Testimonial by Tina Riddell, Former Business Development Co-ordinator at Brooksby Melton College

"Brooksby Melton College is a medium sized college in Leicestershire and is a merged Landbased and General FE college, based across two main campuses approximately six miles apart. As Business Development Co-ordinator for the past four years I have overseen the employer engagement aspects of the Skills and Business Development Department, dealing with enquiries from local companies in and around the Leicestershire area.

During 2005 it became apparent that there were several facets of the college that had regular contact with employers, including a Short Course Administrator and the Work Placement Co-ordinator and a range of Training Officers visiting apprentices in local firms. Whilst we ensured that verbal checks with individuals were done before visiting / contacting a potential new company as business grew it was becoming unmanageable and a software solution was required.

XchangeCRM provided that solution which we selected following recommendation from another college. We also become part of the initial development group for the software enabling us some customisation to suit our organisations needs. Once installation and data transfer had been finalised the system performed well allowing a single source through which to track and monitor employer engagement data. Statistics were easy to produce via the management report function.

More recently we have upgraded to XchangeCRM 2009 Premium Edition which combines all the features with which we are familiar plus a simple and very user friendly new front end to ease navigation.

The main core benefits for ourselves has definitely been the ability to store all employer interactions on one dedicated system, allowing better account management and follow up of enquiries via the inbuilt task manager. The Training Needs Analysis feature we found particularly useful as the proforma could be pre populated with employer details prior to a TNA visit thus making data input an easy process on returning to the office. The overall relationship with employers has therefore improved with advisors being able to target sales more directly to suit companies needs.

Due to the flexibility of XchangeCRM, Northampton College, as with other Colleges, has provided feedback to Tineke Ltd over the past couple of years, that has allowed the system to evolve and improve as needs change.

 The statistical data extracted from XchangeCRM over the past four years has provided the key quantitative data showing trends over time to support, firstly our achievement of EmSKills, and more recently the Training Quality Standard which we were accredited with in April 2009.

Since initial installation the system has evolved with updates being provided as new features became available and an extended user group within the college was established.

We have always found Tineke Ltd to be very responsive to any queries we have raised over the years and they are always keen to develop and evolve the software should the majority of users find a particular feature or function to be of benefit to their organisation. The CRM User Groups they run are a valuable networking tool to meet with other colleges and share ideas on how CRM is being used in different settings. I would have no hesitation in recommending XchangeCRM and Tineke Ltd to other colleges."

Go to the Brooksby Melton College Website