samples, or training materials to validate progress and completeness.
You will also benefit by keeping lines of communication open through messaging apps like Slack. Quick pings can resolve questions and avoid bottlenecks. Just set expectations upfront on response times since contractors aren’t always online.
Finally, troubleshoot issues quickly through direct dialogue and always conduct retrospectives to identify process improvements for the future.
With these tactics, you can operate a productive fractional squad despite members coming and going. The team will feel connected by strong project management.
Leveraging institutional knowledge
One risk with fractional teams is losing accumulated knowledge as contractors roll off. Luckily, with some simple practices, you can capture expertise and speed on-boarding of new resources.
First, over-document everything. Require all contractors to log key technical and business decisions as they work and consolidate these notes into knowledge bases, wikis, or readme files.
Second, institute robust handoff processes between fractional resources. Schedule overlaps for incoming and outgoing members to transfer knowledge. Be sure to pair new resources with internal personnel already familiar with the project.
Next, ask departing contractors to create tutorials and how-to guides for their solutions. These artifacts enable new resources to quickly come up to speed.
Automate administrator tasks whenever possible through tools like Declarative Lookup Rollup Summaries and Process Builder. Relying less on manual work preserves solutions even if the admin contractor changes.
Finally, always brainstorm creative ways for fractional team members to preserve and transfer knowledge. The more you systematize this process, the less reliant you’ll be on specific contractors long-term.
Conclusion
For Salesforce projects, fractional teams provide targeted expertise without the bloat of full-time staff. You engage niche specialists only when required to avoid overstaffing. Constructed deliberately, fractional squads execute intricate rollouts efficiently and cost-effectively. They lend hard-won experience where it’s needed most to optimize your implementation. With careful management, fractional players operate in sync, united by shared objectives.
For your next Salesforce rollout, take the fractional approach for skills on-demand. It’s the smart way to execute intricate projects and still benefit your bottom line.
