SwoopTalent (acquired by SAP which renamed the product) is a global, automated, talent, data management software for Human Resource teams, trusted by brands like Symantec, GAP, and Teradata. Founder Stacy Chapman was a tech and data pro, specializing in HR tech for more than 25 years, including being a PeopleSoft alum. It is safe to say that Stacy was no stranger to tech platforms, so of course we were honored that she trusted us to consult on her business operations.
While the software helps customers manage data, connect systems, and save time, the team had a few internal challenges, like any small business in growth mode. Accountability and communication between teams were the most significant challenges. “We had a few good things, but a lot of giant cracks. Things kept falling through without clear processes and accountability.” The primary need was cleaning up the Customer Support processes, which Stacy described as “a little chaotic.” They needed a single view of customers to be used for sales, current status, and historical information.
The information lived in different places, and the systems were not talking to each other, which meant a lot of little problems across the business, e.g., not knowing when to charge more or upsell, no customer meeting structure, and support teams not knowing if a customer had paid for an enhancement, causing confusion between sales and Stacy’s.
Stacy’s team members had been using Teamwork.com for about two years, but weren’t sure if they were using it to its full capabilities. She initially chose Teamwork.com because it integrated with HubSpot, Jira, and Zendesk, which they were also using, but she wanted to move to Teamwork.com Desk from Zendesk for better integration. Because she was a Teamwork.com user, Stacy visited the Teamwork.com partners page, where she found Beyond the Chaos (BTC) and reached out for a consultation.
During the initial call, BTC learned that Stacy had 15 people working across three different countries. The time zone added a challenge to communications, and so did making sure Customer Success was clear on the best ways to communicate with the customer.
Our challenge was clear. Different teams at SwoopTalent had different needs. That’s not unique. But at SwoopTalent, every team was using a different system. Therefore, it was not a surprise the business units were not feeling connected.
Just like many small business owners, Stacy sought the best tools to use for each team. She had chosen well. The sales team was using HubSpot. The Implementation Team was working in Teamwork.com. Customer Success was using Zendesk. The development team was using Craft, recently shifted (temporarily, as it turned out) over from Jira. But, as is quite common, the systems weren’t clearly talking to each other.
SwoopTalent still needed these tools for support, sales, project management, and development. And BTC wanted to continue to use the ones that were best suited for those purposes rather than forcing everything into one tool. But, the Customer Success Reps still needed the ability to get a holistic view of the customer in order to provide the best service.
They had HubSpot connected to Teamwork.com and were using Jira to act as a mechanism for moving things between Teamwork.com and Craft. But Customer Success still was on an island, only seeing the information coming in from the customers, and Stacy and BTC still weren’t sure of the best place to house the single view.
To help Customer Success, BTC evaluated Teamwork Desk, Zendesk, and Freshdesk, eventually landing on Freshdesk for Customer Success because it allowed the team to set up SLAs (service-level agreements), escalations, and would still connect to Teamwork.com.
BTC’s team does not provide development services, but developing the flow and connectivity was discussed with Stacy. BTC’s role was to determine which pieces of information needed to be shared to make the process and systems work as a whole. Stacy’s excellent development team was able to connect all the systems using APIs.
The next challenge was to create simple processes that clearly defined each department’s role, how the team members communicated with each other, and how to give Customer Success the lead in communicating with the customer and genuinely facilitating requests.
First, BTC wrote a process to explain which department used which tool and for what purpose. The biggest win in creating that process was setting clear accountability and guidelines for Customer Success to follow up both internally and externally. BTC also set up a process for when and how to open a new project, which directed the team to the project template we created in Teamwork.com to help with new implementations.
Meanwhile, BTC worked with Customer Success to help improve customer response times and follow-up. BTC established the SLAs for internal accountability. With Freshdesk connected to Teamwork.com so Customer Success could more easily involve the development or implementation teams, BTC coached the Customer Success reps on customer communication skills, including how and when to close tickets. Customer Success became the communication glue between the customers and the rest of the team. Also, customer requests stopped falling through the cracks.
One of the key communication tools was setting up a status meeting process (how often and who should be in status meetings, who should lead them, and what they should cover). Customer Success facilitated these meetings with the assistance of the implementation team when needed.
BTC also led three training sessions with various team members to train them on the new processes, some basic project management skills, and Teamwork.com’s basics. Following the rollout of the training and processes, BTC did weekly support meetings with designated team members to make sure they understood what they needed to do and to answer any questions that arose. So they could tweak the process if need be.
One result that often comes from streamlining and systemizing processes is greater accountability for team members. Sometimes, that shines a light on a team member who might not be the best fit. This situation arose for Stacy, and she was able to rectify it quickly. Terminating employees is a highly challenging thing to do, and not everyone acts on it. But Stacy’s quick response allowed her Customer Success team to become all-stars pretty quickly by following the process BTC created.
After this three-month engagement, Stacy could not have been more thrilled with the results. What she got out of it was not necessarily what she thought she needed at the beginning, but as BTC talked through the various outcomes, she and BTC adapted to create the right solution together.
We moved to a new system. We had clearly defined SLAs and processes, which better set up the team for success. It’s a really good and fun way to get the best practices in place. Very good value for money!
Being flexible in changing the goals midstream and accommodating unexpected personnel changes helped the project succeed. Stacy was also fantastic at working with BTC to manage the scope so that the changes could still stay within budget.
UPDATE: Publicly-traded SAP purchased SwoopTalent in August of 2021. Congrats to Stacy for prepping her business well in order to sell.
If you need help with connecting your organization, whether it’s improved communication or processes, schedule a meeting with BTC today!
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