User Review
( votes)Limitations with Salesforce Prompted this Financial Services Firm to Switch to Microsoft Dynamics 365 CRM and Power Apps
Out-of-the-box CRM software like Salesforce cannot always address the unique needs of every business. At AKA, we design and implement technology solutions for financial services firms. While recently working with a global, private equity firm looking for a better CRM software solution, we quickly realized that their unique business requirements did not fit the “one size fits all” approach most CRM technology provides.
This particular firm was in need of a customized solution for recruiting and augmenting management teams within their portfolio.
Re-tooling leadership teams requires complex talent search capabilities
This firm increases the value of their investments by restructuring leadership teams. Talent recruiters within the firm looking to re-tool management teams need deep visibility into their relationships and talent pool across all of the companies in their portfolio. To ensure a good match, this requires searching across their extensive portfolio of executives’ qualifications, combined with LinkedIn for deeper analysis.
For this client, there were three business challenges we needed to address:
- The ability to search through resumes and large amounts of data in their CRM system or transactional database to locate the most appropriate candidates for specific roles.
- The firm’s recruiters needed to conduct research and analyze results on LinkedIn without tipping off the candidate.
- They needed to report on highly customized candidate search results within the organization—with printability
After researching best-of-breed systems for tracking and hiring, and knowing that their current Salesforce and home grown system were not able to provide the custom query and resume parsing they required, the firm hired AKA to replace Salesforce with a better CRM technology solution for financial services: Microsoft Dynamics 365 Sales.
One major selling point? Dynamics 365 offers out-of-the-box functionality for keyword searches and complex queries. But the firm’s recruiters needed a more robust querying functionality and an easy-to-use interface to efficiently search on candidate records with specific criteria. For example, a recruiter might need to search for a C-level executive with an advanced degree in economics, and experience working in commodities trading. The results of their search are then saved, and the recruiter can then build a comprehensive list of targeted candidates. Adding a custom Power App was just the solution.
Complex queries addressed through Microsoft Power Apps
As planned, AKA implemented Dynamics 365 as the client’s CRM solution with some special features–including a Power App to handle their complex queries on requested data. This Power App will also search and retrieve the data regardless of criteria set or number of criteria in the query.
The Power App solution was quickly and cost effectively deployed. We eliminated the need for custom coded solutions that would have required more time, money and resources to support over time.
As for LinkedIn, the standard LinkedIn integration with Dynamics does not provide the “true” integration needed for this particular financial services firm. To address this, we used a 3rd party parsing tool to automatically download LinkedIn candidate resumes in PDF format and import them into Dynamics as contacts. Once the resume is parsed, the data elements are automatically loaded into Dynamics and become part of the firm’s repository of talent data. The recruiters can also receive and enter typical Word and PDF resumes that candidates send via email.
Power Apps is a Competitive Game Changer
By eliminating two systems. recruiters now have one comprehensive way to execute quick and customized queries on potential candidates. For more specific results, search queries can now include any tag about a candidate such as title, years held in positions, geography, education, certification history and more.
Additional benefits of the Power App solution include:
- Simplification of a once challenging task now made almost frictionless
- Competitive advantage with improvements in productivity and speed for finding the best candidates
- Significant reduction in training time with an intuitive user interface
Is Power Apps Right for Your Business?
We at AKA are excited about Power Apps, one of the tools in the Microsoft Power Platform. As a Microsoft Gold-certified Dynamics partner, we have seen proven results from this simple, cost-effective, and powerful solution. We would love to discuss how this technology can transform your business.
How can AKA and Power Apps help you? Let’s talk.
To see more real world examples of how Power Apps is being used by five other financial services companies, Watch our on-demand webcast.
ABOUT AKA ENTERPRISE SOLUTIONS
AKA specializes in making it easier to do business, simplifying processes and reducing risks. With agility, expertise, and original industry solutions, we embrace projects other technology firms avoid—regardless of their complexity. As a true strategic partner, we help organizations slay the dragons that are keeping them from innovating their way to greatness. Call us at 212-502-3900!
Article by: Tom Berger | 212-502-3900
With 20+ years of field experience, Tom Berger is Vice President of Financial Services for AKA Enterprise Solutions.
