Connecting corporate strategy to CRM and ERP data

A strategy document says where the business intends to grow and where it intends to protect margin. The CRM and ERP systems record what actually happens: who bought, at what price, and what it cost to serve them. In most companies the two rarely meet. Strategy is reviewed once a year using slides assembled by hand. Operational data is reviewed every week without reference to the strategy it is supposed to deliver.

Closing that gap does not require new data. It requires connecting the data the business already has to the questions the strategy raises.

Start with the strategic questions

Each strategic choice can be restated as questions that data can answer. “We will grow in offshore services” becomes: is the pipeline in that segment growing? How does the win rate compare with the core business? Is the margin on delivered work in line with the plan? Starting from the questions keeps the exercise focused. Starting from the data produces dashboards that nobody asked for.

What each system knows

The CRM records intent: accounts, opportunities, stages, wins and losses, and the activity around them. The ERP records outcomes: invoices, costs, margins, delivery and payment behaviour. Neither is sufficient alone. The CRM cannot tell you whether the customers sales is pursuing are profitable. The ERP cannot tell you where the next order is likely to come from. Joined, they show which customers, segments and products actually make money, and whether commercial effort is pointed at them.

The joining problem

The customer in the CRM is seldom the same record as the customer in the ERP. Names differ, group structures are captured differently, and duplicates accumulate. Product hierarchies rarely line up. Matching entities across systems is unglamorous work and it decides whether anything built on top can be trusted. The matching should be inspectable: a user should be able to see why two records were treated as the same customer, and correct it when they were not.

From reporting to recommendation

A dashboard tells you that margin fell. A useful system tells you where it fell, what drove it and what could be done, and it shows the evidence. A recommendation worth acting on states its assumptions, identifies the data behind it and estimates its impact as a range rather than a single number. Someone accountable then approves it before anything happens. Analysis can be automated. Decisions about pricing, customers and investment should stay with the people responsible for them.

Keep the loop running

Once strategic questions are connected to live data, strategy stops being an annual event. Leadership can see each month whether the chosen segments are growing, whether the margin assumptions are holding and where the plan needs to change. That is a more honest way to run a strategy than waiting a year to find out.

This is the ground RevGen covers: deciding where the business should grow, then using CRM and ERP data to find and act on the opportunities.