You do not need features

When you're on foot in midtown Manhattan, and you need to get uptown quickly, what you need is not a taxi.

Sure, a taxi might help. But the taxi is not what you need.

What you need is to get uptown quickly. There are any number of ways to do that.

And let's be honest, is getting uptown even the thing you really need?

Are you severely injured and need to get to the hospital? An ambulance might be better than a taxi.

Do you just need to deliver an important package? A bicycle messenger could get it there without you.

Here's the thing:

When you're working everyday with a powerful CRM system — especially one as open-ended and customizable as CiviCRM — it can be very easy to get caught up in ideas about what it can or cannot do, or could be made to do.

But that, in itself, is not the thing you need.

Focusing on features without carefully identifying the measurable business outcomes is a dangerous distraction.

Identify the need first. Identify a goal — hopefully one with a number and a unit. Then, and only then, are you in a position to decide how best to reach that goal.

All the best,
A.