“An absence of fear of the future and of veneration for the past. One who fears the future, who fears failure, limits his activities. Failure is only the opportunitv more intelligently to begin again. There is no disgraceful honest failure; there is disgrace in fearing to fail. What is past is useful only as it suggests ways and means for progress.”

Henry Ford, the founder of the Ford Motor Company

“An entrepreneur can make a profit only if he anticipates the future conditions more correctly than other entrepreneurs.”

Ludwig von Mises (1881-1973) philosopher, Austrian School economist and classical liberal

“Most sales people see their CRM systems as a managment application that is designed for executives and number crunches rather than a tool that can be used to increase sales and help to perform tasks more effectively.”

John Golden, US Author and CEO of Huthwaite

 Give Salespeople Wings to fly! This was the goal for the Sales CRM Tool as an example of IT-assisted sales processes. The Pipeliner CRM tool is more than an application; it stands for a principle. As mentioned on the Austrian School of Economics, the application uses entrepreneurs to build its benchmarks. An entrepreneur’s task is to create knowledge and seek out opportunities for profits—in other words, to utilize the advantages that come from information. Taking a risk while protecting existing business is at the crux of every decision a businessman makes. As Jesus Huerto de Soto describes this principle of the Austrian School of Econimics best in his introduction „Market Order and Entrepreneurial Creativity”: „By its very nature and definition, entrepreneurship is always competitive. This means that once an actor discovers a certain profit opportunity and acts to take advantage of it, the opportunity tends to disappear, and no other actor can then perceive and seize it. Likewise, if an actor only partially discovers an opportunity for profit, or, having discovered it completely, takes only partial advantage of it, then a portion of that opportunity will remain latent for other actors to discover and grasp. Therefore, the social process is markedly competitive, in the sense that different actors compete with each other, consciously and unconsciously, to be the first to perceive and embrace profit opportunities.“ This application provides well-founded support precisely for this balancing act.

In day-to-day business CRM tools, it builds its benchmarks for the salespeople as “entrepreneurs in the enterprise”—with the specific requirements and challenges they face in shaping customer relationships in an optimum and successful fashion. But the software also opens up to salespeople and businesses completely new perspectives for better managing the future of the enterprise plus the IT-supported retrospective analysis of the enterprise through a “real-time view.” The competitive situation of the company improves as a result and it has an easier time obtaining liquidity. Investors appreciate being able to use a company’s systematic, well-founded analysis of its future as a basis for their own decision-making. 

Shortcomings of Classic CRM Tools

Classic sales and distribution structures and instruments are fundamentally based on a centralistic, top-down approach. Salespeople face the challenge of attaining goals imposed from above. There is just one motto and one measure. The figures have to be on the mark. When conventional CRM tools are phased in, pressure mounts on the salespeople of being controlled from above. In addition, they face the challenge of carrying out extensive reporting tasks and other activities that are definitely not among their core skills.  As John Golden, CEO from Huthwaite writes in „Winning the Battle for Sales“: „When Salespople are asked to use CRM Tools, they generally  drop their shoulders, roll their eyes, and in their mind kiss their valuable selling time goodbye. For them, it´s anything but automation. For a big part of that day, the perceive themselves turning into a data-enty clerk inputting their deals into a seemingly redundant system only to turn around and discuss those same deals later in the week with their managers.“  Salespeople are not bookkeepers—and have no interest in becoming bookkeepers. They are individuals who think and act as entrepreneurs, who take personal responsibility in freely shaping economic events.

Conventional CRM tools are classic top-down instruments serving as control and monitoring instruments or intensifying previous control and monitoring mechanisms. They turn salespeople into data collectors and data managers. CRM tools of this kind generally benefit organizational entities within the company, not the individual members on the sales team. Little thought has been given to the benefit for sales up until now for CRM tools —and to the fact that people only enjoy and are good at doing what benefits them.