MSCRM Technical Implementations 101

Following an implementation methodology that works best for your clientele, is the basics of any implementation practice. 

I will use excerpts from 'Microsoft Dynamics Sure Step' as it applies to the technical implementation. Sure Step is a full customer lifecycle methodology for all Microsoft Dynamics solutions and is designed to enable the solution provider to better serve customers by helping reduce their Microsoft Dynamics total cost of ownership.

Technical Information Flow of an ideal full cycle MSCRM Implementation (On-Premise) is shown below:

Figure 1: Technical Information Flow





Sure Step has six phases to implement a full customer life cycle however, only five apply to technical implementations. The Cross-Functional flowchart is self-explanatory as it reads, however we will review them in detail in future posts along with discussions on some of the technical challenges & solutions during each of those phases. 

You can also refer to https://mbs.microsoft.com/partnersource/partneressentials/serviceplans/surestep/ to obtain more details on Sure Step and how it applies to your implementation. You will be able to access the URL only with partner or customer logins from Microsoft.

Analysis: Architecture Assessment, Performance Assessment,Sizing and installation of sandbox environment should be done in this phase.

Design: Business Units, Users, Teams, Contacts, Accounts, any other data need to get imported thru' native or custom imports. This phase also marks the technical design of client specific Customizations & Configurations from the Functional Design Document (FDD) - a result of Gap Fit Analysis from the Diagnostic Phase (not included in Figure 1:)

Development: User Acceptance Testing & Training marks the milestone of this phase.

Deployment: Go-Live Checks and Cut-over tasks determine start of the deployment phase. Also the rollout of Outlook Client Installation & configuration need to get accomplished, if users will be using the CRM via Outlook.

Operation: Educating users on how to maintain Solutions, advantages of using Version Control, Turnover document SLA are important milestones of this phase.