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1. Identify the foundational IS concepts in the legacy system (LS), basic CRM components/capabilities absent from the LS with which they must become familiarized, and a strategy for associating the former to the latter intuitively and logically. #knowledge

2. Search LS for inconsistencies, complexities, and redundancies that point to digital literacy skills gaps requiring immediate remediation. Rank missing skills from most to least critical based on their likelihood to proliferate the LS's problems in the CRM. Measure each area separately according to its level of difficulty, number of areas of importance, and resource requirements to weigh against each other to select the best skills to teach. #risk management

3. Recognize patterns of governance in the LS that can be used in the CRM, commend the agents directly for successfully implementing best practices, and show how they will use those same abilities to operate the CRM # confidence-building

4. Narrow operational skills training of the CRM to only those feature processes that most apparently, directly, and effectively strengthen the agency's ability to deliver on its brand promise; next, single out an example of the subsystem's use that will generate excitement about the tool's potential to impact client relationships positively for live demonstration. #buy-in

5. Divide responsibilities for maintenance input between the agents, selecting tasks in accordance with the recognition of individual strengths to create a sense of ownership of/commitment to the system. #adoption

6. Appropriating Peitone's list of characteristics shared by high-performance work systems (2000), I will perform an analysis of Prostar's LS, using the criteria to sort the LS's subsystems from weakest to strongest. Rankings will be indicative of general areas of strengths and weaknesses for further needs exploration. #system analysis

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The image above displays an agent in the act of sharing new NFL policy information affecting players.

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PROCESS

While in computational terms, information is "processed data" (Patel 2005, p. 284), it plays a major role within a business context. The C-suite uses information "to allocate, monitor, and control resources in an organization." Once they have signed with an agency, NFLPA policies prevent the NFL from contacting clients directly, while NFL policies prevent teams from conducting directly with players.

These policies shape agents' roles with their clients, positioning them as filters that selectively allow information (input) from the NFL and NFL teams to reach their clients. The agents disseminate the suprasystem's inputs into its system in a number of ways, the two most common methods being its website portal and directly over the phone. As with all information systems filters, the agents remove less pertinent information, transforming it into something of much greater value

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Khan et al. (2020) define a system as "a set of elements or functional blocks which are connected together and produce an output in response to the input signal." The agency owes much of its success to its agents' synergy. Once college football players on the University of Connecticut's team, they have experience working together to get wins dating back to the 1980s. Prostar is a system comprised of agents (and their team support) who work together to process information received from clients (NFL players and coaches) and NFL teams so as to package it in a way that makes it as appealing as possible to both parties.

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A system embedded within a system

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The output of one system that serves as desirable input for another

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The matrix above shows the agency's selection criteria and its weighted importance going into the process of player recruitment.

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While the team has a clear priority matrix when considering which players to recruit actively, its ideal client—who embodies the agent's highest ambitions— is one with whom the agency will work for his entire professional career, which can be viewed in two stages involving separate contract agreements:

Stage 1: Player career lifecycle

1. The player matches Prostar’s preferred characteristics for new recruits displayed above, and he displays high levels of motivation for success and strong personal integrity, two traits the agents have determined to be most significant in predicting the quality and duration of a client's career lifecycle.

2. The athlete shows he will add significant value to his team in his promotional video reel and during workout tryouts. Teams recognize the player’s value and get into a contract bidding war that the player/agency will ultimately win.

3. The player performs optimially, and his team wins games, activating contract bonus clauses, generating media and marketing opportunities, and giving the agents leverage during future contract negotiations.

Stage 2: Coach career lifecycle

1. The player retires from playing football and becomes a coaching client instead.

2. The new coaching client refers team talent to the agency while rising in the ranks to the position of head coach.

3. Coach retires with generational wealth.

Ultimately, Prostar's best clients assume a client-partner role so that the recruited becomes a recruiter, which gives Prostar a significant advantage over competitors in a number of ways. Perhaps most significantly, the agents are able to get around NCAA regulations preventing agents from contacting student-athletes directly in cases in which coaching clients encourage them to reach out to Prostar.

**/What CRM features will support the transition between stages 1 and 2?  What skills do these features require? /*

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Systems thinking perspective:

** / Answer: What is systems thinking? Why is it the most appropriate method for identifying learner needs in this particular case? What benefits does it yield? / **

Basic overview:

Because these particular learners have been using the same system for 30 years and are happy with it, conceptually framing the CRM as an extended version of their current system will smooth the path toward agency-wide acceptance of change. Starting by identifying the best practices, effective strategies, and technical knowledge they already have will inspire feelings of self-efficacy during the learning process. It will also strengthen their current skills and validate unspoken policies about information management that must be upheld more consistently for the successful setup of the CRM.

NO: [What they need to know] - [What they know] = [What needs to be taught]

YES: [What they know] + [What they need to know] = [What needs to be taught]

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Prostar agents share values that form an idea about how clients deserve to be treated. This belief is the steady foundation that has supported decades-long relationships.

CLIENT-FIRST

Prostar provides comprehensive services for meeting all clients' diverse needs. In fact, the agents habitually extend free services to the players' families and members of their professional support teams (business managers, spiritual advisors, fitness trainers, and others).

SUCCESS-DRIVEN

Ranked #36 / 967, the agency currently holds the record for negotiating the NFL's highest-paying contracts for 7 field positions.

COMMUNICATIVE

The agents have tools, policies, and procedures that effectively support frequent, ongoing communication with clients and teams.

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PROBLEM

Prostar is purposefully lean so clients can get in touch with agents directly, and maneuvers can be executed quickly without a bureaucratic process. With an average roster of 25 players ....

**/ Expound on: "No time, competitive industry, position behind the digital transformation curve > need to start using the same system./**

I plan to start setting up a CRM for Prostar in December. The technical skills needed to leverage the technology's full capabilities are relatively extensive compared to those possessed by the average NFLP agent over 50 years old. To reach ROI benchmarks, the agents will need to leverage the SaaS's full suite of features, which will require them to upskill. To this end, they asked me to lead a training workshop in Denver this March, which will require me first to answer the question: "What exactly do the agents need to learn for the successful adoption of the CRM?"

PURPOSE

A Needs Assessment is "a formal process which determines the gaps between current outputs or outcomes and required or desired outcomes or outputs; places these gaps in priority order; and selects the most important for revolution” (McCormick 1985, p. 8). My goal for this Needs Assessment is two-fold: (1) to inventory the CRM-related skills they currently do and do not need to acquire to operate and maintain their current File Management System (FMS) / Digital Asset Mangement System (DAM) for the purpose of identifying what the agents need to learn to use a CRM and (2) to produce a document that will function as a formal achievement in that it will later be used to design a training workshop.

DEFINITIONS

• Customer Relationship Management (CRM)

• Patterns of Governance

• x, y, z Salesforce feature requiring manual agent input

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While Prostar's services are as comprehensive as they are competitive, the agency's areas of expertise are reputation management, opportunity generation, career lifecyle management, and contract negotiation. The system's output is generational wealth for athletes, coaches, and their families.

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Feedback is an output of a system process that can be re-entered into the system, catalyzing system change.

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Interface: A shared boundary between two functional units, defined by various characteristics pertaining to the functions, physical signal exchanges, and other characteristics.

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Rothwell 86

01 - Market driven

02 - Optimized work system

03 - Clarity of purpose

04- Self-managing work teams

05 - Ability to redesign work processes

06 - Flexible, supported job

07 - Supportive management systems

08 - Supportive HR policies

09 - Open access to info.

10 - "Variance controlled at source"

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CHALLEGES - Do needs assessment studies have this section???

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CHALLEGES - Do needs assessment studies have this section???

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Research: (1) Issues trainers have experienced teach living dinosaurs how to use powerful tech; (2) Learn best practices for leading technical skills training workshops, then talk about the ones that might be a pain in the ass to pull off here; (3) Learn how to setup automation and write synopsis here, passing it off as "will need constant support" discussion.

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Showing how CRM technology can support processes stemming directly from core values will be essential for motivating agents to learn. Limiting the scope of the training to cover only those feature services that can be clearly and directly tied to the agency's top priorities will promote workshop engagement and generate excitement about the CRM's potential for driving organizational progress towards shared goals. For this reason, I intend to use these questions when formulating the curriculum for the training workshop:

(1) Relationship building on Insta /WRITE OUT/

How can the CRM help the agency manage information about clients, their families, and other support network members insofar as interface des

(2) How can it ensure Prostar continues to break industry records? Contract negotiation can be a long process, and it often occurs via text messages populated with emojis. Can CRM technology be used to help Prostar advocate for clients more effectively during contract negotiations?

(3) Communication with clients and recruits currently takes place using a number of mediums. However, the medium the agency has the best chance of reaching new football player recruits on is Instagram, the targeted demographic's preferred social media platform. As the client's most commonly preferred, frequently visited social media site, Instagram is also the medium that has the most potential to strengthen relationships with players currently under management. In what ways can CRM technology help promote client engagement and extend the length of the agency's reach on Instagram? How can CRM technology be used to promote perceptions of trustworthiness on Instagram?

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{

Analysis model #1:

Current system's strengths:

• System patterns of governance > Transferable skills

• System technologies in use > Foundational concepts

• Systems processes conducted on the phone > Metaphors for functions the SaaS will perform

Current system's weaknesses:

• Specific patterns of error > Specific missing skills

• General system problems > Missing knowledge about CRM solutions

• Need for new feature > Need for whatever skill is required to operate it }.

**/ Add an explanation of each bullet point and turn this into a table. Stick a little chunk of text re: "how they've set everything up themselves so current system is a direct reflection of their abilities" and after re: "how inherent assumptions in this model are immaterial to the outcomes." /**

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In the terminology of CSH, the actual/ideal dialectic is analogous to the more common sense notion of what 'ought' to be some (ideal) future state of circumstances. For Churchman dialectic exists in a 'is'/'out' model. There are two manifestations of the dialectic:

Frank (2016) quotes Flood and Ulrich (1990): "The overall purpose of mapping - whether 'actual' or 'ideal' - should be "to lay open perspective and scale, its selectivity and purpose, and should never allow itself to be taken for territory" (p. 14). Frank aligns with Ulrich, who he quotes expressing his position that systems analysis "expertise" and problem-solving by synthesizing information thinkers to instead think in terms of "problem identification alone with the often discomforting attendant response-abilities that incur" (p. 15). Rather than referring to real land mass and cartography drawings in these passages, Ulrich refers to a systems diagram drawn by non-experts from their own experiences and experts from their envisionment of an 'ideal' rising out of empirical research (Frank 2016, p. 15).