Your organization has decided to move to a new vendor.

Now what? There are a lot of things to think about to prepare for any type of transition.

Creating a Project Plan is key to the transition. This way you can map out the timeline of what needs to happen before new vendor takes over. The plan holds everyone accountable for their own tasks and provides a holistic view of the entire team, key stakeholders, and the organization.

Setting up a weekly standup call with all key players is a good tool to keep communication flowing. First, have a kick-off meeting with all key people from your organization and any external consultants or advisors helping you with the transition. Be sure to include everyone from executives to end users. You need everyone's buy-in and participation to ensure you don’t forget any key information and to ensure the project is a success.

In this kick-off meeting, it is a good idea to share how the process is currently working as well as what isn't working. The new vendor can make suggestions on how to streamline processes. When starting with a new vendor, be sure to take the time necessary to improve your internal business processes. Often times, non-profits have been doing things the same way for years. Take this time to re-evaluate your business processes.

The new vendor should share with you the way they typically handle the processes that you share with them, as well as introduce best practices they’ve learned from similar clients.

Be sure to talk through all the programming requirements to ensure you're ready to cutover when it's time to go-live. It is important to get sample files, templates, etc... from the current vendor as early as possible to allow sufficient time for testing and programming.

Allow plenty of time for testing. Determine what needs to be tested, and by whom, so you can create a test strategy and plan. For more information about testing, read this post: User Acceptance Testing

With the right amount of planning and preparation, you can ensure that the transition to a new vendor is smooth and seamless. If you'd like help with your planning, please connect with our team today, we're ready to help.