Full Sail Partners Blog | Full Sail Partners (15)

Full Sail Partners is pleased to announce that the Blackbox Connector for Concur and Deltek Vision is now available in the Concur App Center. The Blackbox Connector for Concur and Deltek Vision provides Concur clients who use Deltek Vision with a solution to more effectively manage project expenses with near real-time exchange of data between these two industry leaders, allowing bi-directional synchronization of projects, work breakdown structure, employees and completed expense reports.

“We selected Concur because they are the best in class for expense reporting both for end-user simplicity, as well as the breadth of customization and options for the accounting staff. We are excited to have our Blackbox Connector available in the Concur App Center. This will allow our clients to marry the elegant user interface of Concur and the power of Vision to reduce their time spent on submitting expense reports, and provide more control and visibility on spend for the company,” said Tanya Drake, Director of Add-on Technology for Full Sail Partners.

Concur is the world’s leading provider of integrated travel and expense management services and solutions. Offering apps with streamlined integration with Concur Travel, Expense and Invoice products, the Concur App Center delivers innovative functionality in key categories such as finance, regulatory compliance, enterprise identity, traveler productivity, travel management and much more. For more information, visit https://www.concur.com/app-center.

Additionally, having completed training by Concur on Concur methodologies, Full Sail Partners is now a Customer Success Partner with Concur. As a Customer Success Partner, Full Sail Partners is now better equipped with insider information and deep product knowledge so you can spend less time setting up Concur and more time enjoying faster deployments and greater returns on your Concur investment.

For more information, please contact Full Sail Partners’ Marketing and Communications Department. 

How does your company measure up to the competition? Are you performing above the industry standards or below? Are you achieving the objectives necessary to continue to grow and operate successfully? In order to answer these questions, management must have a way to track performance. Evaluating the progress of individuals, projects, and specific departments is important, but management also needs an in depth look at the company as a whole.

The two most popular methods for measuring performance are Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) and Benchmarks. Both KPIs and Benchmarking are used to motivate employees by giving them measurable targets to meet. By meeting these targets, the employees help to increase the overall performance of the company. So, if they are both used to measure performance, what’s the distinction?

Key Performance Indicators

Key Performance Indicators are measures of how well a company, individual, business unit, or project is performing compared to specific strategic objectives or goals set by the company. KPIs that are well constructed provide direction leading to a clear understanding and awareness of current performance. KPIs often differ from company to company or department to department within a company based on the goals of the specific company or particular department.

A company’s desire to measure the indicators often dictates the KPIs put into practice. When developing a KPI, how that KPI relates to a specific business objective needs to be considered. Here are a few examples of KPIs that you may use for your business:

• Staff Retention
• New Customer Acquisition
• Timeliness of Projects
• Financial Growth

Planning is key when dealing with KPIs for measurement. It is important that they are significant, understandable and current. Using customized KPIs will provide great insight into your business.

Benchmark Indicators

Benchmarking compares other organizations in your industry to your own organization. Benchmarks are often measured by studying the results of other company operations that have best practices put in place to achieve exceptional results. The goal of benchmarking is to improve your processes to strengthen company performance, enhance customer satisfaction and increase revenue.

Performance benchmarking and strategic benchmarking are commonly used by firms. Performance benchmarking generally compares products and services with target companies in your industry allowing your firm to measure your economic position. Whereas strategic benchmarking involves observing and evaluating how other companies compete (which may include those outside of industry).

There is a significant amount of benchmarking data already gathered and available for companies to allow them to measure themselves against industry peers. The Deltek AE Clarity report, for example, is done annually. Sometimes there is a fee associated with acquiring benchmarking data, but it is easily recouped by the savings of resources and time in not having to do your own research.

Benefit from Key Performance Indicators and Benchmarks

Both of these methods allow management to identify areas where the company excels as well as areas that need improvement. However, to benefit from using KPIs and Benchmarks, a company needs to be willing to set objectives, make changes and follow through. Keep in mind, it is vital for company growth and success that those objectives are set both based upon internal history as well as industry standard criterion.

Yep, you read that right. I said free resources are available for Deltek users. Using these free resources, you can become more familiar with Deltek products and keep up with the newest features and how they work. Even more, Full Sail Partners and Deltek both offer these free resources for your consumption. So, what are these useful yet complimentary tools and where do you find them?

User Groups 

User groups are a great way to network with your peers, learn tips about how they utilize their systems and perhaps better ways to accomplish specific tasks. User group meetings are led by a Deltek expert and you will enjoy an interactive environment where you learn more about a feature and get questions answered in real time. Additionally, user groups provide the opportunity to talk with other users about challenges you may be having so you can discover solutions. Look for a user group in your area and check out our upcoming list of user group events.

Webinars 

Both Full Sail Partners and Deltek offer webinars on a variety of topics presented by subject matter experts. These webinars can be attended live or viewed later on demand. You can ask questions during live webinars and walk away with the answers you are seeking. Additionally, webinars can be attended from anywhere that has internet access making them extremely convenient. Check out a list of upcoming and on demand webinars here.

YouTube 

Full Sail Partners also offers short training videos and demos for Deltek Vision users. These give you the ability to learn as your schedule allows. In our YouTube videos, we show you how to complete time saving tasks so you can quickly move from novice to power user. The videos are packed with valuable information to benefit all users. Make sure to check out and subscribe to our YouTube channel. 

Blogs 

Our weekly blogs cover hot and relevant industry topics. Each blog is written to provide helpful insights and tips with the intention of keeping users up to date on all of the latest information available. You will find links to our blogs in our monthly newsletter or you can check out our blogs on our website. 

Stay Tuned for the Latest Free Resources

While you can always visit our website daily, there are other ways to keep in the loop. We use Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter to spread the word about our new educational resources. Also, make sure to subscribe to our monthly newsletter where you can find lists of new blogs, webinars, and events.

First off, you’re thinking what does this perplexing term, professional services automation (PSA), actually mean? Well, before we jump into the need for it, let’s first look at what determines a professional services firm. At its core, a professional services firm sells knowledge and time as opposed to an actual tangible product.

As a result, tracking revenue to product sold isn’t as simple as selling a “widget” for a predetermined amount to ensure a profit. Instead, time must be tracked to a project to ensure the professional services firm is able to make a profit from the services they provide. Therefore, the purpose of a PSA is to help streamline the delivery of those professional services.

Enterprise Resource Planning Versus Professional Services Automation

All bourbons are whiskey, but not all whiskeys are bourbon. That’s right, and not all enterprise resource planning (ERP) tools are PSA tools. This is because many ERP systems aren’t designed to meet the specific requirements of professional services firms. Instead, many firms try to piece together their own systems using a variety of generic tools such as an off the shelf accounting product and a homegrown project management solution, or in other cases, using a generic ERP and trying to customize it to meet their needs.

PSA systems, on the other hand, are designed to meet the unique requirements of the professional services industry. These systems come complete with all of the tools a firm needs to manage its business. More importantly, all of these systems communicate with each other. Thus, firm leaders have a 360-degree view into their business.

Benefits of Professional Services Automation

Firstly, PSA systems support new business development by integrating the client relationship management tool with the entire system that maintains your business. This integration makes it easier to take a lead to opportunity and finally create a project.

Secondly, resource planning and strategy development are based on past project performance data. The data ensures that your bid for a project is representative of how your firm delivers its services. Consequently, your firm can rest assured that, at the end of the project, the projected profit will be close to the actual profit.

Lastly, PSAs bring all of your business components together in one system. This reduces operational complexity and shortens the amount of time spent on many of your critical business processes. Not only is the time savings a benefit, but smooth operations for back office personnel are ensured which supports improving the client experience and satisfaction.

Moving Your Firm to a Professional Services Automation Software

Implementing a PSA solution can increase your firm’s productivity and ability to deliver projects on-time which guarantees accurate project planning. However, don’t go at it alone. Make sure you pick a solution that meets the majority of your firm’s needs and choose a trusted partner to assist with the implementation. Trying to force the wrong system to work for your firm will only lead to wasted money and poor usage practices from employees. 

It is interesting to note that most document management systems are designed for the Architectural and Engineering (A&E) world where document management is quite the opposite of most other industries. Whereas typical industry documents are standardized and repeatable, with templates that rarely ever change, those required of the A&E environment are not. Here, every drawing is unique, and workflows require systems specifically designed to meet the needs of the A&E space. Here are some examples of the differences for standard businesses and project-based business.

Standard businesses

• Documents are standardized and repeatable
• Minimal revision control with unidirectional workflows
• Basic transmittals
• Simple file naming

Architectural & Engineering Firms

• Every drawing is unique
• Revision control is crucial due to edit-review-rework flows
• Transmittals can include documents, drawings, xref images, specs and more
• Complex naming schemes including: Project & Client Name, Discipline, Floor or Phase of Project, Sheet Category, Drawing # and more

Do You Have More than One Version of the Truth?

Employees can spend hours or days updating a drawing. If an obsolete version is used, then that work must be repeated, costing your firm time and money. Also, using the incorrect version of an engineering document can leave your firm vulnerable to increased corporate risk, failed audits, cost overruns that can extend into the millions of dollars, not to mention significant risks to safety, schedules, and reputation.

Furthermore, manual methods of version control are difficult and prone to error. In most companies, you can find multiple versions of files, one on the server, on a user’s hard drive, in email, and even a paper copy. Using a document management system creates a central point for document access which ensures users across the organization always can obtain the latest version. Document management systems also store previous versions and maintain the historical metadata for auditing the document history.

Are Transmittals Weighing You Down?

Gathering files, ensuring the correct version, attaching xrefs, specs, and any other necessary files are all very time consuming and tedious. Because it is a manual process, there is always a high risk for missing information. Once you include creating, sending, and tracking transmittals, this process becomes a very large, time-intensive process. 

A good A&E document management system provides automatic cover sheet creation and a built-in address book for quickly adding recipients. It also automatically tracks sending, receiving, editing, and routing so you can easily maintain the relationship between the cover sheet and all the files and data you send.

Are Your Naming Conventions Working?

Many companies try to impose naming standards, but without a way to enforce or automate these standards, all it takes is one person choosing to name a document in a way that makes sense to them, and an important file could be irretrievable. When more than one department or branch is involved, or new businesses are acquired, chaos can ensue!

An A&E focused document management system will auto-generate number sequences, include fixed width text place holders for user entered text, predefined data from drop down lists, user entered free texts, and delimiters. In addition, file names would not be the only way to search for files…using metadata either manually tagged to the document or found within it, would be a key part of your file storing and searchability. 

Where Are Your Critical Communication Documents?

Are your firms’ critical communications being housed in email boxes and scattered throughout your organization? What happens when someone is out of the office, or leaves the company? Do you or your staff spend hours trying to locate that critical communication?

A document management system allows you to save emails from Outlook to your projects, contacts and organizations, including version controls, with very few steps. It also saves just one copy of an email and eliminates duplicates to reduce storage and communication that must be sorted through and searched. These emails would then be stored centrally and permanently for audit and legal purposes, essentially preventing them from ever being deleted or lost, especially if a team member leaves the practice.

Why an A&E Document Management System?

A great document management system will provide documentation that is:

• Accurate, current, and trusted
• Easily found, even without knowing specific identifying information
• Under control, using predetermined workflows
• Easily communicated
• Fully audited for changes

If users can bypass procedures to access and change files without proper auditing, you aren’t truly managing your documents. Document management software uses database tables to store both data and files and ensure compliance.

Document management systems cut costs. The time needed to locate a document using easy searches and metadata should drop to seconds. No walking, telephoning or emailing is required - just a connected computer. Errors from using incorrect documentation virtually disappear. Only the latest, approved and published versions are used.

Time spent manually moving files and attaching to emails is eliminated with file sharing. Instead, documents are displayed to the user as soon as they are found. Audit reports can be automatically generated. Knowledge recorded in markup is stored in the system, visible to all who need to know, and your staff are more productive when they know information is reliable.

Calculating the Costs of Disorganized Documentation…Are You Scared to Know the Truth?

Do you know how much time your staff spends naming, organizing, and then trying to find documents? Are you, like many, scared to really find out?

• How much time is spent by users looking for drawings or other documentation?
• How much time your staff spends helping others find what they need?
• How much downtime is also a consequence of these delays?
• How many occasions production has been lost and/or re-working was required due to use of incorrect or outdated documentation?

Multiply these hours by burdened rates and estimate the costs of incidents caused by inaccurate data to extrapolate a typical yearly cost. It appears to be very expensive. Without a good document management system in place, these situations put a true financial strain on your firm.

Are You Ready for a Document Management System?

Using a proper document management system will not only save time, which we know equates to money, but will also prevent the unnecessary headaches of having to constantly forage through numerous files trying to find needed documents. We all know that the A&E industry is a unique and specialized industry which requires organization for project management. It doesn’t need to be so challenging to manage your documents.

In today’s world of technology, computer users are faced with the constant threat of security issues. One wrong click of the mouse and your computer can be instantly crippled. It is not only important that you are aware of the types of threats that are out there, but you should also be familiar with the steps you can take to protect yourself.

Such security threats are collectively known as malware. The term malware is short for malicious software and references a variety of forms of intrusive software. It encompasses ransomware, spyware, viruses, email spoofing and multiple other malicious programs.

What’s Lurking Behind Your Next Click? 

Here’s a look at the different types of threats and the damage they do to your computer:

• Computer Virus – A computer virus is a self-replicating program that can be spread via email or also by inserting copies of itself into other computer programs or documents. Viruses can lead to the inoperability of your computer and spread quickly to the computers of everyone you share files with or correspond with via email.
• Ransomware – Like it sounds, ransomware literally holds a computer ransom by rendering it inoperable and attempts to extort “ransom” money from the unsuspecting victim. Ransomware is typically acquired via email messages and can be spread rapidly throughout the network.
• Spyware – Spyware is an executable program that is extremely difficult to detect and has the ability of secretly gathering personal information about you or your company. Generally, it is not created to cause damage to your computer. However, it is utilized to monitor keystrokes, copy files and gather information about you. Spyware is most often installed on your computer with something you have clicked on, such as a pop-up ad, browser add-ons, or piggybacked on another software installation.
• Email Spoofing – Email spoofing refers to sending emails with a sender address that is forged to make it look like it is sent from someone or somewhere other than where it came from. The sender of the email is hoping that the recipient will believe the forged address is from a legitimate person or company and will open it. Generally, spoof emails are more of a nuisance than anything, but they can contain links which install spyware, ransomware or viruses.

Protect Yourself from Malware Attacks 

The good news is that it is relatively easy to protect yourself from all the above-mentioned security attacks. In most cases, your IT person will have already taken measures to protect the network by installing firewalls, virus protection software and deploying DNS protection. The real question at hand is what can you do to help with the security of your information?

Here some of the measures you can take to be sure that you are doing your part:

• Careful Clicking – Do not click on email attachments or links if you do not know the sender and you are not expecting the document. It is always best to open a browser and manually navigate to the website rather than click on a link which may or may not take you where you intend. Also, take a moment to run a virus scan on any attachments prior to opening them.
• Smart Surfing – Always utilize pop-up blockers within your web browser and never enter personal, financial or any other sensitive information into any web browser that you have not manually navigated to.
• Perform Routine Scans – At times, spyware threats and viruses can slip through the active protective engines due to the sheer number of new threats that are created daily. It is crucial that you update your malware protection and run system scans consistently.

Happy Clicking and Surfing 

Take these simple precautions to protect yourself from a software security breach. While all of this malware fear may seem a bit overwhelming, if you educate yourself, remain alert, and follow the measures listed above, your surfing and clicking will be worry free. Remember, keeping your data safe and secure is easily manageable.

The long-awaited 38^th annual Deltek A/E Clarity report is now available! For those of you who are unaware, each year Deltek performs a detailed Architecture & Engineering Industry study. It is the lengthiest and most thorough study in the industry. Using the A/E Clarity report results, Deltek is able to offer firms unique insights into the AEC industry.

More than 550 firms across the United States and Canada participated in this year’s study. About 25% of participants were from architecture firms, nearly 60% from engineering firms, and the final 15% represented all others. The size of participating firms ranged from small firms with 0-50 employees to large firms with 251 employees or more.

Key Findings in the 38^th Annual Deltek A/E Clarity Report 

The Deltek A/E Clarity report is full of data that allows you to compare your company’s statistics to others in the industry. Information included in the report is comprised of data collected from 2016. Here is a quick preview of some of the statistics you might find interesting:

Financial Management

• Overall, firms’ financial metrics were flat to slightly up
• Operating Profit on Net Revenue at 13%
• Utilization at 60%
• Overhead Rate is down 154%

Business Development

• Firms putting a greater focus on client relationships
• Nearly 6 in 10 firms cite finding time to nurture client relationships among top challenges
• Win Rate dropped 4.8% this year to 40.2%
• Net revenue growth forecast bumped up to 5.3% this year

Project Management

• Firms investing more in project managers
• 73% of projects are currently on or under budget, up from last year
• Firms with very mature project management tripled to 19%, up from just 6% last year
• Top 3 PM KPIs tracked – profitability (95%), average collection period (81%) and multipliers (69%)

Talent Management

• Firms are reevaluating HR technologies to streamline workflows and automate processes
• Staff growth increased to 6.9% this year
• Employee turnover is down 2.3%
• Nearly 8 in 10 firms ranked talent acquisition in top 3 most expensive HR processes

Future Outlook from the 38^th Annual Deltek A/E Clarity Report

Although this year’s report shows that firms continue to remain solid financially, they must continue to focus on project management procedures so that projects are kept on time and on budget while meeting the expectations of their clients. With business development, firms must be constantly looking ahead at where their next projects will come from, what they look like, and how they will be achieved. Additionally, firms must continue to advance their efforts in talent management to find, hire and retain the best of the best.

Benchmark Your Firm with the Deltek A/E Clarity Report 

Using the A/E Clarity Report results, you can now compare your firm’s data, not only to your firm’s previous year, but also to the data of hundreds of other firms in the same field. This report offers significant insights to help you visualize where your firm is today and assist you in developing goals and a plan for the future. For an in-depth view of everything included in the Deltek A/E Clarity report, download your copy today. 

With built-in approvals and workflows, the Purchasing module in Deltek Vision safeguards against inaccurate or inefficient purchases in a paperless environment. Whether simple or complex, a company’s entire requisition, purchasing and receiving cycle can be run by Deltek Vision Purchasing while maintaining complete integration with the Financial Accounting, Project Management, and Resource Planning Vision modules. Thanks to the built-in workflows and approval processes, all purchases are accurately tracked using the Purchasing module.

See What Deltek Vision Purchasing Can Do for You

Here are some key features of the Deltek Vision Purchasing module:

• Security - Employee access is defined by management controls limiting access to each requisition stage during the purchase cycle and allowing the company to maintain a secure purchasing environment
• Inventory Insight - Cost by location and inventory on hand can be tracked and cost automatically assigned to the projects
• Approvals - Automatic notifications from Vision sent to authorized employees when a purchase request is submitted making the approval process quick and streamlined
• Integration - Inventory information can be shared with other Deltek Vision modules, such as project control, ledger, and financial reporting, resulting in improved data accuracy of projects, accounting, planning and budgeting
• Currency Management - Vision Purchasing can also make use of the Vision Multi-Currency module allowing all purchasing activities to be conducted in multiple global currencies

Gain Control of Your Purchasing Process

Manage the complete purchasing cycle online in a paperless environment offering browser-based requisitions, purchase orders, RFQs and receiving. Highlights include:

• Quickly generated price quotes and requisitions
• Numerous purchasing-related reports
• Support for standard, blanket and service purchase orders and tracking change orders
• Purchase orders created from quotes or requisitions or those previously entered
• Automated requisitioning, including employee-created requisitions and online approvals
• A complete receiving function, including support for partial receipts and backorders

The Advantages of Using Deltek Vision Purchasing

The Purchasing module of Deltek Vision allows project-based firms to manage the purchasing cycle, from RFQs to receiving and voucher entry. This paperless purchasing environment is secure due to the management defined user access and is easily maintained. Full integration with other Vision modules such as Accounting, Project Reporting, Billing, and Project Planning provides data consistency and communication throughout all parts of Vision. Finally, accurate purchasing reports are guaranteed using Deltek Vision Purchasing.

There is no shortage of ways for professional services firms to solicit and capture client feedback. Some firms structure their initiative as a once-a-year check-in with repeat clients while others hire outside consultants to conduct third-party client satisfaction interviews. In a previous posting, we reviewed why you might want to start a feedback program. Now let’s discuss specific tools that will help with starting one.

The feedback approach we like to use at Full Sail Partners includes:

• Several “milestone events” throughout the course of complex projects
• Billing thresholds for clients using a la carte services

By identifying this schedule of feedback events in advance, our clients know what to expect of the process and can effectively participate. We manage our program with The Client Feedback Tool from Client Savvy (CFT).

Surely our Existing Data is Worth Something 

When we first started our program, we strategically knew that:

• We would need to scale the volume of feedback without a proportional increase in the program’s administration time
• In Deltek Vision, we already had a system housing key data needed for the program – contact and company names, email addresses, project records, and various other meta data
• Both Deltek Vision and Client Feedback Tool were designed with available API interfaces 

Enter the Blackbox Vision Connector for Client Feedback Tool (VC4CFT) – a pre-built integration between Deltek Vision and CFT. This solution allows us to leverage the existing information in our database, improve consistency across the two platforms and decrease the amount of time needed to manage our routine client feedback program. 

How Does it Work? 

If you’re familiar with how Vision functions, you already know that all operational activity in the system is oriented around projects. Whether you’re completing a schematic design or purchasing paperclips, your work will eventually hit a project in Vision. Managing feedback is setup the same way and all information needed for the process of requesting client feedback is gathered in a project record. While this is typically a “Regular” project, if we’re seeking general feedback from a cross-section of our client base, we just gather those contacts together in an appropriate general project in Vision, either by creating it for that purpose or using one that already exists. 

VC4CFT allows our project managers to send feedback requests in one of two ways:

1. Anytime desired directly from the Project record in Vision
2. As part of the batching function that seeks out eligible projects based on pre-determined rules

For example, during our implementation projects, we first like asking for feedback after we’re about 30% complete. The Connector’s workflows know to look for projects that have recently crossed that milestone based on financial records. Usually about once per month, we have the Connector lookup all the projects that apply under all the rules we’ve put in place. With quick input from the project managers, we’re able to assemble a list of surveys that can all go out at once, driven from a single point of administration. 

Hmm…How Interesting! 

As our clients provide feedback (and we thank you for it!), general information about the feedback history is returned to Vision through the Blackbox Connector. Whether looking at aggregate response rates or figuring out why that one person always opens our requests but doesn’t complete the survey (you know who you are), the most important objective is to enhance the client experience. The combination of Deltek Vision, the Client Feedback Tool and the Blackbox Connector allows us to further leverage our core client information, turn feedback strategies into scalable routine processes, and most importantly, improve the experiences our clients have while working with us.

As a Deltek Vision user, having the ability to access the information in your system from anywhere on any device with an internet connection can change the way you work. Good news! Deltek iAccess for Vision makes this possible. Here’s a short video to give you an introduction and a demonstration of how easy iAccess is to use.