Getting to the Why?

I believe that every Salesforce Admin can revolutionize their company. As a Salesforce blogger I believe that in order to fulfill the mission of making every Salesforce Admin a revolutionary- I need to provide a balance of strategic and tactical posts on this blog to keep our skills sharp.

A recent tweet from Kevin Richardson reminded me of just how important it is to stress the Why when Salesforce Admins are in meetings. No matter what level in the company you work at as an Admin, keeping the vision in mind is important. In this post I’ll look at how you as the Salesforce Admin can benefit from the Why.

Time today with a customer reminded me that starting with what and how never maps back to vision. Starting with why does. #whymatters

— Kevin Richardson (@klrichardson) May 1, 2013

Turf Wars

With any new technology there is a perceived threat to one’s job. I’ve dealt with this before in implementing Salesforce in new departments and it can be tough. Of course as an Admin you know your job isn’t to put anyone out of a job, or blur boundaries, but that can be the perception from the person across the desk from you. Companies all want streamlined processes and as technology evolves so must the process and the tasks that people perform on a daily basis. In meetings that have a Turf wars feel to them, and especially in meetings where individuals are unwilling to view a process in a new way- or redefine it- getting to the Why is key.

Getting to the Why in a turf war meeting helps you level-set when the meeting begins. As an Admin you never know what level of detail has been communicated to individuals before they attend a meeting. Or even why they are attending! Starting with the Why helps the individual understand the mission/vision of the project. More importantly it helps them understand their role- you are there to improve the process, despite what they think about the process- it can always be improved. Getting to the Why helps set the course and guide the discussions from the onset with less distractions.

Internal Politics

I would love to tell you that getting to the Why will eliminate internal politics, but with any group interaction there is bound to be the perception of winners and losers by someone. Internal politics can stem from any number of reasons, usually the most common is order of engagement- or at least that’s what I have found. With your project there is a vision, and a sequence of rollouts/ development that is done for a good reason.
An implementation of Salesforce doesn’t come without its own disruption. And disruption is good. (tweet this)
But with disruption can come a misunderstanding by individuals or departments within the organization about their level of involvement and either “why it wasn’t sooner” or “how they want to be involved moving forward”. Getting to the Why helps us again by providing the vision of engagement across the organization and how it’s relevant to engage with the right people at the right time. The Why in this case can helps us reinforce that everyone’s time is valuable and having accounting in a sales requirements meeting isn’t the best use of their time. It’s not that you didn’t want to involve them, it’s that in order for the information to flow to Accounting correctly- Sales had to work out it’s own kinks.

How Great Leaders Inspire Action

I’m going to close this post with a video that I promise is the best 18 minutes of your day. Take a moment now, or bookmark it for later, and listen to Simon Sinek talk about the golden circle, and How Great Leaders Inspire Action. Then when you get a chance let me know if you found this post helpful and why.