How to Have a Healthy Relationship With Your Microsoft Partner

When is the last time you, as a Microsoft customer, spent time thinking about your relationship with your Microsoft partner? Individually, we spend time investing in our relationships with our personal partners; children, friends, and family. As businesses, we also need to expend energy in tending relationships with our business partners. I'll venture to guess that as a business with a Microsoft Dynamics ERP system, one of your most important relationships is the one you have with your Microsoft partner. Whether your bond is just beginning, having a little bit a trouble, or ongoing, there is always something that can be done to maintain the health of that relationship.

When we first choose a Microsoft Dynamics ERP system, we also begin the process of picking a Microsoft Partner. For some, this is a chicken and egg problem. I say pick the partner first. The partner you choose will help you make weighty decisions for your company, will be integral to your success as you implement, and will continue to support and guide you as your business uses the new ERP system. This is where some of those soft questions come up: How much can you trust them? What will they be like in a crisis? How reliable will they be? Will they be there in the long term?

Spend some time with potential partners to determine whether you are a good match. Talk about how your businesses run, what your philosophies are, what working together might look like, and what might go wrong. Understand your own business enough to know how much you might need to depend on a partner, and whether they'll have strengths to compliment your weaknesses.

Don't just settle for whoever you've found first. Just because a partner may be ...