Making CRM Work in Your Environment

*By Casey Coleman, Deputy Associate Administrator*

*GSA Office of Citizen Services and Communications*

As government agencies consider adopting CRM, executives often wonder,
"Where do I start and how do I make CRM work in my agency?" The USA
Services experience can help government executives prepare for adopting
CRM in their agencies.

USA Services is one of the Bush Administration's 24 E-Gov projects. It
provides citizens convenient access to federal information and services,
and offers federal agencies a resource to improve their responsiveness
to citizens. USA Services employs a wide variety of communications
channels managed by the Federal Citizen Information Center (FCIC) that
make it easy for citizens to get the specific information they want
using the method they prefer. These channels include FirstGov.gov, the
official U.S. government Web portal; toll-free telephone calls to
1-800-FEDINFO; e-mails to the National Contact Center; and publications
available from the federal distribution center in Pueblo, CO.

These are the nine steps USA Services is following as it implements CRM
on a government-wide basis.

[The CRM Roadmap]{.underline}

[Step 1]{.underline}: Define a CRM vision, strategy, objectives, and
high-level scope as the blueprint for adopting CRM in your organization.
*For instance, the USA Services vision and objective is to present:*

*a "single face of government" for citizens to receive timely,
consistent responses about government information and services. USA
Services will enable the federal government to become more
citizen-centric by providing the best value and practices to federal
agencies in citizen customer service contact and response. USA Services
will establish a standard for citizen customer service across the
federal government.*

[Step 2]{.underline}: Establish the CRM program structure by selecting
an executive sponsor, a decision-making framework (governance), and a
program team that is representative of your organization. *GSA, the lead
agency for USA Services, created an Office of Citizen Services and
Communications (OCSC) to provide executive sponsorship and governance.*

[Step 3]{.underline}: Begin the change-management process by developing
a plan to communicate the CRM vision, strategy, objectives, and
high-level scope to all employees*. In the case of USA Services, a
change-management approach was put into place with the support of the
Office of Management and Budget (OMB), which strongly encourages
agencies to use USA Services to be responsive to citizen inquiries. USA
Services also sponsors an ambassador program that engages the senior
leadership of partner agencies to drive change and develop executive
buy-in.*

[Step 4]{.underline}: Conduct a business process and requirements
analysis, starting by gathering CRM business needs and requirements from
all business units. Review existing processes and identify opportunities
to make them more customer-centric. *USA Services surveyed other Federal
agencies to identify their requirements for comprehensive CRM support,
and is using this information to build an ongoing CRM program.*

[Step 5]{.underline}: Select the CRM technology platform that best meets
your organization's business and process needs. Remember to take into
account capabilities; time-to-deployment; and total costs of licensing,
implementation, integration, and maintenance. *USA Services leveraged
call-center technology and platforms already in place at the FCIC's
National Contact Center. It will enhance its capabilities in the near
future by selecting a CRM enabling technology that will meet the
requirements identified.*

[Step 6]{.underline}: Map business requirements and processes to the
enabling technology. Implement in manageable phases, to minimize
customization and to adapt the best practices and processes associated
with the technology. *USA Services adapted proven FCIC systems to
provide citizens the best service possible and is continually improving
and expanding its service delivery capabilities.*

[Step 7]{.underline}: Refine and finalize the change-management strategy
and a training strategy to introduce new CRM processes and technology
into the organization. Remember that most CRM initiatives that fail do
so as a result of lack of training and user adoption. *USA Services
continually trains its information specialists to ensure they are kept
up-to-date on changes in information, processes and procedures. Partner
agencies are encouraged to help develop and administer the training, in
order to ensure their constituent needs are met.*

[Step 8]{.underline}: Test and deploy new CRM processes, training, and
technology in phases. *USA Services has built on FCIC's time-honored
telephone, print, and Internet-based programs to offer its services to
the rest of the government. A successful pilot program leads the way for
USA Services to expand its services to handle e-mail and telephone
inquiries on a reimbursable basis for other Federal agencies.*

[Step 9]{.underline}: Monitor usage and solicit feedback from end-users
to make CRM processes and technology more effective and efficient. Make
necessary changes to processes and technologies. *Usage at USA Services
and feedback from users are closely monitored and results are routinely
shared with partner agencies. We also monitor performance measures such
as caller wait time and e-mail response time. USA Services guarantees a
two-business-day response time.*

*Shailesh Gupta, Managing Partner of CoreSphere, LLC, and an advisor to
GSA\'s enterprise-wide CRM program, contributed to this article. The
9-step CRM roadmap is part of CoreSphere\'s \"Getting Started with CRM\"
methodology. He can be reached at* sgupta@coresphere.com *or at (202)
421-8284.*

*For more information, contact Casey Coleman at <casey.coleman@gsa.gov>
or at (202) 208-7086.*