We all love Microsoft Dynamics CRM, but we admit it is not perfect. That’s why it is very helpful that Microsoft maintains a list of known issues in CRM On Premise and CRM Online in the release ReadMe file. Reading this will save you time when deploying CRM, as you will be aware of current […]
Tip #64: Add PBL Rules to Quick Create Forms
In Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2013, the PBL (Portable Business Logic) rules are an easy way to add business logic to forms without having to write code. But what if you want to add a PBL rule to a Quick Create form? At first glance, when you set up a quick create form, it appears that […]
Tip #61: Change Marketing List View Layouts
When you create a marketing list in Microsoft Dynamics CRM, the list created will contain the typical fields required for a marketing list, such as name, address, city, state, and postal code. But what if you want to change the fields that appear in the view? What if you use a custom lookup field for […]
Tip #60: Remove Decimals From Charts

In Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2011 or 2013, when you have a chart summarizing a decimal or currency field, by default your chart values will contain decimals. What if you want to round to whole numbers? To do this, you will need to export the chart XML. For a system chart, navigate to your solution to […]
Tip #58: Reset the Command Bar
If you upgrade to Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2013 and you find that one of the Command Bar buttons don’t work, reset the ribbon for the entity. Create a solution that just includes the entity with the button that isn’t working correctly and export from CRM. Extract the customization zip file. Open the customization.xml file in the editor […]
Tip #54: Create reminders for emails that you aren’t ready to act on yet
Sometimes I receive an email that requires some kind of action, but I don’t have time to do that action now. I want to schedule time to work on it when I’m not as busy as I am at the moment. I track the email in Microsoft Dynamics CRM, then I drag the email from […]
Tip #52: Open a second Outlook window

So you are using Microsoft Dynamics CRM for Outlook and you want to view CRM and your Outlook email or calendar simultaneously? Easy. From Outlook, right click on one of the folders and select “open in new window.” This will open a second Outlook window. This makes it possible to have Outlook open to mail […]
Tip #48: Update process flow for existing records
So you decided to follow tip 46 and use process flows instead of the sales stage field. How do you update your existing records? If you open a closed opportunity, for example, the record (and the process flow stage) will be non editable. First, understand how the process and stage are stored on the record. if […]
Tip #46: Don’t combine multiple sales process tracking methods
In Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2013, the Business Process Flow is a great way to keep track of where you are in your sales (or any other type of) process. There are also other methods, left over from previous versions of CRM, such as the Close Probability field and Sales Stage field. It can be tempting […]
Tip #44: Reflecting current user in CRM SSRS reports
It is a best practice to reflect the user running the report in an SSRS report and when the report was run in the report footer. This gives you a snapshot of who ran the report, and if there are any questions about the validity of the data reflected in the report, can be very helpful […]