Managing the Implementation of Customer Relationship Management from an Interfunctional Perspective

Customer Relationship Management (CRM) has received an increasing amount of interest among scholars and practitioner in recent years. While some companies have received immense benefits from their investments, other companies have seen no bottom line improvements. One often-cited reason for high failure rates has been the cross-functional nature of CRM implementation. Two functions frequently involved in CRM implementation are marketing and information technology (IT). Consequently, this thesis combines the two fields of interfunctional relations and CRM, and the research problem addressed is: How do interfunctional relations between the marketing department and the IT department affect the implementation of CRM? A cross-sectional mail survey was undertaken, resulting in data from 415 marketing and IT managers of large Swedish companies. Half of the companies had implemented CRM systems. Overall, the marketing and IT departments seem to have good relationships and provide a uniform view of their perceptions of CRM and their interfunctional relations. The main finding was that companies utilizing CRM have higher levels of interfunctional integration and also higher perceptions of performance. Results also indicate that perceived ease of use, perceived usefulness, and managers' involvement in CRM implementation did not appear to have any effect upon performance. Finally, findings from this study show the importance of interdepartmental collaboration as a facilitator, both for performance and perceived usefulness of the CRM system. While I have been working on this thesis, many people have supported me and contributed in different ways. First of all, I want to thank my supervisor, Professor Leyland Pitt, for his guidance throughout the process. Thank you for always, no matter where in the world you have been, taking time to quickly respond to all kinds queries and questions I have managed to come up with. I also would like to express my gratitude to my assistant supervisor Professor Esmail Salehi-Sangari, who gave me the opportunity to work on this thesis. A special thanks to Professor Pierre Berthon, who ran my final preparation seminar and provided me with valuable feedback on how I needed to improve my work. I want to thank my colleagues in the Division of Industrial Marketing for their friendship and support during these years. This thesis would never been accomplished without cooperation from the industry. Therefore, I am deeply grateful to all the managers who took the time to answer my questionnaire. I also want to express my appreciation to my parents for their support …