This is for the operations lead at a consultancy, accounting firm, managed service provider or agency that needs a referral area kept apart from its client CRM.
The job of a referral record: proof, permission and the next move
A referral record has three jobs, and a field that serves none of them should not exist.
- Proof. SourceX decides credit from dated records, and an earlier link click alone does not settle it. Under the unsigned sample of the Channel Partner Agreement, an introduction record names six things: which company, at which web domain, introduced by which partner, for which opportunity, by what method and when, with timestamps. Your CRM should be able to produce exactly that, and little more.
- Permission. The company's CEO decides whether a licensing conversation starts, and a record that cannot show when the CEO agreed, and to what, invites an introduction the decision maker never wanted. SourceX's own screening page lists introductions the decision maker did not know about among the cases that usually do not fit.
- The next move. Referral work stalls between people. Every open record needs one action, one owner and one date.
Company, permission, next step: the minimal referral CRM schema
Fourteen fields across three linked objects. The permission and next-step objects hang off the company record, one company to many of each.
| Object | Field | What goes in it | Filled by |
|---|---|---|---|
| Company | Reference code | A short code such as R-021, used in every report instead of the company's name | Operations lead |
| Company | Legal entity and domain | The entity whose CEO decides, with its web domain | Relationship owner |
| Company | Group | The parent, if any; a parent and its subsidiaries share one reward cap | Relationship owner |
| Company | Decider | The CEO's name and the date you confirmed it; once an acquisition closes, the acquirer's CEO | Relationship owner |
| Company | Relationship owner | The one person at your firm allowed to raise the topic with this company | Operations lead |
| Permission | Scope | One value: raise the topic, send material, introduce, pass a named fact, or share status with a named person | Relationship owner |
| Permission | Given by | Name and role; the introduce and pass-a-fact scopes count only when the CEO gives them | Relationship owner |
| Permission | Date and pointer | The date, plus a pointer to the written message that holds it, never a copy of the conversation | Relationship owner |
| Permission | Ends | A withdrawal date, or a review date the CEO set | Relationship owner |
| Next step | Action | One value from the fixed list below | Whoever opens the step |
| Next step | Owner | One named person, never a team | Operations lead |
| Next step | Due date | A date, not a quarter | Owner |
| Next step | Needs | The permission scope the action requires, filled automatically from the action | System |
| Next step | Closed with | The date, a pointer to the evidence and an outcome code | Owner |
A permission is only as strong as the message it points to, so keep those messages in a referral mailbox your firm controls. For a fuller treatment of what an approval record must hold and nothing more, see recording an executive's approval without keeping extra data.
The save rule that blocks unpermitted steps
Each action on the fixed list names the permission it needs and the evidence that closes it.
| Action | Needs | Closed by | Usual owner |
|---|---|---|---|
| A1. Ask the relationship owner whether the topic may be raised | Nothing from the company | The owner's reply | Operations lead |
| A2. Raise the topic with the CEO, once | Raise the topic, from the relationship owner | The dated message | Relationship owner |
| A3. Screen fit using the CEO's own answers | Send material, from the CEO | Four answers marked pass, unknown or fail | Relationship owner |
| A4. Ask whether anyone at the company has dealt with SourceX or been offered an introduction | Send material, from the CEO | The CEO's answer and its date | Relationship owner |
| A5. Send the partner link and SourceX's published pages | Send material, from the CEO | The sent message | Relationship owner |
| A6. Submit the written introduction | Introduce, from the CEO in writing; A4 closed; your signed Channel Partner Agreement on file | The portal submission reference and timestamp | Partner of record |
| A7. Pass one named fact to SourceX | Pass a named fact, from the CEO, naming that fact | The message reference | Partner of record |
| A8. Read the dashboard and copy stage and reward status | Nothing further; it is your own referral | The labels as displayed, with the date read | Operations lead |
| A9. Close the record | Nothing | An ending code | Operations lead |
The rule. A step can be saved, open or done, only if the company holds a permission whose scope matches the step's Needs field, given by the right person, dated on or before the step and not ended. When a permission ends, every open step that relied on it is cancelled automatically.
Many CRMs can enforce it in software. In Salesforce, for example, a validation rule evaluates field values with a formula when someone saves a record, and if the data fails, the user sees the rule's error message and nothing is saved (our paraphrase of Salesforce's help page). In another system, look for its required-field or conditional-check settings and test them on one record. Write the error message as an instruction: "Ask the CEO for an introduce permission before submitting."
SalesforceA8 needs no new permission: the agreement gives a partner information on its own referral, in generic stages or reference codes. Mapping those labels to fields is covered in reconciling SourceX statuses with a fund's CRM, and what each stage means in the companion stage model for SourceX referrals.
Nine fields the CRM refuses, and where each belongs instead
Delete these fields if your CRM template ships with them, and reject imports that try to create them.
| Refused field | Why it is refused | Where it belongs instead |
|---|---|---|
| Files, exports or samples of the company's records | The partner agreement bars collecting or keeping dataset copies through the program without separate written authorization, and no step needs them | With the company |
| Logins, credentials or access notes | The agreement gives a partner no authority to reach extraction systems | Nowhere in referral work |
| Volumes or system details learned during paid client work | The record holds what the CEO said and agreed to pass on, not what your engineers can see | The engagement file, under your client contract |
| Personal details of employees or customers | No action on the list uses them | Nowhere |
| Expected reward, deal value or pipeline amount | The terms treat portal and calculator figures as projections, not promises | Your finance records, once money arrives |
| Win probability or forecast category | A probability turns an introduction into a forecast nobody at SourceX made | Nowhere |
| Acquisition Partner names, prices or SourceX's margin | SourceX does not have to reveal them to partners | Nowhere |
| The CEO's reasons for declining, word for word | An ending code is enough to stop anyone asking again | The ending code |
| Notes on another advisor's claim to the company | Overlapping claims are SourceX's to settle in duplicate review | The A4 answer, as the CEO gave it |
The volumes row is the one service firms break most often: an MSP engineer can count a client's tickets in a minute, but that count belongs to the client relationship, not to a referral.
What the record can say about fit, and whose words it uses
A3 stores four answers, each from the CEO or someone the CEO names, never read off a system:
- Size at peak. Did full-time headcount ever reach 50 or more? Contractors are left out, and a staffing firm counts only its own staff.
- History. How many years of records has the company created in its own work?
- Ownership. Are those records the company's own, or mostly material held for clients, which is usually not a fit?
- Location and language. Companies in the U.S., Canada and the EU qualify, as do companies in the UK, Australia, New Zealand, India, Singapore, South Africa, Latin America, the UAE and Saudi Arabia when at least 70% of the data is in English.
Mark each pass, unknown or fail with the date; an unknown is a question, not a failure. Whether the records match a current SourceX program, whether customer contracts limit reuse and what a license would cover are settled only in SourceX's review, and the CEO decides whether to go ahead at all.
Owners, due dates and when a step escalates
- Answers come from people, not systems. The engineer who administers a client's systems never owns A3 or A7 unless also the relationship owner, and even then the answers come from the CEO.
- Ten working days. A step that passes its due date by ten working days goes to the operations lead, who reassigns it or closes the record.
- Submit on the day of the yes. Once the CEO agrees in writing and A4 is closed, A6 follows that day; the duplicate-claims checklist explains why.
- Day 90. If the dashboard shows no verified application 90 days after the introduction, close the record as lapsed. The window does not stretch because conversations continue.
- Credit disputes go to SourceX. If you hold earlier dated evidence, send it to SourceX as section 7 of the terms describes; never ask the company to take sides.
Two weeks in a consultancy's CRM (Illustrative)
Illustrative. A generic firm and generic companies, with invented facts and no outcomes implied.
| Ref | Company record | Permissions | What happened to the next steps |
|---|---|---|---|
| R-021 | Distributor, 240 full-time staff at peak by the CEO's account; no parent; CEO confirmed day 2 | Raise the topic, day 1; send material, day 3; introduce, in writing, day 6 | A3 closed day 4 with four passes; A4 closed day 6, no earlier contact known; A6 closed day 6 with a portal reference; A8 due day 20 |
| R-022 | Engineering firm bought by a regional group last year; decider: the group's CEO | Raise the topic, day 2; nothing from the group's CEO | A colleague tried to open A6 because the firm's CFO was keen; the save was refused for lack of an introduce permission; A2 opened instead, due day 9 |
| R-023 | Design agency, owner-run | Raise the topic, day 1; send material, day 3, ended day 8 | The CEO wrote on day 8 that the company would pass; the open A3 and A5 were cancelled, A9 closed as declined, and no new step can be saved |
R-022 shows the rule at work: once the acquisition closed, the group's CEO decides for the firm, and the CRM will not let anyone treat the CFO's enthusiasm as that decision.
Closing a record and what survives it
Every closed record keeps its reference, entity, group, ending code and date; free-text notes, drafts and permission details beyond the pointer are deleted.
| Ending | What else stays |
|---|---|
| E1. CEO declined or withdrew | A do-not-raise flag that every colleague's search will hit |
| E2. Screened out on a named fit fact | The failed fact and the change that would reopen it |
| E3. Not credited after duplicate review | The date of SourceX's decision |
| E4. Lapsed with no verified application | The introduction date and the day-90 date |
| E5. No deal | The date of SourceX's notice, or of the CEO's own news shared with permission |
| E6. Reward paid | Introduction evidence, status history, money received and cap used, for any repeat license by the company or its group |
How long anything stays is your firm's retention policy to set; a useful floor is the agreement's return-or-delete clause, which excepts records needed for reward accounting and dispute evidence. Declined companies also belong on a suppression list, as in the network inventory that excludes people who declined, and the repeat partner activity worksheet is a lighter starting point for a partner with several introductions.
Where a three-object design falls short
- Automations can bypass the rule. Salesforce's considerations page notes that updates made by workflow rules, scheduled process actions or the Mass Transfer tool do not run validation rules (our paraphrase). Run a monthly check for steps without a covering permission.
- Pointers can break. If the mailbox behind a pointer is deleted, the permission becomes an assertion.
- Your firm sees only your firm. The CRM cannot show another partner's claim or an earlier contact between SourceX and the company. A4 asks the CEO, and SourceX decides overlapping cases.
- No outcome data yet. Whether the design shortens the time from a CEO's yes to a verified application is unmeasured; log both dates for two quarters to find out. No figures are published.
More operations guides sit in the guides library, and the stages each record passes through are described on how it works.
Next step
Refer a company. No cap on rewards. Default reward on a company's first qualifying transaction: the greater of $50,000 plus 5% and 15% of Actual Supplier Payout, with no cap; further qualifying transactions first agreed within 12 months of the first Closing pay 15%. Eligibility and payment conditions apply, including the USD 100,000 Minimum Transaction, and a signed Schedule A or addendum can differ. A lead, meeting or signature alone does not trigger payment.
Once the three objects and the save rule are live in your CRM, register your firm as a partner so A6 has an agreement behind it, keep who qualifies beside the A3 screen and save the version of the program terms your schema was built against.