“Making the simple complicated is commonplace; making the complicated simple, awesomely simple, that’s creativity.” – Charles Mingus
When you see a Salesforce.com system which has been over-engineered and unusable, it typically stems from a lack of clear leadership around process and strategy. It is easy to make what is simple complex as Mingus states. A lack of clear thinking and articulation of how a team moves through the sales, marketing or service process they are seeking to execute exacerbates the issue.
A well-designed Salesforce.com system works with complete buy-in from all of the users and managers of the system. Real-time information is valuable towards a feedback and action loop to drive a result:
- Increase revenue
– Increase customer loyalty
– Increase awareness
– Increase productivity
Many times, the goal is forgotten or drowned in the IT work in Salesforce.com. Users end up becoming data-oriented rather than results-oriented. Too many fields or data which is not related correctly can create more wasted energy than useful results. Thus, complexity can creep easily without a clear structure, strategy and focus. Doing less with clarity is much more valuable than adding features, forms, fields, or data because they are nice to have. Over-engineering Salesforce.com can cost you the success you desire and becomes even more costly to undo. Focus on success which is enabled by simplicity from creativity.
