Dynamics Community Forum Thread Details

Contact as a party vs contact as a point of communication - what is the intent of the designers of Dynamics?

Suppose my company has a relationship with Alice (not a real person). Alice currently works for AcmeCorp and has an email address of alice@fake.acmecorp.com. Her mobile phone number is 123456789. She has worked closely with us for a long time and we have a good working relationship with her.

We create a contact in Dynamics with these details. Alice has opted out of receiving marketing texts.

A month later, Alice leaves ACME corp and starts a job at EmcaCorp, which is also an organisation with which we do business. She gets a new email address - alice@fake.emcacorp.com. But she keeps her existing phone number, because her company has a "BYOD allowed" policy.

If we treat the contact as "a person at an organisation" then this is a new contact, but then it becomes harder to see that we have that long history of communication with Alice as a person.

Alternatively, If we treat the contact as "a person" then this is the same contact, but they have a new email address, potentially a new job role, are associated with a new organisation, and so on. We can now see that long historical relationship, but it seems odd to say it's the same contact given how much about the contact has changed.

In the view of the designers of Dynamics, how should we handle this in terms of the contact entity? As the same contact, or as a new contact?

Or, as another way of asking the same question - what is the intended natural key for a contact in Dynamics?

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