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Greetings
and welcome to the November 2002 issue of the Partnering Intelligence Newsletter,
a monthly newsletter for clients and friends of Partnership Continuum, Inc.
(www.partneringintelligence.com).
Please feel free to forward this newsletter to anyone you think might benefit from reading it. Write to me anytime at info@partneringintelligence.com. Your feedback is important to me.
This month's newsletter introduces three services now available from Partnership Continuum, Inc.: Partner Relationship Management (PRM), the Light-Speed™ Sales Process, and our Mentoring Program.
You've undoubtedly heard of Customer
Relationship Management (CRM)--a business strategy designed to reduce costs
and increase profitability by solidifying customer loyalty. Partner Relationship
Management operates under the same principles. It helps you "manage"
all relationships crucial to the success of your business--those with your suppliers,
important customers, outsourcing partners, alliances, and more. The Light-Speed™
Sales Process is a risk that offers considerable rewards. And mentoring is a
partnership that benefits both parties.
Introducing Partner Relationship Management (PRM)
In this difficult economy, companies are looking for tools that can help them retain the loyalty--and business--of their customers. Customer Relationship Management (CRM) is one such tool that's received a lot of attention recently.
I believe that businesses and organizations could benefit even more from Partner Relationship Management (PRM), a true and proven approach to managing business relationships, not just with your important customers, but also with your suppliers, outsourcing partners, and business alliances.
PRM vs. CRM
Despite the word "relationship" in its name, CRM is not really concerned with managing customer relationships, but with managing data about a customer's buying habits and preferences.
CRM emphasizes collecting information about the personal preferences of customers in order to create customer profiles. Business then uses these profiles to market directly to individual customers.
I'm not suggesting this approach is bad. Take Amazon.com, for example--a business that I shop at frequently. Amazon.com does such a good job of managing my buying habits that as soon as I click on the site, it offers me books, CDs, and other items it believes I'll want to buy--or, at least, be interested in buying--based on my earlier purchases.
Of course, Amazon.com doesn't really care about its "relationship" with me. What it wants is another transaction from me. That's the whole objective of CRM: to generate another sale. Sometimes Amazon.com's marketing to me is right on target. But more often than not, my interests have changed and I'm looking for something new and different.
Do I feel loved by Amazon.com? No, I feel tracked. But that's okay. It's smart business to understand your customers' individual preferences and then to use that information to cater to their desires. Now that we have the technology to manage our customers in such a way, why shouldn't we use it?
But don't be fooled into thinking that CRM is "relationship management." What kinds of relationships does CRM refer to? What exactly is being managed? From my vantage point, CRM is not about relationships at all. It's about collecting and understanding information about the buying habits and needs of customers. Period.
Building Real Relationships
Partner Relationship Management, on the other hand, is about relationships. It's about understanding the needs of your business partners and satisfying those needs to the best of your ability--while building trust between you. PRM, therefore, is much more complex than collecting data.
PRM is not, however, the "partner programs" that are so highly touted today by many companies, particularly high-tech companies. Often, these strategies are even called Partner Relationship Management. Like CRM strategies, partner programs are essentially information-tracking systems that help organize and report on what a company's partners are doing in the marketplace.
With PRM, you must learn to communicate with your partner, using your self-disclosure skills to articulate your needs. You must know your personal trust strategies and then share those with your partner. You must build agreements that are mutually beneficial while working through the conflict that collaboration, by its very nature, causes.
PRM also challenges you to change and focus on the future so you don't continually dwell on past glories and stay stagnant. It links your future with that of someone else--in a positive and exciting way.
Critical Skills in a Global Economy
PRM is especially important today as businesses become more global and interdependent. With interdependence comes a greater need for trust. Look, for example, at the call-center industry. American businesses have formed alliances with partners in India, Africa, and other far-flung places to hire thousands of call-center workers to satisfy American and worldwide consumer demands. Such alliances require a high degree of partnering intelligence. Unless trusting and mutually beneficial alliances can be established and managed, the high level of investments being made by these and other businesses will be squandered.
To truly manage such business relationships, companies must have in place a PRM program. Only with such a program can they develop mutually trusting and beneficial partnerships.
To learn about how Partnership Continuum,
Inc., can equip you and your organization with the processes and skills that
will enable you to successfully implement a PRM program, go online or call:
www.partneringintelligence.com
1-612-375-0323
A 60-Second Partner Relationship Management Assessment
Does your organization have a solid Partner Relationship Management (PRM) program in place? To find out, take this 60-second PRM assessment. Simply answer each question "Yes" or "No."
1. Do you have a jointly developed strategic framework in place with your partner(s)?
2. Have you documented your needs based on your business's strengths and weaknesses and shared them with your partner(s)?
3. Do you have a measurement system in place to document and track your partnership's mutual benefits?
4. Are relational expectations documented between you and your partner(s)?
5. Do you have a jointly developed partnership agreement in addition to any contractual agreements you may have?
6. Do the sponsors of the alliance meet at least twice a year in face-to-face meetings to review alliance progress and strategic relevance?
7. Do you measure the relational components of the alliance along with its economic benefits?
8. Is trust a formal indicator that is measured and regularly reported within your alliance?
9. Have the teams implementing the alliance received formal training on building relationships?
10. Are joint communications and symbols of the alliance been prominently displayed in public locations?
Add up your "yes" and "no" responses. If you have three or more "no" responses, you do not have a PRM program in place. Look for comments on these questions in the December 2002 edition of the Partnering Intelligence Newsletter.
Adapted from Partner Relationship Management Training. Partner Relationship Management Assessment © 2002 Partnership Continuum, Inc. All rights reserved.
To learn how you can establish a
Partner Relationship Management program for your business, go online or call:
www.partneringintelligence.com
1-612-375-0323
Spotlight on the Light-Speed™ Sales Process
Remember the movie Miracle on 34th Street? In that movie, the managers of Macy's Department Store find that their company's sales take off when their Santa Claus begins referring customers to Macy's competitors for products that Macy's doesn't carry. Macy's holiday shoppers are so impressed with the store's altruistic advice that they end up buying all their other gifts at Macy's.
Qwest Wireless has taken a similar bold risk--and with similar results. The strategy began last year, when Partnership Continuum, Inc., developed a partnering-based sales process, which it calls the Light-Speed™ Sales Process, for the Qwest Wireless sales department in Denver, Colorado. The process proved to be a big hit with both the indirect marketing/sales people at Qwest Wireless and with their product sales distributors.
Based on the concept that the best way to build relationships with customers is to build them for a lifetime, the Light-Speed™ Sales Process focuses on developing interpersonal skills that creates trust and open communication between sales personnel and customers. Such a focus enables the company to better understand each customer's individual needs--and thus to find the product that best meets those needs.
In the spirit of true partnership-building with its customers, Qwest Wireless decided that it would train its sales associates on its competitors' product features, so if one of Qwest Wireless's products couldn't satisfy a potential customer's needs, the sales associate could recommend a competitor's product. This proved to be a wise strategy, for more often than not, the customer ended up purchasing other Qwest Wireless services that did meet his or her needs.
To learn how your business can benefit
from Partnership Continuum's Light-Speed™ Sales Process, call us directly
at:
1-612-375-0323
Focus on Partnership Continuum's Mentoring Program
Successful managers know the importance of mentoring others. They recognize that mentoring isn't a one-way street where managers have all the answers, but a partnership in which both individuals share ownership and responsibility and work together for professional growth.
The Partnership Continuum, Inc., Mentoring Program can help you or your organization:
To learn more about how your business
can benefit from Partnership Continuum's Mentoring Program, go online or call:
www.partneringintelligence.com/services/mentor.cfm
1-612-375-0323
Partner Relationship Management (PRM) is another element of managing all of
your business-to-business relationships. This study by two Danish academics,
Poul H. Andersen and Rajesh Kumap, explains the importance of trust and collaboration
in building strong partnerships between businesses. It's long, but worth the
read. Find it at:
www.sam.sdu.dk/CESFO/nordic/Full_papers/Poul Houman Andersen og Rajesh Kumar .pdf
Lawyers are ultimately involved in the break-up of a partnership or alliance,
just like they are in a divorce. Learn what risk manager S. Lee Nelson recommends
the construction industry do before starting a partnering relationship at:
www.ramco-ins.com/resource-library/risk-management/06-sleenelson.htm
"Building Partner Friendly Environments at Work" by James Long and
Dan Elash emphasizes the importance of creating a "partner-friendly"
environment in your workplace--what I've long called a "partnering culture."
When you build these competencies within your organization, constructing a Partner
Relationship Management (PRM) program become less difficult. Learn more at:
www.refresher.com/!ddepartner.html
The Business Development Institute (BDI) recently announced that it has entered
into an exclusive strategic partnering agreement with Stephen Dent and Partnership
Continuum, Inc. The comprehensive partnership calls for BDI and Partnership
Continuum, Inc., to join forces on a number of collaborative initiatives including
the development of a joint public seminar and corporate training strategy, as
well as the execution of several other co-marketing and content-sharing initiatives.
BDI is the first and only membership organization focused exclusively on business development. Its stated mission is to help companies and professionals accelerate their ability to capitalize on partnerships and strategic relationships as a means for achieving business growth. BDI's members are an exclusive group of prominent executives in Global 2000 corporations and select influential leaders who share an interest in developing new business opportunities for their companies by leveraging personal relationships and expanding their networks.
For more information, or to apply
for membership, contact BDI at:
www.bdionline.com
info@bizdevinstitute.org
(732) 212-0411
Stephen Dent recently wrote an article for the Business Development Institute (BDI). Called "Smart Partnering Pays Dividends in Business Development," it will be featured on BDI's Web site in the near future.
To read the article, go to:
www.bdionline.com
"Smart Partnering Starts with You," an article by Stephen Dent, appears
in the November edition of Executive Excellence: The Magazine of Leadership
Development, Managerial Effectiveness, and Organizational Productivity.
(I'm in good company. Other articles in that issue are by Ken Blanchard, Stephen
R. Covey, Tom Peters, and Warren Bennis.)
To subscribe to Executive Excellence,
go to:
www.eep.com
Our redesigned Web site is up and running. Visit soon for monthly updates, new
navigational tools, revised course descriptions, online course registration,
archives, special features, and more.
www.partneringintelligence.com
The Partnering Intelligence Fieldbook: Tools and Techniques for Building Strong
Alliances for Your Business, which I wrote with Sandra Naiman, is now available.
Featuring more than 100 assessments, surveys, checklists, and partnering techniques,
this is a valuable resource for anyone who wants to improve his or her partnering
skills.
Check our Web site for details:
www.partneringintelligence.com
Mark your calendar for the Spring Building Smart Partners™ Training
Seminar, to be held March 26-28, 2003, at the beautiful
Minneapolis campus of the University of St. Thomas. Save 15% off the fee
if you register before January 1, 2003.
For more information, or to reserve
your space at the training and receive your discount, call:
1-612-375-0323
Do you need a keynote speaker to talk about alliances and partnerships? For
the past three years, I've been giving exciting and informational talks at conferences
and meetings around the world on creating great partnerships and alliances.
Several of my upcoming appearances are listed and described below.
To learn more about my topics, or
to arrange for me to speak at one of your events, call:
1-612-375-0323
From November 21-22, I'll be presenting a workshop on Nonprofit/For-Profit
partnerships at the Bayer Center for Nonprofit Management at Robert Morris University
in Pittsburgh, PA.
To register for this event, contact
the Bayer Center:
412-227-6814
bcnm@rum.edu
In January 2003, I'll be partnering with Marcus Evans, a worldwide executive
training and event planning organization, to bring our world-class Partner Relationship
Management (PRM) training to Southeast Asia. Ill be in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia,
January 6-7, and in Jakarta, Indonesia, January 9-10.
For more information, go to:
www.marcusevans.com/offices/Kualaframe/Kualaset.htm
If you'd like to meet with me while
I'm in Southeast Asia, call:
1-612-375-0323
Also in January, I'll be giving the keynote speech at the WEMCO Annual Meeting,
sponsored by the American Welders Society. The meeting will be held on January
16-17 at the Hilton La Jolla Torrey Pines Hotel in La Jolla, CA.
To learn more about the American
Welders Society:
www.aws.org
"Vision is where tomorrow begins, for it expresses what you and others who share the vision will be working hard to create. Since most people don't take the time to think systematically about the future, those who do, and who base their strategies and actions on their visions, have inordinate power to shape the future." -- Burt Nanus
"The very essence of leadership is that you have to have vision. You can't blow an uncertain trumpet." -- Theodore Hesburgh
Partnering Intelligence Newsletter is published monthly for clients and friends of Partnership Continuum, Inc. Copyright © 2002 by Partnership Continuum, Inc. All rights reserved.
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Partnership Continuum, Inc.
1201 Yale Place, Suite
1908
Minneapolis, MN 55403-1960
USA
Toll-free (U.S.): 1-888-292-0323
Worldwide: 1-612-375-0323
Fax: 1-612-317-0713
info@partneringintelligence.com
www.partneringintelligence.com