Five Tips for Successful Veeva Implementation

USDM is a Premiere Services Partner of Veeva. We specialize in GxP implementation and validation, and provide superior organizational change and project management based on decades of life sciences best practices.

USDM has delivered hundreds of Veeva projects, and more than 200 life sciences companies trust our Cloud Assurance^TM managed subscription service to maintain their continuous cloud compliance. Because of our experience, we want to share our top five tips for a successful Veeva implementation.

1. Maximize Out-of-the-Box Functionality

Veeva products are created from vast experience with business requirements in the life sciences industry. Since out-of-the-box configuration already represents best practices, we recommend staying as close as possible to out-of-the-box functionality unless there are compelling business drivers to do otherwise. Limiting configuration makes for faster, cheaper, and easier implementation, and less burdensome upgrade cycles.

2. Simplify Processes and Workflows

Regulatory compliance introduces complexity to your business. We know because we have walked in those shoes for over 20 years. Cross-organizational stakeholders bring a variety of operational viewpoints to the table, which can make a process overly complex. Maintaining a holistic view of the project will help you keep business processes and workflows as simple as possible and contribute to your project’s success.

3. Commit Sufficient Time  

Be proactive and commit sufficient time to work through business process exercises and map out how best to implement and use Veeva. You will save time on the back end by assessing and aligning your processes on the front end. Understanding your business process produces a higher quality outcome, and you can assure internal stakeholders that everyone understands the collective business processes without neglecting the end users of the system.

4. Assign a Program Manager to Coordinate all Resources

A customer typically provides an internal point person for the Veeva project while the vendor assigns a technical project manager. USDM has a proven project management methodology to insert a subject matter expert with years of hands-on experience to coordinate the activity of all parties and keep the project on track. This approach has resulted in project on-time and on-budget delivery at a rate 35% higher than the industry average.

5. Create a Single, Integrated Project Plan

Having a program manager that coordinates all activities across all resources enables a single, integrated project plan that represents all involved parties and all components, such as configuration, training and communications, validation, and data migration. By tying all of these activities together and planning for all project dependencies, you create greater visibility and alignment, and have greater success in meeting your project objectives on time and on budget.

Bonus Tip: Develop a Comprehensive Training and Communications Plan

Many IT departments believe that “if we build it, they will use it,” but that’s not always the case. Having a comprehensive plan for Organizational Change Management (OCM) will ensure you recoup your return on investment sooner rather than later. Start by communicating “what’s in it for me” to the end users. Explain the change and business deadlines and milestones with all stakeholders. Create OCM materials such as emails, articles, literature, and events. Develop role-based training and deliver it to end users. Record the training sessions and use them when onboarding new people. These steps will ensure that the system is being used effectively and in a compliant and business appropriate way.

Do not overlook the long-term costs of implementing a short-sighted, lower price solution. Your technology is only as good as your end users’ understanding of the technology. USDM goes above and beyond to ensure your people know how to use the system and your business processes are aligned to maximize your Veeva technology investment.

On-Demand Webinar

Watch our on-demand webinar, Minimize Risk and Maintain Compliance on Veeva with USDM Cloud Assurance, to learn more about USDM’s solutions for Veeva.