Gov staff turn down tech vendor "gifts" in large numbers - iTnews

The CRM vendor relationship has always had a conflict of interest baked into it — and a recent government audit just made that visible in an uncomfortable way.

Australian government staff declined gifts from a tech vendor in large numbers, gifts that were offered right around the time a CRM contract was being awarded and as "extensive contract variations" were being negotiated. The audit flagged the pattern. Most staff did the right thing. But the fact that it happened at scale tells you something about how these vendor relationships actually work.

Here's what that means if you're running ops or marketing at a mid-market company: the consultant and vendor ecosystem around CRM software isn't neutral. The person recommending the platform often has a financial relationship with the platform. The implementation partner billing you $300/hour has an incentive to make the project complicated. Every "contract variation" is another invoice. You've probably felt this without being able to name it — the scope creep, the change orders, the sense that the goalposts keep moving.

You've been through enough of these cycles to know the pattern. A cleaner alternative isn't another vendor promising partnership — it's a setup where the people building your CRM are operators who get paid when your system works, not when it gets complicated.

The best CRM deal you'll ever sign is the one where nobody's sending anybody gifts.

#CRM #SalesOperations #MidMarket #OperationsLeadership #TechAccountability

Original Source

The gifts were made leading up to the award of a CRM deal and as “extensive contract variations” were made. An audit of the CRM deal ...