University of New Hampshire recently conducted an extensive search and analysis of recruiting and compliance software offerings before ultimately choosing the ARMS – Athlete Relationship Management System. Below is an outline of the process UNH undertook to ensure they were selecting the best tool available.
A product search lead by experience: Carrie Doyle, University of New Hampshire’s Senior Associate Athletic Director for Compliance led UNH’s search for a web-based Compliance and Recruitment Management system. Carrie has been involved in compliance issues for nearly 20 years with experience both working in the NCAA National Office and overseeing compliance issues as the Senior Associate Athletic Director for Compliance/Senior Woman Administrator. Additionally, she has lead efforts to automate student athlete information at UNH since 2004 through the creation of a Banner to CAi “bridge” program that has been sent to hundreds of other universities throughout the country. Carrie’s unique collection of experiences made her the ideal candidate to find the best system on the market.
Surveying the market place: One of the first steps Carrie took was to embark on a nation-wide survey of universities to understand what her peers were doing to automate compliance. UNH contacted over 120 colleges and universities asking for information about what tools each school was using and their level of satisfaction. In addition to her nation-wide survey, Carrie spoke with the coaches inside her own department to understand how they were using software and what features they thought were important for their roles as recruiters.
Narrowing down the Field: After her initial research phase Carrie was able to narrow down the contenders to the only three options that have Active Compliance Controls (rules built into the program that would warn coaches before they completed any action that could potentially result in a violation). Representatives from these three solution providers were invited to campus to give a presentation.
Getting Input from Compliance AND Coaches: The companies that were asked to present their offerings on campus presented both to compliance officers and to all coaches in the athletic department. Carrie knew that coach acceptance would be critical because if the coaches felt the software that was selected was too hard to use, not powerful enough, or “forced upon them from above,” they wouldn’t use it and the entire automation process and compliance effort would have been an ineffective waste.
ARMS stands out from the crowd: All of the finalists offered the features that met Carrie’s minimum requirements for UNH and offered their packages at competitive prices. But ARMS stood apart from all other competitors for three primary reasons.
1) Powerful, flexible Features – ARMS has a number of features that separate it from the competition, but one of the best parts of the software, it is not a “canned” package that forces Athletic Departments to fit into predefined software preferences; rather, the software is implemented to fit the unique needs of each specific team and compliance office. The robust features and flexibility makes ARMS the easiest tool on the market for getting information in and out of the system, and easily viewing the data in a way that makes sense. Tasks that can take hours on competitor tools take minutes in ARMS.
2) Coach Endorsements – Some coaches in the UNH Athletic Department were already using ARMS as a recruiting and camp management tool after switching from a less powerful recruiting tool. The endorsements of these coaches, strong referrals from other schools, and the positive feedback the rest of the UNH coaches gave after the ARMS presentation all gave Carrie confidence that the coaches in her department would be very happy with ARMS.
3) A True Partnership Approach – Throughout the sales process it became evident that ARMS was a different type of provider than the rest of the competition. The ARMS team showed a willingness and desire to listen to the coaches and administration and make changes as opposed to dictating to them about how to use software. The partnership approach taken by ARMS when communicating with UNH drove home what could be expected from ARMS in the future.
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