Background

About our client

Our client is a major alternative investment manager with over $40Bn of assets under management. They have networks across Europe and North America, and focus on private equity, private credit and real estate. 

About Holland Mountain

Holland Mountain is a specialist consulting firm and data solutions provider for private markets with over 350 successful digital strategies and transformation projects for Private Capital managers. Holland Mountain has extensive experience in implementing systems for private capital firms, and deep expertise of DealCloud. 

 

Challenges in Legacy CRM Systems: The Transition Journey

The firm previously utilized Salesforce across all its functions. This system, while extensive, presented challenges due to its complexity and the disparate manner in which it was used across the firm. Over time, data within Salesforce became outdated, which compromised its reliability as the primary source of truth. This led the firm to rely increasingly on offline Excel trackers for CRM data management, complicating workflows and affecting the ability to institutionalize CRM data. 

As a result, data and processes were siloed across the firm leading to a lack of transparency hindering the potential for collaboration across regions or teams. This led to high-value employees spending considerable time manually creating reports, which a capable CRM could have generated automatically. Furthermore, the cost of CRM licenses was not justified by the value delivered, prompting a re-evaluation of their CRM strategy.  

Recognizing these challenges, the firm initiated a transition to consolidate its various functions into a single, more efficient CRM solution with the guidance of Holland Mountain. This strategic shift aimed to enhance operational efficiency and data management across Private Equity, Real Estate, and Investor Relations functions. 

 

Strategic Implementation of Intapp DealCloud by Holland Mountain 

With deep expertise of DealCloud and extensive experience in implementing systems, Holland Mountain was tasked in optimising the firm’ CRM capabilities and managing the implementation of DealCloud for the Private Equity and Real Estate functions. 

Using our extensive experience across private capital operations, our implementation team could collaborate with DealCloud to recommend best practices and ways to leverage the full potential of the CRM” added Billy Dix, Associated Director at Holland Mountain.  

Holland Mountain’s expertise ensured successful requirements gathering, historical data migration, and smooth go-live transition to DealCloud. Our approach was methodical, ensuring a comprehensive transformation of the firm’s CRM system.  

  • Holland Mountain led initial workshops with the Private Equity, Real Estate and Portfolio Operations teams, ahead of DealCloud design sessions, to discuss and agree on the vision for the target future state. 
  • Gathering system requirements, and giving recommendations in design workshops with DealCloud, to ensure system configuration does not become overcomplicated and is in line with industry best practices. 
  • Cleansing, de-duplicating and migrating historical data from Salesforce, Outlook, and offline sources into DealCloud to ensure that all data is mapped correctly and in line with the entity structure agreed during design sessions. 
  • User acceptance testing for Private Equity, Real Estate and Portfolio Operations users across seniority to ensure system configuration meets requirements and addresses their use cases. Holland Mountain produced end-to-end test scripts, assigned them per team, and provided support and guidance to all teams involved in the process. Feedback was then triaged and either handled by 1-1 training with users or passed back to Intapp for further configuration. 
  • Development of a go-live plan and delivery production of business-wide change communications arming all teams with the necessary information to begin using DealCloud. Mitigating the common pitfalls of a CRM go-live, clearly communicating the change program to the wider business, ensuring a smooth transition, and minimizing the disruption to the business. 
  • Go-live hypercare across European and North American Private Equity, Real Estate and Portfolio Operations teams to supplement the standard vendor-led training, where useful training materials were shared. Ensuring the system is well adopted from day 1, and any queries and issues are promptly addressed – this is key to users feeling supported and capable of using the system which is ultimately paramount to long-term user adoption. 

This project not only guaranteed a comprehensive implementation of the technology but also optimized the associated people and processes to maximize long-term adoption and enhance the system’s value. 

 

Enhanced Efficiency and Strategic Advantages 

Following the implementation of DealCloud, the firm experienced a significant transformation in their data management capabilities. The company’s data is now institutionalized, leading to enhanced transparency and accessibility across various departments, effectively materialising the benefits of the firm’s extensive proprietary data. Previously, the firm relied heavily on offline Excel spreadsheets for reporting; however, these have been successfully decommissioned. All data is now mastered within DealCloud, where reporting is automatically generated and shared with teams, ensuring consistency and accuracy. 

Consolidating their CRM functions was a strategic move that unlocked significant potential for streamlined operations and enhanced decision-making capabilities. It was made possible by an effective engagement from the firm’s business stakeholders and the co-operation of Holland Mountain and DealCloud’s delivery teams” commented Billy Dix, Associate Director at Holland Mountain.  

DealCloud has become deeply integrated into the firm’s daily operations, managing reporting, monitoring, and outreach exclusively through the new system. This integration has freed up deal professionals to focus more on core tasks rather than on managing data across disparate systems. Furthermore, operational costs have been reduced due to the consolidation of multiple CRM licenses into a single, more effective system. 

These changes represent a pivotal shift in their approach to CRM and data management, demonstrating a clear alignment with the firm’s strategic goals of efficiency and data-driven decision-making. 

Holland Mountain’s Team

  • Billy Dix, Associate Director. 
  • Jordan Shum, Managing Consultant. 
  • Adam Kasperczak, Senior Analyst. 
  • Rose Hugh Smith, Senior Analyst. 

How Holland Mountain can help 

For more insights into how our client transformed their data management systems, contact us or visit our website for detailed project breakdowns and success stories. 

Implementation 

We’ve helped dozens of private capital firms implement new systems end-to-end to get the most out of their digital spending, as well as improving existing systems that are not delivering enough value for managers. 

Strategy Advice 

Our team delivers operational reviews and target operating models for CTOs, CFOs and COOs, providing them with a target future state and plan to achieve it.

 


Download a PDF version of the case study

By Billy Dix

June 7th, 2024

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