Background: After watching the FRP Community segment on FY22 Partner Center and other tool changes and bringing AI to help evaluate OSU/Partner of Record claims faster, I wanted to suggest an alternative approach. My assumption is that it would be possible to have passive approvals for what I also assume are the majority of claims by changing the process. AI could still be used for what remains.
To truly streamline, having a hosted "request website" at Microsoft would be best as the OSU claims team would significantly reduce the need to manually evaluate claim forms. This saves whatever global quantity of FRPs there are from maintaining similar, but separate processes. The Microsoft program can pre-approve each FRP SOW for standard items at the beginning of the annual program period and implement required changes, like the public sector requirements on the fly or with minimal intervention. The team handling the claims approval would then have more time to process those with custom SOWs, that may include special offers or value-added services.
The customer and partner experience would improve significantly. Some customers have adversity to a document-based form that is routed via email versus a webform. There would be better reporting for all parties involved in the process. Lost claims forms situations should go to zero. Target dates could be captured from the customer, when submitting the request. The partners would have better visibility to the status of claims and reduce manual input as well. The "chain of custody" problem with some claims would be eliminated. With some common sense guidelines determined programmatically, there could be a reduction of erroneous disassociations, which will reduce disputes. When disputes arise, more specific data in a single repository would exist, thus streamlining the ability to respond appropriately and more timely. There is potential that this process could also support short-term or specific programs like we saw with Edge or Teams Rooms. The limitations about the number of claims submitted could either be identified upon submission or be eliminated.
The workflow I envision is as follows (with my knowledge of the process):
To truly streamline, having a hosted "request website" at Microsoft would be best as the OSU claims team would significantly reduce the need to manually evaluate claim forms. This saves whatever global quantity of FRPs there are from maintaining similar, but separate processes. The Microsoft program can pre-approve each FRP SOW for standard items at the beginning of the annual program period and implement required changes, like the public sector requirements on the fly or with minimal intervention. The team handling the claims approval would then have more time to process those with custom SOWs, that may include special offers or value-added services.
The customer and partner experience would improve significantly. Some customers have adversity to a document-based form that is routed via email versus a webform. There would be better reporting for all parties involved in the process. Lost claims forms situations should go to zero. Target dates could be captured from the customer, when submitting the request. The partners would have better visibility to the status of claims and reduce manual input as well. The "chain of custody" problem with some claims would be eliminated. With some common sense guidelines determined programmatically, there could be a reduction of erroneous disassociations, which will reduce disputes. When disputes arise, more specific data in a single repository would exist, thus streamlining the ability to respond appropriately and more timely. There is potential that this process could also support short-term or specific programs like we saw with Edge or Teams Rooms. The limitations about the number of claims submitted could either be identified upon submission or be eliminated.
The workflow I envision is as follows (with my knowledge of the process):
- The FRP provides the customer one of 2 ways to engage with the claims/partner of record process:
- The customer could receive a custom URL for a specific FRP
- The FRP would have a code to provide to the customer, that identifies the specific FRP
- For custom SOWs, the FRP could pre-enter much of the data and upload the SOW that is outside of the preapproved items for that FRP. Then a custom URL for that document could be provided to the customer and they would login and approve.
- When the customer logs in, they complete the necessary fields. There may need to be an interim step as a Tenant Administrator (or even the FRP) may need to complete some fields and then save it as a draft or send it onto the designated approver at the organization.
- Want: The page could have both logos so it is visible this is a Microsoft program, delivered by a Partner
- Want: The customer could define the appropriate contact for surveys, indicating a single POC for all services or individual for each
- The completed webform routes a notification as it moves to the FRP-confirmation stage, to the FRP for confirmation and once they confirm, it goes for approval to the OSU claims team
- The FRP should have the right to send it back to the customer for corrections
- With a preapproved SOW list, any services at this stage that are defined as "standard" for the FRP, would have a passive approval, if no existing claims exist.
- Want: Process improvement to reduce erroneous partner dissociations.
- When a customer logs in for approval in step 2, they would see what is claimed by which FRPs and if they are below a certain percentage with no growth over a certain time period (TBD), they would be eligible to change.
- If they don't meet that criteria, there can be an exception form the FRP can walk through with the customer to determine if disassociation would be appropriate.
- Want: Process improvement to reduce erroneous partner dissociations.
- It is likely a significant portion of these would be auto-approved at this point, with confirmation emails sent to the Customer and Partner. Exceptions, customer SOWs, and disputes would become the majority of the work for the approval team as they can shift the volume out of their queue.
- In the backend, this process could be linked to the Partner Center portal interface and simply loaded automatically at some interval, improving the speed of seeing the claims from the current process.
Status details
2021-10-21 - Program Team -Thank you for sharing your thoughtful suggestion on how to improve upon our processes. Partner/customer association processes are used across multiple programs, and is comprised of a tool/system component, as well as back-end processes validating POEs. Microsoft is currently on a multi-year journey to create a modern platform, which will be used for an increasing number of partner incentives. As we start to transition existing/legacy incentive over to the new platform, an opportunity is presented to look at various solutions both in terms of the association mechanisms (DPOR, CPOR, PAL etc.), and also when POEs are required, and how they are executed on. We are not at a stage today where we can share concrete details (e.g. solutions, timelines) externally, but your feedback will help us consider potential options in improving the experience for you and our joint customers.
2021-10-07 - Assignment Team - Assigning to Partner Experience Team to triage.