Full Sail Partners Blog | Katie Manning

Project managers live in the field. You know what's happening on the ground. What you need is quick access to the numbers that tell you whether that project is tracking to profit—no hunting through reports, no waiting for accounting. Just clear, fast answers to the questions that actually matter.

In our latest Showcase Demo, Cindy Cates and Bryce Crosby walked through exactly how to do this in Deltek Vantagepoint. They showed how to configure your login to surface the numbers you actually need, and how to dig deeper when the situation calls for it. Let's check out a high-level summary of what they covered: 

Configure Your Home Screen with a Dashboard

The moment you log in, you should see what matters. Most project managers default to their timesheet or a generic welcome screen. Cindy's recommendation? Choose a dashboard instead.

Dashboards surface the end result of all the work flowing into Vantagepoint—you see the outcome without digging through menus. A well-configured project manager dashboard shows milestones ahead, project profitability, status against budget, backlog and unbilled revenue, AR aging, unposted labor, and recent receipts. Speed is critical when you've got other things to do.

The power here is flexibility. You configure the dashboard to your role. You can set it to show only projects where you're the PM—so you log in, get your numbers, and move on.

Use Contracts and Milestones as Your Planning Baseline

Once your dashboard is set, contracts and milestones become your planning tools.

Contracts hold the big picture. They capture what you've won, what you're chasing, and what's approved and signed. When you set up a contract in Vantagepoint, you define its status (awarded, in negotiation, approved) and attach the contract dollar amount. This amount becomes your baseline for everything that follows.

Milestones live inside each contract. They mark the gates: when phases are due, when deliverables land, when invoicing milestones trigger. If your firm operates on phase gates or milestone billing, you set these up once and use them to track progress throughout the project.

The value is straightforward: you know what you committed to deliver, when it's due, and what the contract is worth. Everything else in the system flows from that foundation.

Go Deeper with Project Hub

Dashboards give you the quick read. The Project Hub in Vantagepoint lets you go deeper when you need detail and where you can see the full financial picture for a single project:

• Project summary — contract, baseline cost, current status
• Billing and performance — how much you've invoiced, how much remains unbilled, estimated final cost vs. budget
• Labor detail — all time entered on the project, broken down by phase and task
• Expense activity — all costs charged to the project
• Commitments — purchase orders and what you've committed to spend
• Revenue recognition — where you stand if you're using revenue recognition

Reports Let You Ask Specific Questions

In Vantagepoint, you don't customize reports by writing queries or hiring someone to build from scratch. You take a provided report and modify it to fit your needs.

What can you change?

• Options — what kind of data to see
• Columns — which fields display
• Filters — show only projects where you're the PM, or only specific statuses, or only billable projects

Once you set up a report the way you want it, save it for yourself or (depending on your security role) for your whole team. Most administrators create favorite reports for each role, so they run automatically with only relevant data.

Some of the most useful reports for project managers:

• Project Statistics — earnings, costs, profitability, status—everything in one place
• Aged AR — unbilled labor by how long it's been sitting, so you know where to focus collection
• Contract Status — all your contracts and their current standing (awarded vs. negotiation)
• Project Detail — raw cost, labor, and revenue data when you need to drill down

Vantagepoint Is Configurable

Here's what matters: Vantagepoint is configurable. That means you can set it up in a way that works for your firm.

For project managers, that's huge. You're the ones entering timesheets, reviewing costs, watching milestones, and accountable for whether a project stays profitable. The system should work for you, not the other way around.

Vantagepoint lets you configure dashboards to your role, modify reports without building from scratch, set up contracts and milestones that fit your process, and control what data people see based on their security role.

One more insight from Cindy: project profitability starts with good data. If your timesheets are accurate, your expenses coded to the right projects, and your contracts set up with realistic budgets—then your dashboards and reports tell you the truth. And that's what keeps projects on track.

Keep Your Business on Course

Vantagepoint's dashboards, hub screens, and reporting tools give you the visibility you need. Configure them right, and you log in to exactly what you need.

 To hear more detail on what Cindy and Bryce covered—including questions from attendees—watch the Showcase Demo recording.

Each year, the Deltek Clarity A&E Industry Study gives architecture and engineering firms one of the clearest pictures available of where the industry stands — financially, operationally, and strategically. The 47th edition surveyed 896 firms of all sizes and types, and the throughline across every section is the same: this isn't a market that rewards guessing. It's a market that rewards intentional, data-backed decisions.

This is the fifth and final installment in our blog series walking through each section of the Study. We're closing out with the section that ties them all together: the people who actually do the work.

The headline for Human Capital Management this year is a shift in focus. Firms are moving from growth mode to sustainability mode — from "how do we hire more people" to "how do we keep, develop, and deploy the people we already have." Turnover is still elevated at 13.8%, the highest in five years, but relatively unchanged from the prior year. Hiring has stabilized. What hasn't stabilized is the pressure to build workforce systems that hold up: ones that connect learning, planning, and staffing decisions to real data instead of instinct.

The skills firms need most are the ones data-driven teams build faster

For the first time, the Study asked firms to name the skills they'll need most over the next three years. Strong project management topped the list by a wide margin at 70%, followed by AI literacy at 41%. Rounding out the top five: collaboration (34%), adaptability (34%), and change management (26%). Decision-making under uncertainty came in at 22%.

Look at that list again and a pattern shows up fast. Project management, collaboration, and sound decision-making all depend on the same thing: everyone working from the same accurate information. A team can't collaborate effectively if half of them are working from a spreadsheet and the other half from the system of record. And nobody makes a confident decision under uncertainty by guessing harder — they make it by having the right data in front of them at the right time.

This is exactly the argument we've made throughout this series, especially in our Project Management post: the tools don't replace good judgment, they support it. A well-configured Vantagepoint environment, paired with clean CRM data, means your PMs, your BD team, and your leadership are all looking at the same numbers instead of reconciling three versions of the truth. That's the foundation the most-needed skills on this list are actually built on.

Learning and development just became a metric that matters

Learning and Development hours entered the Study's list of tracked KPIs for the first time this year, and it didn't ease in quietly. It landed at 49%, immediately one of the most widely tracked metrics in HR, just behind the long-standing top three of revenue per employee (67%), voluntary turnover (63%), and employee retention (63%).

That's a meaningful signal. Firms aren't just talking about development anymore, they're measuring it. And the reason is straightforward: the skills firms say they need most, like collaboration, adaptability, and sound project management, aren't the kind of thing you learn from a slide deck. They're built through mentorship, repetition, and hands-on experience.

If your firm is starting to track L&D hours as a real metric, it's worth asking content and programs fill those hours. A recorded video counts. Someone sitting with your project managers while they work through real scenarios in Vantagepoint tends to stick a lot longer. That’s where Full Sail Partners consultants can lend a hand; reach out if you’re interested.

The technology gap that's quietly limiting workforce strategy

Technology investment in HR is growing, but it's uneven. LMS adoption grew 5.6 percentage points, yet many firms still rely on spreadsheets and manual processes to track workforce skills. That gap limits the ability to connect learning investment to talent deployment, succession planning, and long-term workforce strategy. Firms with more connected HR infrastructure are simply better positioned to act on their data and respond quickly to changing staffing needs.

We see this pattern constantly, and not just in HR — project data trapped in a spreadsheet, marketing leads that never make it into the CRM. The information exists somewhere in the firm. It's just not connected to the systems that need it.

More than four in ten firms haven't touched their HR system in over five years, and small firms in particular are still operating on aging infrastructure. That's not just an HR problem, it's a strategy problem. As the report's outlook puts it plainly: an LMS without a skills tracking practice, or a new HR platform that doesn't connect to project staffing and financial data, won't deliver its potential value. The priority should be integration — connecting people data to operational decision-making so that workforce planning and project capacity planning inform each other in real time.

That's a high bar, but it doesn't have to happen all at once. Closing those gaps one connection at a time is exactly what the Blackbox Connector is built for: bringing HR, project, and financial data together instead of leaving it scattered across systems that don't talk to each other. If your firm is trying to figure out what a more connected HR setup could look like, our HRIS integration webinar walks through it in more detail.

Workforce capacity and planning is a top challenge for a reason

When firms ranked their top challenges in managing human resources, succession and career development planning held the top spot at 49%, but workforce capacity and planning came in a close second at 40%, reflecting how hard it still is to align staffing levels with shifting project demand.

Workforce capacity is a particularly sharp challenge for engineering firms, where it ranked even higher at 44% compared to 35% for architecture firms, and it hits medium-sized firms especially hard. These firms are often complex enough to have sophisticated staffing needs, but without the dedicated HR infrastructure larger firms can lean on to manage it.

Staffing decisions live at the intersection of two things firms often keep separate: who's available and what work is coming. When those two pictures don't talk to each other, firms either overstaff and eat the overhead or understaff and burn out the people they can least afford to lose.

Vantagepoint has some resource planning capability built in, enough for many firms to get a real read on who's available and where. But as staffing gets more complex, across multiple offices, disciplines, or a growing project load, some firms need more: longer-range forecasting, what-if scenario planning, or a more granular view of capacity by role and skill. That's what Vantagepoint's planning module add-on is built for. Either way, the point isn't buying more software, it's making sure resource availability and pipeline data live in the same system instead of two. If workforce capacity keeps showing up on your firm's list of top challenges, check out a few of our mini-demos on planning.

Firms are hiring younger — but the support structure isn't keeping up

One of the clearest strategic shifts in this year's data is how firms are thinking about their talent pipeline. Targeting new graduates and younger professionals debuted as a response option and immediately landed at 47%. Career paths defined within the firm for candidates followed at 42%. Firms aren't just competing on pay anymore — they're investing earlier in the pipeline and making the path forward visible before someone even accepts an offer.

That's a smart play, especially as the availability of experienced candidates remains the top talent acquisition challenge at 80%. But hiring younger talent only works if the infrastructure to develop them is in place. And right now, the data suggests it isn't. Mentorship programs declined as a formal initiative this year, even as the skills firms say they need most are precisely the kind built through experience and guidance, not coursework.

Modern performance management practices did gain ground, growing nine percentage points to 28%, reflecting a shift from annual reviews to continuous feedback. That resonates with younger employees, but feedback isn't the same as development, and it doesn't replace the hands-on guidance that turns a new hire into someone who can run a project.

Firms are naming the right priorities. The next step is turning them into something more durable than a to-do list.

The bottom line

This year's Human Capital Management data tells a consistent story: firms are shifting their attention from hiring more people to getting more value, insight, and longevity from the people they already have. That shift only works if it's backed by real data. Skills you can't see, learning you can't measure, and capacity you can't forecast are all the same problem wearing different hats.

The firms making real progress are collaborating so that a decision about training, staffing, or succession is made with actual information instead of a best guess.

That's the theme that's run through this entire series, from technology adoption to business development to project delivery to the people doing all of it. Intentional decisions require good data. Good data requires connected systems. And connected systems are something we spend every day helping A&E firms build.

Catch up on the full series: Technology Trends | Business Development | Financial Management | Project Management 

Want to talk through what the Clarity Report data means for your firm specifically? Contact us — we'd love to dig into it with you.

Reconciling credit card activity can eat up a lot of accounting time — especially when receipts are missing, transactions are delayed, or charges need to be split across multiple projects.

In the latest installment of our Powering Project Success with Deltek Vantagepoint series, our consultant Theresa Bowe walked through credit card reconciliation tips and tricks in Vantagepoint — from initial setup through statement close — and consultant Cindy Cates answered questions from attendees at the end.

Want the highlights? Here’s an overview of everything we covered.

Setting up credit cards in Vantagepoint

Everything starts in Settings > Cash Management > Credit Cards. Corporate cards link to a master account — such as American Express or a specific bank — and there's no limit to how many credit card programs your firm can configure. Individual cards go in as secondary credit cards, each linked directly to the expense user assigned to that card. One employee can carry more than one card, too — they'll see a dropdown in the credit card pane to choose which card's charges to pull from.

Importing transactions

The Import tab is where the time savings really start. It tells Vantagepoint how to read the transaction file from your bank — so when charges come in, most of the information is already populated. Less manual entry, fewer errors, cleaner data. Each card company formats its download file differently, so compare what's available from your bank when you set this up.

Ready to reconcile? Go to Cash Management > Credit Card Reconciliation and bring in charges — weekly or monthly, whichever fits your workflow. One statement period can hold multiple imports; just make sure all charges are in before you close it out. Every transaction in the import file also carries a unique identifier, so Vantagepoint recognizes charges it's already seen — duplicates don't import.

Under Settings > Expenses, you can also turn on reminders that alert employees when charges are ready to be added to a report. No more chasing people down at close.

Expense reports: web and mobile

Once charges are imported, employees can start building their expense reports right away — and this is where the workflow really comes together.

In the web interface, employees assigned to a credit card see a credit card charges pane directly on their expense report. It shows exactly how many transactions are waiting. They open the pane, select their charges, add them to the report, then fill in category, project, phase, task, and attach receipts — either from a network drive or by dragging and dropping.

Need to split a charge across two projects? After adding it to the report, an employee edits the dollar amount on that line. The remainder goes back to the credit card pane as a separate available charge — ready to be added as a second row on a different project. Clean split, no workarounds. It's also worth noting that imported charges can't be deleted from the system — an employee can remove a charge from their report, but it returns to the credit card pane. That keeps your reconciliation intact.

The mobile app handles the same workflow on the go. After logging in, employees see an alert for pending charges. They can start a new report or add to one already in progress, and the report syncs seamlessly between web and mobile. For firms with staff in the field, this is a meaningful difference at month-end.

Reconciling at month-end

When expense reports are posted, the reconciliation steps are straightforward. Under Cash Management > Credit Card Reconciliation:

• Enter the statement ending balance on the Summary tab
• Review total imported charges, what has cleared, and what remains uncleared
• On the Charges tab, click Clear All to mark all posted charges
• Return to the Summary tab — confirm the difference is zero
• Close the statement under Other Actions > Close Statement

Zero difference, closed statement. Clean, controlled, and fully documented.

The bottom line

Credit card reconciliation doesn't have to be a painful part of month-end close. Vantagepoint's built-in tools — import automation, the expense report integration, mobile access, and a straightforward reconciliation workflow — give your firm real control over company card activity without the manual effort. If you want to hear this process with more detail, check out the mini-demo recording.

We've helped firms of all sizes get more out of Vantagepoint's accounting features. If you want to dig into how this could work for your firm, reach out. 

Contact us at info@fullsailpartners.com — or follow Full Sail Partnerson LinkedIn to catch upcoming mini demos and events.

Over the past several months, our content themes have focused on something many firms don’t always make time for: stepping back.

We’ve talked about improving efficiency, sharpening focus, leveraging existing resources and data, and refining the systems and processes that support your business. Each of those conversations centered around understanding where your firm is today — what’s working, what’s underutilized, and where opportunities for improvement exist.

Breaking down each of the month’s themes, efficiency challenged firms to look at where time, energy, and effort were being lost in everyday operations. Focus encouraged teams to identify what truly deserved their attention instead of trying to improve everything at once. Leverage explored how firms could better use the systems, data, and expertise they already had in place or could bring in. Refine emphasized improving the quality of processes, reporting, and operational structure so systems could deliver clearer, more reliable results.

Taken together, those themes all share a common thread: awareness.

They encourage firms to pause long enough to understand where they are, where friction exists, and where opportunities for growth may already be sitting right in front of them.

But eventually, every organization reaches the same crossroads.

You can only evaluate and plan for so long before it’s time to actually begin.

That’s where this month’s theme, Adopt, comes in.

Adoption is where strategy turns into action. It’s the point where ideas stop living in planning documents, meeting notes, or “future initiative” conversations and start becoming part of daily operations. It’s the moment where firms begin testing new processes, using underutilized tools, modernizing workflows, and giving employees the support they need to move forward with confidence.

And while adoption often sounds exciting in theory, in reality, it can feel uncomfortable at first.

Because change — even good change — introduces uncertainty.

Why Adoption Is Often the Hardest Part

Most firms already know where some of their biggest operational challenges exist.

They know which reports require hours of manual cleanup every month. They know which workflows rely too heavily on spreadsheets, email chains, or institutional knowledge. They know where data inconsistencies create frustration or where processes have slowly become more complicated over time.

Teams typically don’t have a lack of awareness. They need the push to decide to move from “we should probably improve this someday” to “let’s start now.”

That transition can feel surprisingly difficult, especially because adoption affects people just as much as systems.

Some employees immediately embrace change. They enjoy learning new tools, experimenting with technology, and finding faster ways to work. Others prefer predictability and consistency. They may worry about making mistakes, slowing down productivity, or losing familiarity with processes they’ve relied on for years. Most teams include a mix of both perspectives.

And honestly, that’s normal.

Successful adoption is rarely about forcing people to instantly change the way they work. Instead, it’s about helping people understand why the change matters, how it benefits them, and what support exists to help them succeed along the way.

That’s one of the biggest misconceptions around implementation and operational improvement: technology alone does not create transformation.

People do.

A new system, dashboard, workflow, or automation only creates value if teams actually use it consistently and confidently. Without adoption, even the best technology investments can end up underutilized.

That’s why change management matters so much — especially in project-based firms where teams are already balancing deadlines, budgets, staffing pressures, and client expectations.

The goal is not to create disruption for the sake of disruption.

The goal is to remove friction, improve visibility, and make everyday work more manageable over time.

Adoption Rarely Happens All at Once

One of the reasons firms sometimes hesitate to move forward with change is because they assume adoption has to happen in one massive leap.

A complete overhaul.
A fully redesigned process.
An immediate shift in how everyone works.

But in reality, meaningful adoption is usually much smaller and more gradual than that.

It often begins with small, visible wins:

• One team testing a new workflow
• One department improving reporting visibility
• One repetitive task becoming automated
• One employee finding a faster way to work

Those moments matter because people tend to trust real experiences more than promises. Seeing a coworker successfully use a new process or tool often builds confidence faster than any rollout presentation ever could.

That’s why internal advocates are so important during adoption. When employees at different levels of the organization begin using new systems successfully — and sharing those successes with others — change starts feeling less intimidating and more achievable. Over time, what once felt unfamiliar simply becomes part of how the organization operates.

That’s something we discussed during our recent LinkedIn Live conversation with RTM Engineering Consultants, where we explored how their organization approached business intelligence and reporting using Power BI alongside Deltek Vantagepoint.

What stood out during the conversation wasn’t just the technology itself — it was how adoption evolved throughout the organization over time.

Some users immediately embraced the ability to access and visualize data differently. Others needed more context and exposure before they felt comfortable changing the way they interacted with reporting. But as teams became more familiar with the tools and began seeing the practical benefits firsthand, momentum started building naturally.

That progression is important because it reflects the reality of adoption inside most firms.

Very few organizations experience instant company-wide transformation overnight. More often, successful adoption happens through gradual trust-building, practical use cases, and visible wins that encourage additional engagement across teams.

Our recap blog, Turning Vantagepoint Data into Real Insight: What We Learned from RTM’s Power BI Journey, explores this process in more detail and highlights how thoughtful implementation and user adoption can completely change the way firms interact with their data.

Starting Small Is Still Progress

The same principle applies to one of the biggest conversations happening across nearly every industry right now: artificial intelligence.

For many firms, AI feels exciting and intimidating at the same time. Teams see the potential benefits, but they also worry about complexity, accuracy, learning curves, or simply not knowing where to begin.

But adoption doesn’t have to start with building custom AI tools or completely reinventing your business processes overnight.

In many cases, the easiest place to begin is with the AI functionality already being introduced into the systems your teams use every day. Tools like Dela within Deltek Vantagepoint are designed to help firms work more efficiently by surfacing insights, simplifying tasks, and making information easier to access within an existing workflow.

That’s part of what makes AI adoption feel more approachable for many organizations — it can start with small, practical improvements inside familiar systems rather than massive operational change.

Our recent LinkedIn Live, Adopting AI in Your Life and Business, explored this idea in more detail and emphasized an important takeaway: you do not need to become an expert overnight to begin benefiting from new technology.

Whether it’s experimenting with AI-assisted reporting, summarizing meeting notes, organizing action items, or simply becoming more comfortable interacting with new tools, adoption often starts with curiosity and small-scale experimentation.

For firms looking to better understand Dela and how AI capabilities are evolving within Deltek Vantagepoint, Deltek’s Dela Learning Hub is a great place to start exploring available resources and use cases.

Maybe AI helps summarize meeting notes after a long project discussion.
Maybe it assists with organizing action items.
Maybe it helps brainstorm ideas, improve communication, or simplify repetitive administrative tasks.

Those smaller use cases create familiarity and confidence without overwhelming employees with unrealistic expectations.

The same mindset applies across operational improvements in general.

Adoption does not require a dramatic overnight transformation. More often, it looks like incremental improvements that steadily reduce friction and help teams work more effectively over time.

That philosophy is also part of the thinking behind our Powering Project Success with Deltek Vantagepoint mini-demo series.

These short demonstrations are intentionally designed to help firms explore practical improvements in manageable ways. Instead of overwhelming teams with massive process overhauls, the mini-demos focus on specific workflows, tools, and real-world use cases firms can begin applying immediately.

Whether the topic involves:

• billing workflows
• CRM strategy
• reporting visibility
• project management tools
• financial processes
• contact segmentation
• dashboard improvements

…the goal is the same: make adoption feel approachable.

Sometimes all people need is a starting point.

The “Perfect Time” Usually Never Comes

One of the biggest barriers to adoption is the belief that firms need to have everything fully prepared before they begin making changes. And while preparation absolutely matters, waiting for perfect conditions often creates its own form of stagnation.

Because the truth is, many improvements become clearer only after implementation begins.

Teams learn through interaction.
Processes improve through repetition.
Confidence develops through experience.

In many ways, adoption is iterative.

You start with what you know.
You identify what works.
You adjust where needed.
You continue improving over time.

That process is often far more effective than endlessly planning for a “future version” of the organization that somehow has unlimited time, flawless data, and zero operational constraints.

The firms making the biggest strides today are not necessarily the firms with the largest budgets or the most aggressive technology strategies.

Often, they are simply the firms willing to take the first step.

They are willing to pilot a new process.
Experiment with a new reporting method.
Test a workflow improvement.
Give employees space to learn and adapt.

Most importantly, they understand that progress and perfection are not the same thing.

Adoption Is Ultimately About People

At its core, adoption is not really a technology conversation.

It’s a people conversation.

Successful adoption happens when employees feel supported instead of overwhelmed. It happens when leadership communicates clearly about why change matters and what success actually looks like. It happens when firms create environments where people feel comfortable asking questions, learning gradually, and improving over time.

That human side of implementation is easy to overlook, but it often determines whether a new process becomes fully integrated or quietly abandoned a few months later.

At Full Sail Partners, that’s a major part of how we approach consulting, implementation, and process improvement work. As your advisors, our passion is to help firms create sustainable operational improvements that people will actually use long after implementation is complete.

That means understanding how teams work, identifying where friction exists, and helping organizations introduce change in ways that feel practical and manageable instead of disruptive. Adoption is not about chasing every new trend or reacting to the loudest idea in the room. It’s about thoughtfully applying the insights, tools, and improvements that genuinely support your firm’s long-term goals.

You do not need every answer before you begin.
You do not need a perfect roadmap before taking the first step.
And you certainly do not need to change everything overnight.

You just have to be willing to start.

We recently hosted a webinar on the future of business intelligence with three of our BI specialists—Jake Lucas, Jason Kelly, and Sparsha Muppidi.

These are the people who spend their days deep in Vantagepoint data—building reports, troubleshooting gaps, and helping firms get more out of what they already have.

This session wasn’t theoretical. It was a practical look at what’s changing, what’s working, and what firms should be thinking about as reporting needs continue to evolve.

If you missed it (or just want the highlights), here’s a quick breakdown of what matters most.

Business Intelligence: Why It Matters Now

Most firms already have reporting in place. Dashboards exist. Data flows. Reports get built.

But as firms grow and questions get more specific, those tools don’t always keep up.

That’s where business intelligence comes in.

Modern BI isn’t about replacing Vantagepoint—it’s about making your data more usable in the moments it actually matters. And from what we see, that usually comes down to a few key things.

First, your data needs to be up to date. Decisions are time-sensitive, and what was true last week isn’t always helpful today.

Second, it needs to be accessible to the people who are accountable for it. If project managers, finance teams, or leadership have to go through someone else to get answers, reporting slows everything down.

Third, your data has to be presented in a way that makes sense. Not just tables and exports, but visuals that clearly show what’s happening and where attention is needed.

And finally, teams need the ability to explore that data on their own—filtering, drilling down, and answering follow-up questions without starting over or submitting a request. There’s also a piece that often gets overlooked: security. Strong BI tools respect your org structure, so the right people see the right data automatically. That’s what makes it possible to share dashboards more broadly without creating risk.

The reasoning to look into and invest in BI isn’t about more reports, it’s about being able to answer questions and interpret data faster—and with more confidence.

Informer: Structured, Fast, and Built for Self-Service

Informer is built around a simple idea: define your data once, use it everywhere.

Everything starts with a dataset—cleaned, structured, and calculated in one place, then reused across dashboards, reports, and exports.

From there, users can drill from high-level dashboards down to transaction detail, filter and explore data without breaking anything, and build dashboards quickly using drag-and-drop or AI-assisted tools.

The biggest benefit is consistency.

No duplicate reports. No conflicting numbers. No wondering which version is right.

And because everything stays within a governed environment, you avoid the usual “export to Excel and lose control” cycle.

Power BI: Flexible, Visual, and Built to Scale

Power BI shines when you need to look beyond a single system.

It can pull data from Vantagepoint, CRM platforms, HR systems, and more—bringing everything into one place.

That makes it a strong option for firms looking at cross-functional reporting.

On the front end, it offers highly visual, presentation-ready dashboards, interactive filtering and drill-through, and the ability to embed reports directly inside Vantagepoint so your team can access insights without changing how they work.

One key takeaway from the session: most firms don’t struggle with building reports—they struggle with structuring the data behind them.

That’s why starting with a clean, consistent data model makes all the difference.

Data Sources: How Everything Connects

Before any dashboard exists, your BI tool needs a reliable way to access your data.

For Vantagepoint users, that typically comes down to two options.

ODBC is a direct connection to your database. It refreshes a few times per day, provides full access to all tables, and is the most common and cost-effective setup for most firms.

DaaS, or Data as a Service, uses a cloud-based Snowflake layer. It refreshes more frequently—about every 30 minutes—and provides a more structured dataset, but comes at a higher investment and is typically better suited for larger firms.

The important thing is that this decision isn’t tied to Informer or Power BI—it applies to both. It’s really about your firm’s size, your reporting needs, and how current your data needs to be.

Where do you start?

Everything we’ve covered in this article and in the webinar is a conversation we’ve had with a client or a prospective client. This is the kind of guidance our team is providing and work they’re doing with firms every day. This path does not have a set starting or ending point – and each firm and their goals are very different. You don’t have to start from scratch, you could just need another perspective on refining what’s already there. Our BI experts are consistently cleaning up data, structuring it in a way that makes sense, and building reporting tools that people can actually use without overthinking it.

Because most teams don’t need more dashboards. They need clearer data, better visibility, and systems that support how they actually work.

If you’re starting to feel friction in your reporting—or like your data should be more useful than it is, that’s exactly where our team comes in. If you want to talk through what that a BI solution could look like for your firm, we’d love to chat.

Watch the recording of the webinar to hear more of the specifics, or reach out to learn more about how Full Sail Partners can help you with your business intelligence goals.

Here’s the thing about finance in Vantagepoint:

When the basics are solid, everything works. When they’re not… everything feels harder than it should.

And most of the time, it’s not because teams are doing anything wrong. It’s because over time, processes evolve, workarounds get layered in, and the original foundation gets a little… fuzzy.

That’s exactly why we’ve spent the past few months revisiting the core financial workflows inside Deltek Vantagepoint—not from an advanced or technical lens, but from a practical one.

Because when you get the fundamentals right—project setup, time and expense, billing—everything downstream gets easier, clearer, and a whole lot more reliable.

It Starts with Structure: Projects, Contracts, and Budgets

One of the biggest drivers of financial clarity (or chaos) is how projects are set up from the beginning.

In this recent blog, we looked at how aligning project structures with contracts and budgets can directly impact billing accuracy and profitability.

Because here’s the reality—if your project setup isn’t right, everything downstream gets harder:

• Billing becomes more manual
• Revenue recognition gets murky
• Reporting loses credibility

And suddenly your finance team is spending more time fixing issues than analyzing performance.

The Day-to-Day: Time, Expense, and Transaction Entry

Once projects are in motion, the next challenge is execution.

This is where a lot of firms feel the friction—because these processes happen constantly.

Time entry. Expense tracking. Transaction posting.

Individually, they seem simple. Together, they either create a smooth flow… or a daily headache.

When these workflows are set up well inside Vantagepoint, they don’t just support accounting—they actively reduce rework and improve confidence in your data. Check out another recent post where we go over this.

The Features You’re Probably Not Using (But Should Be)

Then there’s the other side of the equation: functionality that’s already there… just underutilized. Jenny Labranche, one of our accounting gurus, shares some of those features in her blog.

This is where things get interesting, because many firms aren’t dealing with a lack of tools—they’re dealing with untapped potential.

Small adjustments—whether it’s automation, approvals, or billing workflows—can have a big impact on:

• Efficiency
• Accuracy
• Visibility

Sometimes refining your process isn’t about adding something new. It’s about finally using what you already have.

Billing Still Doing Too Much Heavy Lifting?

And of course… billing. Always billing. Take a look at this blog from last year where Cynthia Fuoco shared background on simplifying invoice processes.

Because billing is where everything converges:

Projects → Time → Expenses → Contracts → Client expectations

If any part of that chain is off, billing is usually where it shows up first.

So What Does “Good” Actually Look Like?

All of these topics point to the same bigger question:

What should finance actually look like inside a project-based ERP when it’s working well?

Not theoretically.

Not in pieces.

But as a connected, real-world workflow.

If you want to see what this actually looks like in practice, we’re walking through it live next week.

In our upcoming Finance Basics Showcase Demo, we’ll connect the dots across project setup, time and expense, billing, and reporting—so you can see how it all works together inside Deltek Vantagepoint.

Most firms have more data than ever before — but far fewer answers than they expected.

That was the thread running through our recent LinkedIn Live with RTM Engineering Consultants.

We sat down with Ben Sermersheim and Andrew Slivka to talk about what it actually takes to turn Deltek Vantagepoint data into something people actually use — not just something that exists.

And if there was one thing that became clear quickly, it’s this: most firms don’t have a data problem. They have a clarity problem.

When “Reporting” Becomes the Work

RTM’s starting point wasn’t that unusual. Like many firms, they had access to the data they needed — it just wasn’t working as hard as it could.

Reporting meant pulling data out of Vantagepoint, rebuilding it in Excel, and recreating dashboards again and again. Over time, that process became less about insight and more about maintenance.

And as that cycle repeated, a few things started to happen. Reports didn’t always align. Teams spent more time preparing data than using it. And perhaps most importantly, trust in the numbers began to erode.

As Ben described it, different teams were often working from slightly different versions of the truth.

Why They Looked Beyond Vantagepoint

This wasn’t about replacing Vantagepoint. It was about making its data more accessible across the business.

RTM needed a way to connect data more flexibly, explore it more dynamically, and deliver it in a way that made sense for different users across the firm. Power BI opened that door — not as a standalone solution, but as a way to extend what Vantagepoint already does well.

But getting there wasn’t immediate.

The Moment Things Got… Complicated

RTM didn’t jump straight into outside support. They started where a lot of firms do — by trying to build it internally.

And to their credit, they made real progress.

They built early reports, created a working model, and proved that better reporting was possible. But as the system grew, so did the complexity. Manual refreshes started taking up more time. The underlying data structure became harder to navigate. And maintaining what they had built began to outweigh improving it.

That’s the point where many firms stall out.

Instead, RTM made a different decision: bring in the right support to move forward more effectively.

Building the Foundation First

When Full Sail Partners joined the effort, the focus wasn’t on dashboards or visuals. It was on the foundation.

Before anything else, the data itself had to be structured, validated, and made reliable.

That meant pulling Vantagepoint data into a centralized environment, organizing it into a consistent model, and ensuring that every metric tied back to a trusted source. It also meant removing the need to rebuild that structure every time a new report was created.

This kind of foundational work is what ultimately makes business intelligence scalable — and it’s the same approach we take across our broader Full Sail Partners offerings.

Once that foundation was in place, everything else became easier.

Andrew described the shift simply: instead of spending weeks preparing data, they could open Power BI, connect to a trusted dataset, and start building immediately.

Just as importantly, it created a clear division of strengths. Full Sail handled the complexity behind the scenes, while RTM focused on shaping reports around how their teams actually work.

Why Starting Small Made a Big Difference

One of the smartest moves RTM made was resisting the urge to do everything at once.

Instead of trying to connect every dataset, they focused on a few key areas first — employee data and high-level project financials. That smaller scope made it possible to validate the data quickly, fix issues early, and show progress right away.

That progress mattered.

Because trust in reporting tools isn’t built all at once — it’s earned over time. And for technical teams especially, even small inconsistencies can derail adoption.

By building incrementally, RTM gave their users something they could start using — and believing in — right away.

Turning Data Into Something People Use

Even with the right data in place, adoption doesn’t happen automatically.

RTM was intentional about how they introduced their new reporting environment. They validated every dataset against Vantagepoint before releasing it. They walked users through how metrics were calculated. They trained teams across the firm and created space for feedback.

They also identified internal champions — respected team members who could help bridge the gap between finance, leadership, and technical staff.

That combination made a difference.

Instead of pushing out reports and hoping people would use them, they built something that felt collaborative — something users could understand and trust.

What Changed

Once that foundation and trust were in place, the role of reporting shifted.

Instead of rebuilding reports or double-checking numbers, RTM’s team could focus on asking better questions. What used to take weeks now takes minutes. And the conversation moved from “Is this right?” to “What does this mean?”

Looking Ahead

RTM is now expanding their reporting environment into planning, forecasting, and CRM data — building on the same foundation they established early on.

It’s a natural next step. Once teams trust the data, they start asking for more of it — more context, more specificity, more ways to use it in their day-to-day decisions.

Advice for Firms Getting Started

A few takeaways that came through loud and clear:

Think long-term from day one
It’s much harder to retrofit a data structure later.

Don’t overbuild early
Start with what matters most and expand from there.

Design for the end user
If it’s not intuitive, it won’t get used.

Final Thought

This wasn’t just a conversation about Power BI.

It was about what it takes to move from:
data → to trusted data → to decisions.

And more often than not, that shift happens when the right tools are paired with the right foundation — and the right expertise.

This month, we’re focused on a simple idea: leverage.

Not as a buzzword, but as a practical way of thinking about how firms get more value from what they already have — and when to bring in the right tools, resources, or expertise to unlock even more.

Across our blogs, social content, and virtual sessions, we’re exploring what it really looks like to turn information into insight — and insight into better decisions.

Let’s take a closer look at how that plays out in today’s blog.

Most firms have more data than ever before — but far fewer answers than they expected.

Between project metrics, financial reports, utilization dashboards, and CRM insights, ERP systems like Deltek Vantagepoint generate an incredible amount of operational data about how a firm runs.

And yet, many leadership teams still find themselves asking the same question:

Why isn’t this data translating into clearer decisions?

The difference between a system that simply stores information and one that drives business decisions often comes down to something far less technical: expertise.

Why Data Alone Doesn’t Drive Better Decisions

In today’s business environment, data is everywhere. Firms track project performance, monitor utilization, analyze revenue forecasts, and review financial metrics across multiple systems.

All of that information is valuable — but raw data alone rarely answers the most important questions.

• Why are certain projects trending off budget?
• Why does utilization fluctuate between teams?
• Why are we so successful in one geographical area versus another?
• Why do reports sometimes tell a different story than what project leaders are experiencing day to day?

Numbers can highlight patterns, but they don’t always explain the context behind them. That context often lives with the people who understand how projects, finances, and operations function inside the firm.

Without that perspective, even the most sophisticated reporting can fall short of driving meaningful action.

ERP Systems Are Powerful — But They Still Need Expertise

Modern ERP platforms are designed to bring together many of the operational components that drive project-based businesses. They connect project data, financial performance, resource planning, and reporting into a single system that helps firms understand how their business is running.

When configured well, systems like Deltek Vantagepoint can provide real-time visibility into budgets, staffing, profitability, and project performance — helping teams make faster and more informed decisions.

But technology alone rarely solves operational challenges.

Even the best systems still depend on people to:

• structure projects correctly
• interpret reporting trends
• configure workflows that reflect real processes
• translate data into insights leadership can act on

Many firms begin exploring ways to optimize how their Deltek Vantagepoint system supports their operations once they realize that the technology itself is only one piece of the equation.

In other words, systems generate data.

People generate understanding.

The Internal Expertise Many Firms Overlook

One of the most valuable resources many firms have is also the easiest to overlook: their internal experts.

These are the people who understand the nuances of how the firm operates.

The project manager who knows how scope shifts impact budgets over time.
The finance professional who understands the complexities of revenue timing and billing.
The marketing leader who sees how pipeline and project delivery intersect.

These individuals carry years of practical knowledge about how the business runs — knowledge that doesn’t always live inside a system.

When their expertise is incorporated into how systems are structured and used, data becomes more meaningful.

Reporting reflects reality more accurately. Processes begin to align more naturally with the way teams work.

But that only happens when those experts are included in system conversations.

Too often, systems are designed around software capabilities instead of the people who rely on them every day.

And that’s where leverage gets lost.

Real Leverage Happens When Systems and Expertise Work Together

At its core, leverage isn’t about adding more tools.

It’s about getting more value from the systems, processes, and knowledge that already exist inside the firm and then filling the holes with the appropriate resource.

When the right people are connected to the right systems, data becomes far more than numbers on a screen. It becomes a foundation for better conversations, clearer reporting, and stronger decisions.

For example, some firms are combining Deltek Vantagepoint data with tools like Power BI to make reporting more accessible across their organization. We’ll be touching briefly on this approach in an upcoming LinkedIn Live conversation with RTM Engineering Consultants, where their team will share how they built dashboards that engineers and leadership teams use.

Stories like this illustrate an important point: technology becomes far more powerful when it is designed around how people work.

How Outside Experts Help Firms Unlock More Value from Their Systems

Internal expertise is essential, but sometimes the fastest way to uncover opportunities inside a system is by bringing in an outside perspective.

External consultants bring something internal teams rarely have access to: pattern recognition across many firms.

They’ve seen how different organizations structure projects, manage billing workflows, design reporting frameworks, and configure systems to support their operations.

Because of that experience, they can often identify opportunities quickly — whether that means adjusting project structures, simplifying reporting, or helping teams take advantage of capabilities already available inside their ERP.

In many cases, the biggest improvements don’t come from implementing new software.

They come from unlocking more value from the technology a firm already owns.

A structured review — such as a Navigational Analysis  — can help organizations evaluate how well their system configuration, data structure, and processes are working together.

Unlock More Value from Your System

If your firm has valuable data inside your ERP but struggles to translate it into meaningful insights, it may be time to bring a fresh perspective into the conversation.

Our team works with project-based firms every day to evaluate systems, align processes, and uncover opportunities to get more value from Deltek Vantagepoint.

Start a conversation with one of our consultants to explore where greater leverage might exist inside your system.

National Engineers Week celebrates innovation, problem-solving, and building what moves the world forward.

But here’s the part we don’t talk about enough:

Engineers aren’t just designing projects — they’re running them.

They’re balancing budgets and staffing plans. Managing schedules. Tracking billing milestones. Mitigating risk. Navigating client expectations.

And yet, ERP systems are often positioned as tools for finance teams or executives.

In reality, if you’re an engineer or project manager, Deltek Vantagepoint may be one of the most valuable tools in your toolbox.

This week, we’re shifting the spotlight. Because smarter project delivery isn’t just about technical expertise — it’s about visibility, structure, and control.

Real-Time Project Visibility (No Waiting on Finance)

No one likes surprises at month end.

Most project stress doesn’t stem from design complexity; it comes from uncertainty. Not knowing whether labor is burning faster than planned. Wondering if billing aligns with percent complete. Questioning where the budget truly stands.

When that information is siloed or buried in reports, decisions slow down.

Vantagepoint brings project financials and performance metrics into clear view. Engineers and PMs can see budgets versus actuals in real time — along with labor burn, dollars spent, bill dates, and profitability indicators — without chasing down data.

Instead of asking, “Where do we stand?” you’re operating from clarity. And when visibility comes earlier in a project’s lifecycle, adjustments can be made while they still matter.

👉 Learn more about how we support Productive Project Management.

Moving Beyond Spreadsheets

Exporting data to Excel “just to make it easier to see” has become routine in many firms.

But disconnected spreadsheets create version control issues, duplicate effort, and the risk of outdated information. They also signal that the system isn’t fully aligned with how projects are managed.

When budgeting and tracking are structured intentionally inside Vantagepoint — aligned with your work breakdown structure and the way engineers organize work — everything becomes more intuitive.

Time, expenses, consultant costs, billing, and AR live within one framework. Adjustments reflect immediately. Reporting ties directly to execution. The result isn’t just cleaner data; it’s stronger confidence in the decisions you’re making.

One consistently used system removes a surprising amount of friction.

Smarter Resource Allocation = Less Firefighting

Capacity challenges rarely stem from a lack of talent. They arise when visibility into workload and availability is incomplete.

Across the industry, familiar resource management issues show up: overallocation, last-minute staffing changes, uneven workloads, burnout. These aren’t people problems — they’re systems problems.

When resource planning is fragmented, predictability disappears. But when resource data connects directly to project financials inside an ERP, firms gain a clearer view of both demand and utilization.

That visibility allows leaders to pair the right people with the right projects intentionally — instead of reacting after problems surface. The result is steadier delivery, fewer emergencies, and a healthier team.

👉 Explore how better resource planning and visibility in Vantagepoint supports long-term profitability: Resource Planning with Precision in 2026

Monitoring Risk Before It Escalates

Engineers are trained to identify technical risk early. The same mindset applies to financial and operational performance.

Budget drift, scope creep, billing lag, and outstanding AR all affect project health. The challenge isn’t that these risks are invisible — it’s that they’re often recognized too late.

When project data is centralized and accessible, early warning signs become part of ongoing conversations. Instead of discovering issues in a month-end review, trends surface as they develop — giving teams time to respond strategically rather than reactively.

This isn’t about finance stepping in. It’s about equipping project leaders with the insight they need to guide outcomes with intention.

Data-Driven Decisions (Because That’s How Engineers Think)

Engineers are systems thinkers — analytical, process-oriented, wired to optimize.

An ERP like Vantagepoint supports that mindset by connecting time, cost, billing, and performance data into structured dashboards and reports. When information is organized clearly and shared transparently, knowledge flows more easily across teams.

Strong knowledge sharing requires infrastructure. A centralized system ensures project history, financial performance, and staffing patterns aren’t locked in silos — they become insights that strengthen alignment and accountability.

When everyone works from the same data, decisions sharpen. And over time, that clarity builds momentum.

👉 See what’s possible with Vantagepoint dashboards and reporting

From Project Engineer to Project Leader

As engineers step into project management roles, their responsibilities expand beyond technical execution.

They become accountable for profitability, budget discipline, staffing strategy, billing performance, and overall project health.

That transition is smoother when financial and operational data aren’t abstract concepts but accessible tools.

ERP systems succeed when the people running projects understand their value and engage intentionally. When engineers see how financial structure connects directly to execution, their decisions strengthen — technically and strategically.

The earlier that business perspective becomes part of an engineer’s toolkit, the more confident and capable they become as leaders.

ERP isn’t simply another software platform. Implemented thoughtfully, it becomes part of the operational foundation that supports growth, stability, and long-term leadership development.

Smarter Projects Start with Visibility

Innovation doesn’t stop at design.

It shows up in how firms structure budgets, align staffing with demand, share knowledge, and monitor performance with clarity and purpose. It lives in the systems that support the people delivering the work every day.

Deltek Vantagepoint was never meant to sit quietly in the background as a finance tool. At its best, it supports executives, marketing teams, finance professionals — and the engineers managing projects from kickoff to closeout.

We’ve found that many firms are only tapping into a fraction of its capabilities. But when Vantagepoint is intentionally aligned with how engineers actually run projects, it becomes far more than software — it becomes a critical part of a healthy, high-performing data ecosystem.

Because ultimately, it’s built for the people responsible for delivering results.