Accounting Software Shreveport

Business Process Challenges: Human Related or Software Related?

Posted by Adrian Montgomery on Thu, May 16, 2013 @ 01:12 PM
Business Process Efficiency

We are covering the eight steps to conducting a Business Process Assessment in this blog series.  Learn how to unleash profits by finding ways to work more efficiently.  In previous blogs we covered; how to compare current ERP systems to new goals, how to create a business process project management committee, who to nominate as the business process project management committee leader, how to develop a comprehensive business process anlysis document to measure and assess the existing business processes, how to define your milestone and project projections and how to prepare a project time line.

In our sixth part of this series we will cover how to determine if your business process challenges are human related or software related.  We will take into consideration technology, people and company organizational goals.  This part of the business process assessment targets results and goals of organizational tasks.  

First, we consider the current company technology business processes within each company department by reviewing the following 5 bullets:

  1. Business Process Automation Design
  2. Business Process Execution
  3. Business Process Integration
  4. Business Process Documentation
  5. Business Process Measurement
Second, we consider human related business processes:
  1. Strategy and Leadership
  2. Business Process Performance Training
  3. Business Process and Management Measurement
Each criteria above is measured on a 5 point scale, 5 being the best.  A score of 5 means the department has reached maximum efficiency, therefore the process cannot be improved, where a score of 2 would mean; business process improvement is needed.
This part of the business process assessment reveals business process performance problems, process management problems, performance improvement targets, measures against improvement efforts and assists to identify training needs.

Tags: MAS 90, Accounting System Consultant, Accounting Systems, MAS 90 and MAS 200, MAS 200, business process consultant, ERP Consultant, Business Process Assessment, Business Process Improvement, ERP software consultant, ERP System

Business Process Assessment: Compare Current ERP System & New Goals

Posted by Adrian Montgomery on Wed, Feb 06, 2013 @ 03:53 PM
Business Process Assessment

In this blog series we are covering 8 steps to conducting a Business Process Assessment.   If you haven’t looked into performing a business process assessment for your business, please read our series to learn how to unleash profits by finding ways to work more efficiently.  In our previous blogs we covered;  how to create a business process project management committee, who to nominate as the business process project management committee leader, how to develop a comprehensive business process analysis document to measure and assess the existing business processes, how to define your milestone and project projections and how to prepare a project time line.  

In our fifth part of this series we will cover in more detail why it is important to compare your current IT and accounting functionality against your newly identified requirements or recommendations based on the business process assessment.   We will also offer suggestions on how to create a matrix to compare each business process need against the capable functionality of your internal personnel and accounting, human resource, customer-relationship-management systems.

In our previous blog about setting milestones and project projections we gave the example of Ruth (the committee leader for the Accounts Payable department) who has identified several business processes that took up too much time and led to inefficiencies.  She is looking into possible accounts payable automation software as a solution to integrate with their ERP system.  The priorities of the AP department are to eliminate manual invoice processing, improve invoice approval process and automatically generate an electronic notification to recipient when payment is processed.   

Now let’s review how Ruth will use these next steps to 1) compare your current IT and accounting functionality against your newly identified requirements and 2) how to create a matrix to compare each business process need against the capable functionality of your internal personnel and accounting, human resource, customer-relationship-management systems.

Compare current IT and accounting functionality against newly identified requirements

Ruth has mapped out a business process for the check writing and approval in the Accounts Payable (AP) department.   She has identified a few areas that take up time and expense to the AP department’s resources.   Now she is comparing the existing accounting software and how the new areas for improvement will or will not work with their existing ERP solution.  She has reported back to the committee that there are several areas that are manual within their existing solution.  She has researched AP automation software and found a few add-ons or enhancements that integrate with their existing accounting and ERP solution that will help automate their manual and inefficient processes.     Ruth will explore the 2-3 ERP enhancements and report back to the committee her findings and recommendations.  She found one solution that seems to fit the best and is scheduling out demonstrations with the ERP consultant she works with to service their entire ERP system. 

Develop a Matrix

Developing a matrix on an Excel spreadsheet is the most basic way to help the business process assessment committee and the ERP consultant easily identify what is the description of current business process in the AP department, for example.  It will also list all of the issues with current process and also list the recommendations for improvement of the existing processes.  Tracking these business processes is an essential step since there could be a long list to track across departments.  This will allow the business process assessment committee leaders to prioritize what processes should be improved on first.  Now you can sort by priority and set-up an action plan to improve the overall efficiency and profits of the business.  Your business process assessment committee and ERP consultants will be essential in starting the improvement plan moving forward.

Within one business process, like in the example of the AP check writing and the check approval process, there may be a combination of multiple processes that are common given different scenarios.  It is important to outline the various processes that are linked with one activity like check writing, for instance.  This comparison of current functionality with the requirements to change must take place across the entire organization.  This will involve investigating the resources and capabilities of personnel, the current ERP system including accounting, human resource management and your customer relationship management (CRM) systems.   With a little teamwork and involvement across departments your business is now on its way driving toward continuous improvement and maximizing profits. 

If there are inefficiencies eating away at your business profits and tying up costs it is best to detect them and eliminate them before more damage is done!  We have performed hundreds of business process assessments please contact us for more information.

Tags: MAS 90, Workflow, BPM, MAS 200, Process Automation, Busienss Process Automation, business process consultant, ERP Consultant, Sage 100 ERP, Business Process Assessment, Business Process Improvement

Business Process Assessment: Define Milestone and Project Projections

Posted by Adrian Montgomery on Wed, Jan 30, 2013 @ 04:51 PM
Business Process AssessmentIn our fourth installment of our eight part Business Process Assessment series we will be covering how to go about defining milestone and project projections and why is it important.   After reading our previous blogs, you now understand the importance of why your company should institute a business process assessment (BPA) in the first place.   You also understand the importance of selecting a Business Process Project Management Committee and have hopefully started developing a series of questions to establish how business processes are currently running in each department.  Once you have the answers back from each department, you will have a snapshot of what improvements need to be made and how to prioritize them in order of importance.  Now let’s review how to get started on defining milestone and project projections.

The objective of a Business Process Assessment is to challenge your business to strive for continuous performance and profitability.   Once the list of issues in each department is prioritized, you can now get to work on setting milestones for the objectives laid out in the plan.   This will help break things down into stages and monitor the progress.  If resources need to be allocated to accomplish a department’s objective then you will have a way to plan out what amount of time or money needs to be budgeted and spent to accomplish the goals.  Here’s a closer look at the next two steps in moving forward: 

Defining Business Process Assessment Milestones

Business Process Assessment Milestones help break up each department objectives with communication of issues and coordination of activities that need to be accomplished along with a tracking tool to manage toward success of each objective or project.  An Excel spreadsheet would be an example of a basic tool that is often used to track this progress.

  • Milestone = activities + required resources (funds or activities) + deadline + progress to date + status of activities
  • EXAMPLE:   Objective - Accounts Payable Department wants to improve check writing procedures to vendors – Owner - Ruth (AP department BPA committee leader)
  • Milestone Activity #1 – Ruth will investigate how current check writing and check approval process creates backlogs + deadline Friday, February 8, 2013 + progress to date = Ruth is interviewing AP clerks, managers and vendors and will report findings and recommendations to the committee.  Ruth will explore options on how to improve process based on findings.
  • Milestone Activity #2 – Ruth will report back to BPA committee findings and recommendations + deadline Wednesday, February 13, 2013 + progress to date = pending completion of Activity #1

Business Process Assessment Project Projections

Business Process Assessment Project Projections help companies achieve their goals and lower operating costs by helping to manage and prioritize multiple projects by department.  Project projections also help to ensure the proper resources of time (by role) and anticipated budget are allocated appropriately.  

  • Project Projection = Projected project cost + individual task total cost + expended costs to date + balance to complete + pending costs + anticipated hurdles or delays to completion
  • EXAMPLE:  Objective - Accounts Payable Department wants to improve check writing procedures to vendors.  Owner - Ruth (our AP department BPA committee leader) has completed her milestone activities for project and has reported her findings and recommendations to the committee. Ruth has prioritized the next steps on how to improve the AP department check writing and approval process. Based on the committee approval and prioritization, it is determined that the check writing and approval process should be improved. 
  • Project Projection #1 - Ruth estimates that it will take her 2-3 days to explore recommendations for improvement to the current process + this will take her away from her normal duties which will require overtime pay or an AP clerk temp will be hired while Sally the AP clerk backs Ruth up + $1,200 is allocated to hire a temp or pay for Ruth’s overtime + pending costs will be tracked + Ruth may need to purchase an ERP system add-on or total system change to automate process =  1 week is the goal for Project Projection #1  completion
  • Project Projection #2 – Ruth determines that the check writing and approval process is wasting the department’s time totaling 10 hours per week with their current manual process and Ruth is exploring ERP software check writing and approval enhancement options that will integrate with their Sage 100 ERP software system. + Ruth will take 1 day to explore options and review estimated costs + pending costs TBD ($2,000 to $4,000 is estimate for ERP enhancement add-on) = ERP enhancement for Sage 100 ERP software recommendation will be presented to committee in 1 week

Project Projections help organize the costs and success of each individual activity for each department in your organization.

You may have heard the saying, “It is wise to begin with the end in mind.”   If you don’t have a clear and defined destination from a leadership perspective and within the leaders of each department, it is very hard to have the whole team rowing with you in the same direction.  Your milestones and project projections will serve as a guide to measure where priorities fall within each department.  Working to develop a Business Process Assessment and culture within your organization will help your business improve how it works together to facilitate change and continue to evolve as a high performing and profitable business.  Working at all levels of your business through department committee leaders will enable leadership and accountability for results throughout your organization.  

 Contact us to learn more about our free 30 minute ERP software needs assessment.

Tags: MAS 90, Sage Needs Assessment, MAS 90 Needs Assessment, MAS 200 Needs Assessment, MAS 200, Sage 100 ERP. Sage 100 ERP Accounting System, Business Process Assessment

Business Process Analysis: Develop Department Specific Questions

Posted by Adrian Montgomery on Mon, Jan 14, 2013 @ 02:12 PM
Business Valuation India

This the third part of our eight part series describing why every business should incorporate a Business Process Assessment.  In previous blogs we discussed the importance of creating a Business Process Project Management Committee and electing a leader to represent each department within a company.  The third step is to develop a comprehensive business process analysis document with a series of questions.  

The business process analysis is a series of questions each department in the company is required to answer.  This gives the business process management committee a blueprint of the business process opportunities to improve between departments in a company.  The answers to these questions serve to reveal bottlenecks within a company and improve on efficiency.

Examples of questions a business process assessment would ask the Accounts Payable (AP) department include:

  1. What is your check writing procedure?
  2. How are AP cash requirements determined?
  3. Are there requirements for prepayments to vendors?
The business process analysis is a comprehensive examination of each department within a company.  The business project management committee develops a list of questions the business project managment department leader is assigned to answer with the help of employees within the each department.  This gives the employees the opportunity to contribute to the discovery process and the ultimate solution associated with each problem. Each answer should associate a weight of importance, i.e. low priority = 1, medium priority = 2, high priority = 3 and essential = 4.  This will give you an immediate snapshot of the most important issues to focus on first.
If it is discovered there is a need to replace the business process automation software or improve upon the current systems via enhancements it is our experience the employees will likely accept that change easier and take ownership in making the software change successful.

Tags: Business process management, business process analysis, Business Process Assessment, Sage 100 ERP consultant, MAS 90 consultant, ERP software consultant

What is a Business Process Project Management Committee?

Posted by Adrian Montgomery on Thu, Jan 03, 2013 @ 04:45 PM
Project Management Lifecycle

The Business Process Project Management Committee is a group within an organization assigned to maintain the health of interdepartmental business processes and dependencies. Usually an organization will form a Business Process Project Management committee to measure the efficiencies of human and software related business processes.

Each department within an organization elects a Business Process Project Management Committee representative.  Each department representative is asked a series of questions to identify human and software related bottlenecks and inefficiencies.  The department employee surveys the department to identify opportunities to improve and reports the information back to the Business Process Project Management Committee.

The Business Process management Committee then determines how to solve the inefficiencies through employee training or implementation of business process automation software.  If the Business Process management Committee decides the inefficiencies are Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) software related the committee will define the business process management objectives and write a request for proposal from ERP software vendors.  Once the ERP software selection is final the Business Process Management committee overseas the new ERP software related implementation to insure it meets the objectives of resolving the business process inefficiencies.

The Business Process management Committee focuses on the following objectives during ERP software implementation related projects

  • Consistent program and project execution
  • Meeting commitments
  • Staying within the parameters to measure progress across the entire organization
  • Employee project inclusiveness
  • Employee culture change

If you are interested in learning more about Business Process Management or Business process assessments please contact us to learn more!

Tags: Business process management, Business Process Assessment, Sage 100 ERP consultant, MAS 90 consultant, ERP software consultant

Business process assessment and needs assessment how are they different?

Posted by Adrian Montgomery on Thu, Dec 06, 2012 @ 05:21 PM
Cost Benefit Analysis Concept with Target Pin Marker

What is the difference between a business process assessement and a needs assessment?  

These two terms are interchangeable and can go hand in hand.  We at Accounting Systems Consulting Group, LLC define a needs assessment as the initial intelligence gathered when a prospective customer is interested in replacing their accounting system.  This is a non-billable engagement offered by our team to assess the requirements of your back office accounting and front office customer facing teams.  During the needs assessment we determine the potential cost/benefit to our prospective customer in consideration of replacing the existing business management system or systems.  The needs assessment is a basic assessment to determine whether or not the prospective customer will benefit from a more detailed business process assessment.

The business process assessment is a tool used to reveal process improvement opportunities. Prior to selecting a new accounting system it is important to understand the degree the new system meets the business process automation objectives of each department within a company.  This can be achieved by asking a series of questions applicable to the individual departments and assigning a weight to each question answered.  The business process assessment can reveal "bottlenecks" within a particular department that are hindering the growth and efficiency of the business.

Step One: The technology project managment committee decides which questions apply to each department within the company.  
 
Step Two: The goal here is to get the people within each department engaged.  Each question is answered and given a weight of importance.
 
Step Three:  Analyze the data
 
Step Four:  Match the business process automation objectives of each department and match it to the functionality of each accounting system under consideration by creating a matrix.

Contact us to learn more about our complimentary needs assessment evaluation.

 

Tags: Accounting System, Sage 100 ERP, Business Process Assessment

3 Ways an ERP Software Needs Assessment Helps Remove Bottlenecks

Posted by Adrian Montgomery on Thu, Nov 29, 2012 @ 07:24 PM
Business Process Assessment

Is your company growing?

Are your ERP software users complaining about lack of functionality they require to efficiently accomplish customer service objectives?

If you answered yes to the questions above, here are some reasons your company will benefit from an ERP software needs assessment.

  1. An ERP software needs assessment is a set of questions asked by an ERP software consultant to identify key issues in your companies business processes and business process automation.
  2. An ERP software needs assessment can reveal human related issues versus software related issues within your company's business processes
  3. According to source:  TGI http://www.tgiltd.com/erp-software-selection/erp-software-needs-analysis.html, "An ERP software needs assessment can be the foundation for preparing a complete ROI calculation and analysis.  The ROI analysis is the key to starting the software selection search off on the right track, because it builds the foundation for assessing and selecting the software for your organization's future."
An ERP software needs assessment is a living document that defines ERP software users need based requirements and measures how well their business process needs are currently being met.  This document will express the business case findings from the user's perspective.
An ERP software needs assessment will usually reveal whether or not your organization needs a more in depth business process assessment.  In our next blog, we will explain in further detail the differences between an ERP software needs assessment and a business process assessment.

Contact us to learn more about our free 30 minute ERP software needs assessment.

 

Tags: Accounting System, Needs Assessment, Sage 100 ERP, Business Process Assessment

9 Steps to Conducting a Business Process Assessment

Posted by Adrian Montgomery on Mon, Nov 19, 2012 @ 01:09 PM
Business process assessment

The business process assessment is a tool used to reveal business process improvement opportunities.  Many times companies have business process challenges that go undetected like termites invading the frame of a home.  The termites proliferate and cause more and more damage as time goes on and you may not be aware until it is too late!  It isn't until you get inside the walls to find that real irreparable damage has occurred.  Just like it is important to have your home checked every so often for termite invasion it is important to have your business checked as well. 

We recommend the following steps to perform a business process assessment:

  1. Create a business process project management committee by selecting one member from each department of your company so every part of your company is represented.
  2. Nominate a business process project management committee leader to manage the progress.
  3. Develop a comprehensive business process analysis document to measure and assess the existing business processes.  This can be achieved by asking a series of questions applicable to the individual departments and assigning a weight to each question answered.  The business process assessment can reveal "bottlenecks" within a particular department that are hindering the growth and efficiency of the business.
  4. Define your milestone and project projections.  Prepare a project time line.
  5. Compare your current IT, accounting functionality against your needs and business process assessments.  Create a matrix comparing each business process need against the capable functionality of your internal personnel and accounting, human resource, customer-relationship-management systems.
  6. Prepare a simple checklist to visualize whether your business process challenges are human related or software related.
  7. If the business process challenges are human related than it may just be a matter of training. If the challenges are software related and can not be addressed with your current systems in place you may realize return-on-investment by replacing your dysfunctional software systems.
  8. Prepare a simple checklist request for proposal and submit it to the paired down list of vendors. It is important to keep this simple, some vendors will not fill out lengthy requests for proposals especially if there is an independent software consultant involved.
  9. Request product demonstrations.  Invite the RFP respondents who checked off the requirements meeting your needs to demonstrate their accounting system, human resource system, customer relationship management system etc.
If there are termites eating away at your business detect them and eliminate them before more damage is done!  We have performed hundreds of business process assessments please contact us for more information.

 

 

Tags: Accounting System, Sage 100 ERP, Business Process Assessment