Posted by Dread.
It’s not a typical word that comes up when you decide to purchase whatever type of learning system, whether it is an LMS, LXP, Learning Platform, Talent Development Platform, Employee Dev Platform (a tiny market, but it exists), or whatever a vendor spins their learning system as.
Yet it is there.
Dread. In the states, a recent poll found that 64% of Americans see 2024 as dreed. Since they didn’t call me (not that I would ever answer the phone, nor do I have a landline), it still came off as a surprising number. Oh, this is why I ignore polls in general – because what age bracket has a landline, picks up the phone on a random number, and reads e-mails that offer refunds if you send them money? They always ask – do you think this is a scam?
Regardless of the number of respondents who see 2024 as the Year of Dread, I feel it myself. And I bet you do, too.
Dread is there when you are in the first, second, third, and all the other stages of purchasing whatever type of learning system.
The First Stage
Finding Out – Exploratory
Exploring and understanding use cases. Having to talk (ugh) to people in various departments, maybe plant locations, workers – whether it is frontline (diskless), blue-collar (which some people see differently than frontline), office workers – distributors/partners, and whomever else is in order.
Perhaps you did a gap analysis before you even got there (I always did, and I recommend it). The benefit is that it reduces the time of conducting interviews with all various departments. And I won’t even go to the committees – which is another nightmare (it is easy, though, to steer them to what you want – again, I’ve done it multiple times).
Those interviews. Do you know what questions to ask? Do you know how to listen and follow up? Do you go script, or do you extract? Do you hire someone to do it for you? Do they know what they are doing? Have they been in that same spot? Then you have those stakeholders. Even the pushy ones. The ones that make your life miserable. Yep, those interviews. Managers who do not buy in. CEOs who buy in unless it is an employee in the plant or manufacturing site or at the retail location. Then nah, you can’t train them, with this learning, whatever you want to buy.
It’s enough to give anyone a sense of dread. Yet, it is needed. People often will ask their external audiences what they want – which, while it sounds good in practice, isn’t a need – you were hired to run the training – not them. And even with internal, you will get everything all over the map. The content piece is relevant for external. Whether or not they want a storefront or a user interface that says happy days are here again – not.
Stage Two
Creating the RFP document
These are the typical routes people go when creating the RFP (BTW, save time, use my template that said)
- Put in 90% that every vendor already has – but you are unaware. I hear it all the time – no vendor has this – and then I say, about 200 plus do. I understand why the “we need this” is listed, under the assumption nobody has it – but when you do the due diligence first and see the demo with your already pre-existing template – you can now remove said template and reduce it OR not use one (I did the latter quite a bit, but yeah, it’s not for everyone – I respect that).
- Take all that information people gave you and put it all in the RFP without making sure that it isn’t redundant, or redundant using different vocabulary, or really needed. There is no filter – which should be you.
- Take all that information, extract, reduce, review and if it truly aligns to what is needed – since you are the expert in L&D or Training – and not them – you place it in the RFP. Trust me, most people forgot what they gave you, plus you can always say, “Yeah, great idea, it is on our roadmap in the future, since we had to focus on specifics with our budget.” I mean the future could be a decade from now.
- Write an RFP that is massive in size. Use case? Yes – go detailed – no ambiguity. Even if you think – oh they will know this – assume they won’t. You have a specific tech stack – an HRIS and payroll separate and some tech product that is this or that and so on – list it. Again, don’t just say we may add it or not. It is better to know if it is doable, even if you do not start with it, then get the surprise later. Identify the number of users you see using the system in a given year. If you plan on rolling it slowly out – with X number, say it. If you plan to roll out with a stage of X, but then by Q3, a larger audience says it. Going entire company – give the total number of the user base. Vendors love to say active, sounds great – but again, unless they bill monthly, then they are not staring at your actual active numbers. Do you need hundreds of questions about security and privacy? No. Do you need to have questions about their financial stability? Doubtful, unless you are large enough, where you are required to see their books. Otherwise, everyone will say they are financially well off, even if, privately, they are on the market. Need to see references? Come on. Do you think they are giving you references who hate or have issues with the system? Nope.
That’s a lot of dread right there. Nobody loves or likes creating an RFP/RFI or whatever you do. It is not a fun experience, which is why that intern seems reliable, and hey, they can type in text, so what will it hurt?
Stage Three
The search
Often, folks go a few ways – do extensive due diligence, (FindAnLMS can help) and talk to the vendor. Schedule the demo. RFP has already been created, but they hold off sending it, until they decide whether to move forward or not. This scenario is rare. It should, though, be the only scenario you do. It is the one that will get you the right system, and not one you regret ten minutes after you sign that contract.
Do a cursory search. Find a few systems of interest. Create an RFP/RFI or similar document. Send to the vendors.
If the cursory only focuses you typing into Bard, DuckDuckGo, ChatGPT or Bing, top 10 systems, not only will you run into all types of sites including such as Trust Radius (which I never trust), many will be affiliate sites (without you realizing it). The internet these days are filled with affiliate sites, which are the worst. Unless you find Chris, the expert of cave dwelling and travel, tell you here are the best learning systems to buy – and you shake your head and agree.
Listen to some folks on LinkedIn who tell you system X or Y. RFP created. Blast to the vendors.
The cursory search is a failure. Listening to folks on LinkedIn who have never gone through the process, nor has the experience, nor has the specific use cases or case you have, nor the audience, nor the budget, and the list goes on.
You tie all that into the due diligence part for the initial search.
The benefit of seeing a demo first, with your RFP in hand – and not the vendors’ is that you can ask to see what you want rather than rely on them saying they have it when, in fact, they may not, or they have a workaround. This, again, is another reason: people pick the wrong system because they believe that anything the vendor says they have in that RFP must be true. I mean, who would mislead you?
Stage Four – or it may be your three
Talk to the vendor’s salesperson
They seek to qualify you. Honestly, if you are breathing and have the user base, they will accept you, including whether you are internal – L&D or external. Exceptions: you contact a vendor that only does customer training. How do you know? It’s always on their website, front and center. But you ignore that, contact them, and say you need a system for internal use – your employees. They won’t take you – or at least they shouldn’t. I know of one vendor who does anyway, then says they are customer training only.
Most systems are a combination – they accept both internal and external users. So, if your use case is mainly internal, but you also have external partners, they will likely be a good fit – especially if the core use is internal. A customer training system will take employees, but only if the main audience – the larger numbers – are external, and the internal is maybe 100 or 150 or so (using this example – the external to start is 5,000 or 10,000 or even 2,500).
Anyway, you talk to the salesperson. They ask questions. You respond. They always want to know your budget. You decline (I recommend this). Blah, blah, and more blah.
You say you want to see a demo. They will usually ask you to send over your use case – which you just explained to them. You say okay. And when is that demo?
Then, when it’s near demo time, they call you (they should) and ask what you want to see. Be specific. If you’re not sure – and you want to see it all – but will pivot throughout the session, tell them.
Stage Five
I want to tell you that I experience Stage Five a lot when I talk to vendors, even now. It is DREAD at its highest level because frustration becomes an art. I love the line, “If you need to jump in and ask a question, go ahead.” Because 60% of the time, they ignore you and continue to rumble on – and your brain has turned off – “Hey, I never knew my pen is also a pencil.”
The Pitch Deck
The worst. We are talking about a lot of information that can be sent ahead and you can read it on your own. They just read it for you, like you cannot read or think independently.
Do I care you have clients in Mongolia? (No offense to my readers in Mongolia)
Do I care if you have X number of users using your system daily? Do I care that you are showing me well-known or known names on a list that have nothing to do with me – my industry? Do I care about seeing quotes from folks who love your system? Do I care that you provide a bunch of information early on about your system or other dribble that isn’t relevant because I am interested specifically in seeing the system – not you talking about a deck your marketing or sales team or a combined entity has created.
Seriously, I always tell vendors to send me the deck ahead of time, and if I have questions, I will send them before we talk. I get about 50% who do it. This list below is some of the stuff I have heard from vendors who show me the pitch deck (even if I want to get to the demo)
- But blah blah (name withheld) spent all this time working on this – just a few more (then it takes another 30 minutes and limits the time to see the system)
- It is just a few more slides (When I ask if we can move to the demo and send me the deck) – The few more aren’t like three – it is always a lot – Hey, look, I can turn off my camera and mute!
- We will send you the slide deck after the presentation – I rarely see it.
- I understand what you are asking, but we want to show you more (Hey, I don’t care)
My favorite is still the “they spent all this time,” because the quote came from the CEO, who was on the call.
When I see that “who’s who” is using their system – and again, it is names that grab your eyeballs – I always ask, is that system the only system in that company? It is rare – with those big names, but it does happen. OR I ask in conjunction with that question – what department or area are you in? For example, the vendor could be the vendor for the European side of sales training. OR the vendor for customer service.
You would be surprised how many of these sales folks, including high-level execs, have no idea.
I will hear, “Well, many of these companies have many systems,” – okay, great – so just say it, rather than having me pull teeth out to ask you. I love the “we are very transparent,” which isn’t entirely transparent if I have to ask you precisely because it is not on your list.
And yes, I get vendors who say they will get back to me, and I hear nothing back. The majority of the people on these calls are senior execs, even CEOs or COOs.
That is DREAD. Thus if you think, does this happen to anyone else? YES!
Stage Six
The Demo
Assuming the person reached out ahead of time to ask what you want to see (as noted earlier), that’s a good sign. You will get salespeople who do not do this. That is a bad sign.
The demo can bring excitement and DREAD, especially if the “you can stop me at any time thing” is ignored. I’ve seen C-Level or senior execs take control of the demo, and they ignore it. Or it is clear they are going on a script, and thus, when you try to pivot to something else, they say yes but continue down their path.
I always recommend pivoting to see if they are on a script. It’s easy to do. Some vendors will have a sales consultant, technical consultant, or solutions consultant drive (i.e., they are driving the demo and answering questions) handle it.
It can either be amazing (I’ve seen a few) or a disaster – because they know some things, not other things – which is fine, and then when you ask the salesperson to find out, they never respond. It isn’t the solutions consultant’s fault – it’s the salesperson’s fault.
I’ve seen where the salesperson has zero clue, and the solutions consultant knows more. Bad sign. Why have you, the salesperson, been the one to land this deal when your solutions person saves you in many ways? It’s like tipping. Your server stinks; the person who gets refills and cleans off the table is superior, but the tip goes to the server. You know what I am talking about!
DREAD plus one. I have no problem if the salesperson doesn’t know the answer to my question. Still, I expect them to find out (which they always say they will) and then get back to me with the answer or the person I can speak with to find out the answer. I can’t believe the number of salespeople who never do, and I can’t understand why you didn’t go with them.
Now, with generative AI, if it can be even worse, it happens frequently. Trust me – you – the salesperson, talk to a Gen AI expert and say, “I have a client who asked me these questions I do not know the answer to. Can you talk to them or provide me the answers and offer to talk to them?” How hard is that?
With Gen-AI, it is rare to find a salesperson who really knows the industry, let alone the LLM they are using and other acceptable items—just the basics. In the time I’ve been talking to vendors who have Gen AI, and it is not the CEO or CPO (head of product who has the in-depth knowledge) I can count on my fingers – one hand who knows it OR connects me to someone who will.
Stage Seven
Negotiations and Pricing
It will be DREAD if you do not relish in negotiations. If you are a person who is not fully familiar with how the industry’s pricing really works (and not them telling you), this will lead to DREAD when you are stuck in a contract and want out.
If you are familiar, can negotiate and are unaware that everything pricing wise always comes down to the final number in the proposal, which you might miss because of the spin – DREAD will come later.
If you do everything right, procurement comes along, wipes it all out, and picks the cheapest, which solves nothing, but it’s cheap – the DREAD early on is there.
If you deal with a committee that thinks they know more than you or those wonderful member committees you must go to when working in an association, you must defend why you want this vendor – and they have zero clue on what you are talking about. That is DREAD.
OR someone on the committee heard of system Y as ideal because another association has it, OR their buddy who works for XYTS has it. You realize this will be a battle that leads to DREAD.
Getting the deal done in the end is DREAD.
Dealing with their support, if it ends up being awful, leads to DREAD.
Bottom Line
Buying an LMS, LXP, Learning Platform, a combo LMS/LXP platform or whatever spin a vendor comes up with for a learning system, may lead at some point to DREAD.
I’ve been there. I still deal with it, when I represent clients who need a learning system.
Whereas you expect Euphoria, what you get instead
And wish you never would ever see,
Is
“Feel free to ask me any question.”
I promise I won’t get back to you.
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