Prone to Failure: Why CRM and Billing Systems Implementations Are High Risk

A typical case of module scalability limitations was experienced by the North American satellite company. For example, in the case of the CRM software, the product catalog was found to be a drain on system resources. The system generated so many internal transactions requiring overhead that it resulted in structural scalability problems.

A problem of a similar nature was experienced by the Latin American wireless carrier. Although its software was a subsequent version of the same CRM platform which the satellite operator intended to install, scalability problems persisted.

At the integration level, some of the case studies identified problems between billing and OSS for order management. In this case, the integration between both systems resulted in a high volume of data transfers, which also affected systems performance.

In a similar way, the North American satellite operator experienced numerous issues attempting to integrate the CRM platform with other applications. The system generated innumerable internal transactions requiring overhead, which resulted in structural scalability problems. Unfortunately, the company’s IT staff could not address them because in order to get around them, the original systems architecture needed to be rethought completely.

Project management shortfalls:

The case studies identified numerous areas where implementation problems could be attributed to project management problems:

Limited user involvement: While the project Steering Committee in the North American wireless company was composed of senior functional representatives, systematic delegation of attendance to deputies resulted in the participation of junior people that were less familiar with the carrier’s strategic requirements or the systems architectural¹³. While participation by the user community in the Steering Committee of the Asia/Pacific wireless subsidiaries was high, the participants were not very familiar with the specifics of the project, which impacted the quality of the decisions.

The lack of involvement on the business side of the North American wireless carrier was rooted in the passivity deployed throughout the project. For example, the marketing department was not focused on developing a vision as to what were the strategic needs of a CRM.

Conversely, a conscious approach to include the end-user community in all key project decisions was a key contributor to salvaging the projects at the European wireline carrier and the Latin American wireless company. It was at both companies that, at the urging of business owners, the IT function renegotiated agreements with the systems integrator and made sure that a commitment for delivery by the outside vendor was made.

Limited implementation capabilities:

The correlate of project complexity in implementing CRM and billing systems at telecommunications carriers is that if the project does not have the appropriate set of human resources (technical and business), the risk of failure or significant delay increases. This could be increased exponentially if the product chosen has limited integration capabilities.