Technical Debt Reduction and Agentforce POC: How AAPL Found Sustainability and Clarity with Plative

The Complexities of Organic Growth

As the IT Director, Sean Sullivan arrived to find a technology environment that had grown organically over time. This meant systems were being held together by “baling wire and duct tape” , resulting in duplicate data and outdated mechanisms.

This technical complexity created serious roadblocks. Critical workflows risked breaking down because they relied on technology that was expiring and would soon lose support. In some cases, Sean notes, they “would have been dead in the water”.

Specifically, AAPL had accumulated a lot of technical debt within their Salesforce environment that needed to be reviewed. This debt was limiting their ability to move forward, continue to innovate on the platform, as well as embrace new technologies and solutions that would further enable their ability to engage with members.

 Adding to the challenge, the organization had invested three years and significant capital into an internal project. Plative’s collaboration on this initiative helped AAPL realize that it was a ‘non-starter,’ allowing them to cut their losses and focus their resources elsewhere. Facing a single, new internal Salesforce resource , the organization needed experts to help them clear this accumulated technical debt and secure the future.

A Partner to Phone a Friend

AAPL sought a partner to act as an external escalation point and a reliable “phone a friend”. They chose Plative for our deep bench of knowledge with associations. Plative began by providing advisory support, conducting a comprehensive audit of their business processes and their technology. Plative then presented a read back that was focused on several key areas:

• Strategic data management
• System landscape optimization
• Customer experience digital transformation
• Innovation readiness
• CPQ enhancements and stabilization

With that roadmap, AAPL was then able to determine where to invest strategically based on the business’s priorities. This collaborative, authentic approach also gave AAPL’s new Salesforce Administrator a level of comfort and the experience needed to take ownership of the system. The partnership was about more than just technical fixes. It was about building a reliable relationship:

“For me, that was, the big selling point was having a deep bench, having somebody that we could rely on, and having an escalation point outside of our own organization.”

–Sean Sullivan, IT Director

The Foundation for a Sustainable Future

The most significant immediate success was the substantial reduction of technical debt. By cutting their losses on the failed project and remediating their systems , Plative helped put AAPL in a sustainable position. This cleanup also saved AAPL from the costly and stressful consequence of hiring additional team members just to keep their existing systems running.

Qualitatively, the partnership had a profound effect on the IT Director’s comfort level and the internal team’s growth:

“The big one, the really big one on the top of my list is reducing our technical debt. I walked into this role, there was a lot of it… we have the organization in a place that is much more sustainable, where I am much happier sitting down in front of our audit and risk committee and saying, this is what our present state looks like.” 

– Sean Sullivan, IT Director