Spreadsheets are the most common tool for managing channel data and tracking channel performance. Many of the
world’s largest corporations are still managing significant portions of their channel operations through spreadsheets. They’re calculating incentive program payments through spreadsheets, determining sales rep compensation through spreadsheets, reconciling special pricing discounts through spreadsheets and tracking sales performance through spreadsheets.
Sounds simple and flexible, but is it really? Spreadsheets also provide the “opportunity” to correct the same data errors week-after-week and month-after-month and year-after-year. The same errors are reported over-and-over again and you correct these same errors over and over since your spreadsheets don’t learn. And not only do they not learn your corrections, they don’t learn the relationships within the data. They calculate, they organize but they don’t learn your adjustments or corrections. Spreadsheets leave that up to you…
Is this the best use of your time?
