Thanks for Attending!

We would like to thank all of you who attended our SharePoint Seminar yesterday and helped make the event a success! If you missed the event, we presented the latest collaboration tools and technologies of Microsoft® SharePoint® 2010 that can help your business:

Collaborate and innovate. Organizational knowledge gets where it needs to go. With advanced social computing tools, you can build more flexibility into your business. Ideas cross-pollinate, sparking innovation and new perspectives.

Gain business insights and act. People across your organization get the ability to monitor and analyze up-to-date information. They can make informed decisions and speed up response times, both of which can give your business a competitive edge.

Reduce risk. You control security levels and usage policies. Information is findable and useable by the right people, and content has policy and process attached.

Free your people to collaborate easily, and put them in contact with the knowledge they need. If you have any questions about what SharePoint can do for your business, contact us today.

Business Intelligence Tips

Understand Your Organization first

Truly understanding your company and how it works is perhaps one of the most important Business Intelligence tips anyone can offer. This includes understanding the business itself, the processes involved, the data, and how that data is used by the people with in the organization. You will need to understand what your organization specializes in or with.

If business deals with sales, what does the organization sale?
How can you make that product better?

You need to familiarize yourself with the products and how they are made. Understanding your business’s product is the first step toward being able to sell that product. When you are informed about what your organization does, and what it takes to do the job right, you will be able to make better decisions regarding your company.

The other area that a manager or an executive should be sure to pay close attention to is the information about their target consumers. Who are you trying to sell your product or service to? You need to know who is most likely to be interested in your organization, what kinds of products and services interest that group, and the order of importance in which that group views quality, cost, and design.

Still a company cannot over look the importance of understanding its organization internally as well. Take note of what generates the most desirable results whether they are financial, productive, or return customers. Who are key players in the company? What is the organization’s ultimate goal? All of these aspects are important and crucial to the survival and livelihood of any and all organizations.

Involve Key Users

The key users are users that are key or vital to the data analysis and reporting processes, as well as the decisions that will be made in light of the information provided by the Business Intelligence software. Key users can be executives in the line of business, or even analysis specialists who work closely with the applications. Involve these users early on in the venture, provide them with the information they need to form their own opinions about the situation. Get sponsorship from the organization’s senior executives and find out how they feel about Business Intelligence and what expectations they have. Starting off with a clear idea of how they executives expect a new Business Intelligence system to benefit your organization give you a good idea of what tools and developments you need to focus on most.

Understanding how everyone involved feels about the Business Intelligence system and its tools is imperative to its success. Everyone will need to come together to make asset decisions involving what tools will be needed and what areas of the organization will benefit most from the applications available. Each idea and thought should be considered important, and every decision properly documented. It is during this process that the heads of an organization will set aside Key Performance Indicators and discuss Business Performance Management strategies.

Make Components Work Together

You need to be sure that the components of your business intelligence system work well together. Some components may have been thrown together as a result of procurement. Also ensure that the new Business Intelligence system assimilates with the existing back-end systems. It is very important that no applications are conflicting or operating at a less then standard level.

Be mindful that different employee grounds will want differing interfaces or dashboards and spreadsheets. Each type of employee may need the information presented in a way that is easiest for them to follow, this may not always be the same, so be sure to learn early on what each associate prefers. Also take that into account when evaluating products.

Prequel Solutions, LLC is a full-service information technology and management consulting company. If you would like to see how Prequel can help your company, contact us here.

(information from Exforsys Inc)

What are the benefits of having a Business Intelligence System?

What are the benefits of having a Business Intelligence System?

Some of the benefits of having a Business Intelligence system include the ability to access data in a common format from multiple sources, a way to measure goals and analyze cross-departmental data, to see who your organizations good and bad customers are, and to track customer behavior in order to improve services and relationships.

This software can also help to track specific product sales and distributors to improve supply and production, as well as track external trends to improve processes, track market trends to improve an organization’s competitiveness, and fine tune pricing and marketing policies.

Some issues still need consideration, though increased efficiency and extraction of clear information from complex data can improve and reduce the need for data analyst and improve revenues, determine the exact return on an organizations investment in Business Intelligence systems can be difficult. It can take a while to see the real world benefits of Business Intelligence software and executives can easily label the venture as a failure when results are not immediate.

Though the demand for Business Intelligence tools is growing at a rapid pace there is still criticism from the marketplace that the programs are to complex and difficult to use. User resistance will be one of the biggest hurdles for suppliers of Business Intelligence providers to overcome. Another potential problem is the Business Intelligence tools themselves. The applications may be more user friendly than they used to be, the core use of Business Intelligence is still reporting data rather than process management, though that is slowly starting to change. Business Intelligence users must careful not to mistake business intelligence with business analytics.

Are there different types of Business intelligence?

There are two different types of Business Intelligence, each serves the main purpose of providing large quantities of information in an easy to view and digest manner. The first type pf Business Intelligence we will explore is Traditional Business Intelligence.

Traditional Business Intelligence is the use of cubes and graphs to normally track a business’s performance in the past and upcoming terms. It is also used to predict the organizations future performance based on past data. One does this by using reporting and analyzing tools. The one draw back to Traditional Business Intelligence is that the present or real-time data is not usually being observed. Taking action using present data calls for Operational Business Intelligence.

Operational Business Intelligence is used to offer immediate results by providing the needed information to its users. This can be done to implement any needed changes to effectively run the organization in a small amount of time. Operational Business Intelligence deals with operational data, such as the data used by inventory managers or even truck drivers.

It allows these professionals to have up to the minute information to use to make immediate decisions. Where Traditional Business Intelligence deals with past data, Operational Business Intelligence uses real time data, allowing users to access, review, and make needed adjustments.

Is Business Intelligence worth the challenge?

In the end, simplifying and gathering data from multiple sources in an organization enables users to rely upon the informational memory to help with the decision-making process and problem solving strategies to better understand the customers and market behavior.

It may take patience and cooperation from both ends, meaning the data analysts and the IT specialists, to accomplish the desired outcome and benefit from Business Intelligence tools. This can be achieved through comprehensive training on how to use and interpret the information provided by the applications.

When the Business Intelligence tool users are comfortable and well trained, they should find that the product will in fact meet or even surpass its market value. It is easy to view both sides of this issue, yet when one truly takes into account the need for a better way to process, collect, and analyze complicated and large amounts of information the price of such a tool should not be an issue. This is said simply because when using the cost / benefit process it is simple to see that no matter the scenario the benefit usually out weighs the cost.

Prequel Solutions, LLC is a full-service information technology and management consulting company. If you would like to see how Prequel can help your company, contact us here.

(information from Exforsys Inc)

Business Intelligence Key Performance Indicators

What are Key Performance Indicators?

Key Performance Indicators are also known as Key Success Indicators, they help an organization to better define and measure their progress toward professional goals. Once an organization has clearly identified its need, analyzed its mission, and defined its goals it will need a way to measure the progress toward those goals. Key Performance indicators are those measurements.

These indicators are measurements agreed upon before hand that reflect the critical success factors of a business or organization. They differ depending on the business, the business may decide to appoint the percentage of its income that comes from returning customers as a Key Performance Indicator, or a college may use the rate of students that meet graduations requirements as a Key Performance Indicator.

No matter what Key Performance Indicators are selected they must reflect the business or organization goals. This means they must be “key” or directly related to its success and they must be measurable. It is also a proficient way to ensure that a company is taking the correct steps toward realizing their goals for the organization’s success.

When these indicators are set into place and used to measure what if any impact the decisions made are having on that specific area, the organization can then fine tune the plan of action and take the needed steps that will increase the success, profitability, or productivity of that area.

How does Key Performance Indicators work?

To assess the present state of an organization Key Performance Indicators are laid down, they help to analyze business success and plan a proper course of action. This system gives organizations the necessary information presented in a clear way. To define a complete and effective set of performance indicators companies need to be sure that the measures are simple, workable, and firmly in place. The greatest challenge comes with selecting the appropriate indicators to meet goals and building activities needed to meet the asset levels of performance.

Choosing the right measures is very important to the effectiveness of a plan. Perhaps more importantly the system needs to be easily interpreted by all who will be expected to meet or surpass the indicators that will be put into place. This is so the current rate or position can be determined and then a plan to increase productivity or profit can be put into action.

An organization needs to seriously review their professional needs before attempting to create a plan of action or setting Key Performance Indicators. They will also need to decide upon a way to monitor and review the data relevant to their asset goals.

Prequel Solutions, LLC is a full-service information technology and management consulting company. If you would like to see how Prequel can help your company, contact us here.

(information from Exforsys Inc)

How does Business Intelligence aid the Corporate Decision-making process?

Business Intelligence systems offer applications and programs that enable an organization to monitor the current and past activity of their company. In addition to this however they can also use the Business Intelligence tools to make predictions about the company’s future based on a possible decision. Though some may consider this a complete waste of time and finances, any thriving company knows the importance of making an informed decision.

Business Intelligence systems contain a variety of tools that allow managers or executives to view real-time information about the inner workings of their organization. This empowers them by ensuring that they are completely informed on all aspects of the organization and how each one is performing. Getting familiar with how productive each area of your organization is allows you to funnel all of that knowledge into the choices you have when it comes time to make crucial decisions. Basing decisions on the statistics and predictions made by the Business Intelligence applications guarantees that the organization is not blindly stumbling forward into the unknown.

In addition to helping users make decisions concerning the future of an organization, the Business Intelligence tools also provide managers with the information needed to make decisions with little time for preparation. This is most helpful with some outside event affects the organization without notice. It allows executives to make the speedy and adequate decisions needed to protect or improve the state of their company.

Prequel Solutions, LLC is a full-service information technology and management consulting company. If you would like to see how Prequel can help your company, contact us here.

(information from Exforsys Inc)

Business Intelligence Briefings from Prequel Solutions

Now is the time to learn how Business Intelligence can help you and your company. Stop delaying, Prequel Solutions can work with you to build a limited-size pilot project to demonstrate the benefits of Business Intelligence and solving a pain point.

Most companies utilize information on a daily basis to make critical decisions. This information normally comes from traditional reports. To survive today’s economy, that “old way of doing business” will not be enough. Prepare for the inevitable recovery, by investing in Business Intelligence.

We also must empower the decision-maker whether they are from Finance, HR, Operations or other Departments to access the right information at the right time to make Critical Decisions.

We at Prequel Solutions specialize in latest Business Intelligence technology and techniques that will empower your decision-makers to maximize their efficiency utilizing the most relevant information to drive the correct decisions regarding your bottom line. Organizations, small to large, are utilizing Business Intelligence’s amazing capabilities to run their businesses smarter and more efficiently than ever before.

Sign Up for a Briefing Today!

Please click the “Sign Up Now!” button to identify the team members that will be attending the executive briefing.

We will contact attendees to finalize an accommodating schedule.

If you prefer to have your briefing at your office, please call us at 724-820-1575 and we can schedule a time.

We thank you in advance for providing us this opportunity to share our latest knowledge on Business Intelligence.

Achieve Business Goals faster with Professional Services from Prequel Solutions

Prequel Solutions, LLC is a full-service Information Technology and Management Consulting company with more than twenty-five years of experience and expertise. Our success has been in both the private and public sectors. When you have a challenge or an opportunity, we provide the technical services – leveraging Information Technology to save resources, gaining a competitive advantage with Business Intelligence data, generating new revenue through powerful, web-based systems, or solving a formidable IT problem.

WHAT WE DO

Prequel’s experience in business, government and technology has led to an unparalleled service model focused on providing management consulting, custom application/business system development, Business Intelligence, interactive web design and development, and supplemental IT staffing services. No project is too large, too small, or too demanding for the Prequel team. We love challenges. Our Fortune 1000 clients are from many industries including:

• Manufacturing and Distribution
• Healthcare and Pharmaceuticals
• Services and Retail
• Technology
• Telecommunications
• Financial Services
• Government

What Business Results or IT Challenges may we help you to resolve?
Call us today…724-820-1575…and we will focus Our Expertise on Your Results.

Benefits of Cloud Computing

Cloud computing and applications represent a style of computing in which scalable resources are provided as a service over the Internet. Users need not have knowledge of, expertise in, or control over the technology infrastructure in the “cloud” that supports them.

With a cloud computing solution, the customer does not have a big upfront capital expenditure for hardware, software licenses and implementation services. Nor do customers have the ongoing expense of administering the hardware and infrastructure software (e.g. patches). Instead, most cloud computing solutions offer a subscription or pay-as-you-go model, so customers pay a smaller recurring operating expense based only what they used which includes the hardware, software, and administration.

The other big virtue of cloud computing was its ability to provide flexibility in scaling beyond what standard dedicated infrastructure could provide. Because cloud services are virtualized and delivered over the Internet, users can more easily increase or decrease capacity depending on their current needs.

Prequel Solutions, LLC is a full-service information technology and management consulting company. If you would like to see how Prequel can help your company, contact us here.

Twitter

There is an important behavior shift happening around the World Wide Web, content is shifting from “push” to “pull” An internet consumer finds information that they are interested in and you subscribe to its “feed” and your favorite updates come to you automatically.

Twitter is becoming the leader for this effortless service and a way for readers to subscribe to content they want to read. With Twitter you can broadcast messages of up to 140 characters to everyone who opts to follow your “tweets.”

With this shift in business model, content must be more interesting and always relevant to its target. With Twitter and its simplicity, messages can be sent from or received via cell phone, computer, Facebook, Twitter Web site, and virtually anywhere else, people tend to tweet even minor thoughts and activities.

Have you Tweeted today?

Prequel Solutions, LLC is a full-service information technology and management consulting company. If you would like to see how Prequel can help your company, contact us here.