CEO Feedback on Salesforce Blowouts

Hi Andrew

Thank you for your insightful newsletter on the challenges of customising Salesforce and the associated cost overruns. It’s quite disheartening to see these massive blowouts, especially when they impact charitable sector, where resources are critically needed.

To answer your question, I have indeed experienced similar frustrations. I've been involved on and off with a committee implementing Salesforce since 2016 for a charitable organisation in Queensland and nationally, and despite our best efforts, we're still not significantly better off than when we started in some states. The problem seems to be a combination of the complexity of customisations and what you aptly referred to as the "get your foot in the door" approach by some providers.

In our case, we've repeatedly fallen into the trap of engaging the same providers to "fix" the problems, often at significant cost, only to encounter new issues whenever updates are rolled out. This cycle has often felt like a classic case of the sunk cost fallacy—continuing to invest in a problematic solution because of the substantial time and money already spent, rather than cutting losses and exploring new options.

I've noticed that many charities face similar challenges. The customisations, while intended to tailor the platform to specific needs, often lead to a tangled web of dependencies and workarounds. And every update seems to break something that was just fixed. The reliance on certain providers for ongoing support also means we are frequently locked into costly arrangements without ever reaching a satisfactory outcome.

To manage these inflated costs, we've started advocating for more transparent and accountable project management practices. We are also focusing on minimising the number of customisations made to Salesforce, aiming to leverage its existing functionality as much as possible while still meeting our business requirements. By reducing customisations, we hope to create a more stable system and avoid the pitfalls associated with frequent updates and ongoing maintenance issues.

Your point about the potential issues that will arise when the government attempts to upgrade to a major new version of Salesforce due to customisations resonates with me. We've had to delay several updates ourselves due to similar constraints, each time incurring additional costs for further modifications to maintain compatibility.

Again, thanks for the insights!

Andrew Walker
Technology consulting for charities
https://www.linkedin.com/in/andrew-walker-the-impatient-futurist/

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