Goal of an Account Review:
The first goal of a product review is to Actively Listen. The below questions serve as a guide to the review conversation and are not necessarily in any particular order or required.
Organizing the Call:
See email sample communication in Knowledge Base. Ideally, if you are new to working with the client contact, the one requesting the account review should introduce you.
Before the Call:
It is recommended to review their account configuration prior to the review conversation. Here are some things to look at prior to the call:
- How long have current system admins been using the system?
- How many new hires do they have in the last year? How many terminations?
- What do their dashboards look like for employees, managers, and administrators? Are they aligned with best practices?
- What recent ticket history do they have? Are there problems we haven't addressed holistically?
During the Call(s):
Questions to consider for the call guide the conversation:
- Tell me more about how your current business needs may have changed, since coming on board with PayNW.
- What system challenges are you encountering today?
- As a System Administrator?
- For your Managers?
- For your Employees?
- Potential items to review for improvements:
How well is your current [-X Configuration-] working for you?- Dashboards / Navigation (Start/Favorites)
- Security / Groups
- Workflows
- Lifecycle Processes: Hiring, Rehires, Transfers, Terminations, etc.
- Are there things you are doing outside the system that you wish could be accomplished within it? I.e. tracking in spreadsheets, using paper forms, etc.
- Are you interested in seeing a demo of current system best practices related to [X Product]?
- If we had a magic wand that could make the system do anything you'd like to make your life easier, what would you wish we would do?
From the conversation, it is important to gage level of importance / priority of any action items. Also, partnership is about understanding their business needs driving changes or challenges. Recognizing what needs have changed can help with identifying solutions to fit their current needs and move forward strategically and holistically.
Recommendation: Add your notes to the ticket related to the account review and provide a link with the recording of the call for later reference.
After the Call:
A good account review should follow with a summary of the discussion, define the client's business needs (the why) and priority, and result in a list of action items to take. Remember not all problems have an immediate clear solution, so sometimes the first step of action is to explore or research solutions further. More actions may need to be added later.
1) Provide a summary email via a ticket to the client for transparency and accountability. Tasks will need to be assigned out to appropriate staff, so set an expectation that someone will be following up with them on each item. Also, this is a good opportunity to ask if you missed anything that was discussed, for them to offer additional input.
Here's a sample (Ticket 372709 step 1 [Call Notes] Step 2 [Summary email to client]:
2) Let the manager who requested the account review know it is complete so they can review the details from the account review and assign out tasks to appropriate staff.