Hi Paul!
I want to share my story with SuiteCRM, and I wish people could do the same, would be interesting to hear your stories!
From Teaching CRM with MS Access to Building a “Dream System” with SuiteCRM 8
Over 20 years ago, I was working as an IT teacher at a commercial college. I was asked to teach CRM systems, which meant I first had to figure out exactly what they were: why they are needed, what they are used for, and so on. Beyond the theory, I had to consider how to bring them into a classroom setting. My goal was to teach the concept of customer relationship management as a whole, rather than just how to use a specific software.
I built my very first teaching versions of a CRM using Microsoft Access.
Eventually, I discovered SugarCRM and began using it in my classes. However, my career took a turn toward “real-world sales.” At that point I really realized that sales are the thing I most love at work.
Fast forward to 2014: I was building a new company and needed a CRM. That’s when I started using SuiteCRM. I used it for managing customer data and invoicing. At the time, the system wasn’t the perfect fit for the specific needs of a construction company, so I eventually had to switch to another platform—even though I genuinely liked SuiteCRM.
Over the years, I kept a casual eye on how the SuiteCRM project was evolving.
A year ago, I started investigating the expansion and customization possibilities of the commercial CRM system used at my current workplace. I kept hitting the same wall: no matter what I asked, I was redirected to a consultant who wanted to sell me a service package. Documentation was nowhere to be found. The web version of the system was severely lacking, and while it could have been improved through paid consulting, I didn’t want a consultant—I wanted documentation so I could configure it myself.
Slowly, I began to wonder if we should switch systems entirely. I looked into the current state of SuiteCRM and ended up installing SuiteCRM 8.
Even though the UI had changed and still feels somewhat monolithic—displaying only one thing at a time—it felt familiar and logical to me. I started building a SuiteCRM instance alongside our production system to test integration.
In the early stages, I ran a continuous batch job to migrate all customer data one-way from the commercial system to SuiteCRM. I began analyzing our business processes as a whole, aiming to build a “dream CRM.” This required a deep dive into our own workflows and led me to heavily customize the system.
Today, we have an extremely functional CRM in use. There is still room for improvement, but many daily tasks are now significantly easier than before. I am also gaining insights and data from the system that I simply couldn’t access before.
When I read Paul’s post from about a year ago (Why are people leaving SuiteCRM?), I saw so many valid points.
I have already fixed some of the shortcomings mentioned in that discussion within our own instance, and I’ve submitted them as Pull Requests to the SuiteCRM Core.
I hope to see more of this from everyone who is able to contribute to SuiteCRM in their own way. Submit Issues, comment on existing Issues, and help test Pull Requests.
I’d love to hear your stories—feel free to share your journey here! 