Cobras, British colonists, CRM & KPIs.
The British colonists tried to reduce the snake population in India and offered bounties for dead cobras.
The local population started to breed cobras to kill them & get the bounty.
The colonists discovered this & scrapped the bounty forcing the breeders to release their now worthless cobras – further exacerbating the problem.
Incentives, right?
A software company introduced a CRM for the management to be able to accurately forecast their sales.
Their salespeople ignored it because it was seen as simply a way for more stakeholders to ask questions without adding any value.
The management then decided to link commissions to deals being registered in the CRM.
The salespeople started to use the CRM but only to enter the deal *after* the contract was signed.
Frustrated, the management had to adjust the KPIs one more time.
Now, the salespeople could get commissions *only* for deals registered in the system for *at least 30 days*.
Problem solved? No – a story for later.
Lesson? KPIs, though powerful, are only part of the solution.
The underlying problem here was value.
The management failed in communicating how valuable the CRM would be to each salesperson’s success.
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