I know, I've been writing a lot about politics lately. I can't help it. The parallels to sales organizations and accountability are just too ripe to resist. This week, let's look at Iran and your CRM.

I recently met with a prospective client for my consulting services. Like many who meet with me, he wanted to improve sales effectiveness in his organization with a group training and some follow-up coaching. I asked him how his salespeople were keeping track of their opportunities. He told me that they all have "their own systems." I asked him how he keeps track of sales opportunities across the organization. His answer was related to revenue at the end of each quarter rather than the paths his people were taking to get there.

In other words, there was no consistent information across the organization about how the salespeople were approaching and attempting to convert opportunities.

Meanwhile, in the same week I met with the above mentioned client, the third week of February, 2012, Iran was hosting a team of inspectors from the IAEA, (The International Atomic Energy Agency - the UN nuclear "watchdog"). The purpose of the inspections was to verify that Iran was - as claimed - building nuclear capacities only for peaceful purposes rather than for the development of a nuclear weapons capacity. On Tuesday, the inspection team was denied access to a military facility. Sounds a lot like another similar story from that neighborhood not so long ago - and that story didn't play out so well! Here is a link to an article on BBC for those who may want more details:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-17122738

The situations are completely parallel. In both cases, "management" is unable to get data on activities. Without data on activities, it is hard to know what is really going on. Instead of data, management then needs to rely on stories. The stories may or may not be true, or accurate, but stories are always easier to assess with some data behind them. In both the sales organization of my prospective client, and in Iran, there is nothing to go by except for stories.

What my client needs - among other things - is some kind of CRM. I tend to be agnostic about CRM systems - a well-organized system of sticky notes is better than nothing - the point is that the system should allow the salespeople to track their opportunities and for management to get some insight from the data that naturally flows out of that tracking activity (by the way, there are many possibilities that are MUCH more efficient than sticky notes!). The point is that managers should manage sales activity - the process of getting there. Otherwise, the end of the month, quarter or year will bring a surprise. Maybe a good one, maybe a bad one, but an outcome that is not predictable based on the analysis of data is - pretty much by definition - a surprise.

As for Iran, well, the same thing applies. In this case however, the potential surprise could be pretty ugly.