Implementing SFA at Quantium Technology Essay

Quantium Technology (founded in 1989) was an innovative applied science company that provided calculating machine hardware and computer software for large enterprises. It had grown to become a trail provider of enterprise servers and specialized workstations which were known for their reliability and security. Quantium was an enormous benefactive role of the dot-com boom, but struggled after the bust and the recession. In 2004, Anne Rothman was the new executive Vice President of Global Sales and she felt that sales top executive automation was one of Quantiums biggest challenges. There were numerous problems with the existing SFA software solution Siebel Sales. Sales representatives were abandoning the system, sales managers were complaining that the sales pipeline learning was not accurate.The system did not appear to be increasing benefit rates or shortening the sales cycle as expected. by and by the internet bust, competition had commoditized the server market by offeri ng cheaper servers that were culmination the performance gap. Quantium moved from being a product company to a solutions company. The sales reps had to adjust by focusing on pedigree issues and business problems instead of technical features. Also the aggroup selling approach was not quite successful. Sales managers and company executives complained that they did not have reliable information on the company sales pipeline. To rectify these problems, Rothman started interviewing the people associated with executing of the SFA course. SFA was in any case the core of many CRM applications. The key SFA elements were opportunity management and sales forecasting. Siebel was selected as the SFA software to be implemented.This was implemented with the help of IT specialists and assistance from IT consultants and system integrators. The IT team was pressured to deliver the best possible solution as there were differences as to whether to implement the standard product or its customized version. A training program was rolled expose to get the entire sales reps and managers up to urge on on the new SFA tool. As the system was being rolled out and put into operation, performance problems emerged from the field and it was associated with Quantiums existing outdated technology infrastructure. The sales reps especially faced a lot of problems and were hesitant to custom the system with a steep learning curve. Rothman went over the history of SFA implementation as well as the current status. She has identified the implementation mistakes and has to point out a solution to make SFA work at Quantium.