In the News

So, you’ve heard about the new Vision Unleashed, Deltek Touch Time and CRM mobile applications and want your smartphone users to be able to utilize these applications to access Vision offsite. Perhaps you like the idea of your Vision users having the ability to work from home or abroad or maybe you think the new Navigator interface would be really helpful for project managers out in the field.  However, you feel opening up Vision access from the web sounds kind of scary and you have questions. Is it safe? Is it expensive to set up? Is it hard to configure? 

Well, let’s take a look!  

Is it safe?

Yes it is!  When properly deployed using Secure HTTP and a strong password policy, accessing your Vision data from anywhere is as safe as accessing your banking information. 

Is it expensive?

Only in the time to set up (generally an hour or two) and the purchase of a security certificate. The certificate is good for several years and costs only a few hundred dollars. 

Is it hard to configure?

For a single server install the process is simple and can be completed with very little downtime or afterhours with proper planning.  Multi-tier installs offer a bit more complexity and should be discussed to ensure all the nuances are covered before beginning.  Full Sail Partners has assisted many firms with the transition. Feel free to reach out to us for support.  

Here are the steps to open Deltek Vision to the internet to allow your firm access to new features like Deltek Touch.

1. Configure a Fully Qualified Domain Name (FQDN) that you will use to reach Vision from offsite. ‘Vision.yourcompanyname.com’ is a common format.
2. Purchase and install a SSL security certificate for your new FQDN on your Vision server.
3. Modify your firewall rules to allow port 443 (secure http) traffic to be forwarded to your Vision server. Note: This is a good time to try visiting your Vision login page to see if everything is on the right track, in Internet Explorer. Visit HTTPS://Vision.yourcompanyname.com and make sure it loads.
4. Verify the FQDN is also reachable internally, DNS may need tweaking.
5. In Reporting Services Configuration Manager, under the Web Service URL tab, add the SSL identities now available since applying the new security certificate.
6. In the Vision Weblink, on the reporting tab, change the Server URL to your new FQDN/reportserver. For example: https://vision.yourcompanyname.com/reportserver. Note: Be sure to click the Test button to verify you have it right!
7. Voila! You should now be able to log in from both onsite and offsite and successfully run reports.  Once verified, you can notify all of your users to use the new link for their Vision needs. 

iAccess, Deltek Touch, and Vision Unleashed can now be deployed.  Enjoy safely and securely accessing Vision, anywhere, anytime! Let us know your experience.

When evaluating your professional services firm, understanding your past trends can provide valuable insight into the future.

It is important to know where you are going, as well as, where you have been. Understanding mistakes and achievements is paramount to truly understanding how to progress your firm. The old adage by George Santayana remains true, “Those who cannot remember the past, are condemned to repeat it.” Luckily, firms don’t have to rely on people’s memory. There are all kinds of ways to track information. However, having the tools set-up to extract, dissect, and analyze the data is a different story. When it comes to proposals, it is essential to know the Win to Loss Ratio (Hit Rate).

In a recent 2012 survey, SMPS Technology Committee reported firms are tracking the following marketing metrics: 56% | Win to Loss Ratio 50% | Client Satisfaction 46% | Marketing Expenditures 39% | Revenue 30% | Sales Funnel/Pipeline 27% | Sales Potential Forecast 26% | Proposal Cost vs. Revenue         Generated 24% | Referrals

In a recent, SMPS Technology Committee survey, only 56% of firms stated they tracked this information, which is surprising. This type of report allows you to evaluate the overall hit rate by the firm, a division, the pursuit lead, or other criteria.  You can also evaluate it by percentage or by revenue.  Knowing both provides you a different story.

Take William Apple, who has a 50% hit rate for the number of projects he has pursued.  He pursued 10 and won 5.  Ann Johnson on the other hand only has a 33% hit rate. She pursued 3 and won 1.  Seems like William is doing better, right?  However, if you evaluate them on revenue, William only has a 24% while Ann has a 73% hit rate.  Why the difference? 

Well, the one project Ann won, was a large project worth millions of dollars.  William however, won a lot of smaller projects and lost out on the bigger project. Both are important to the business.  However, if you start to see that William is constantly losing out on the large projects or maybe particular project types, this type of analysis would be valuable information that could be acted upon.

Key metrics like the Win to Loss Ratio allow a quick snap shot to determine if you need to dig deeper.  The historical progress of an opportunity sometimes provides further clues. 

• Were you realistic with your expectations?

• What stage did you lose the opportunity?

• Did you have an established relationship and effective pursuit strategy?

Is your firm able to answer these questions or are you repeating the same mistakes? Let us know how your firm learns from your success and failures and how your firm is improving your hit rate by leaving a comment. Interested in more historical trends information?

Deltek Vision’s billing system is very versatile, allowing you to present many different billing formats for your clients without having to create different invoice designs. This is accomplished by using Vision’s Project Billing Terms. By using billing terms you can produce an invoice for your clients that bills Fixed Fee, % Complete against a Fee, Hourly, Consultant and Expense billing, all on a single invoice. A drawback to this “mixed billing” formatting in Vision is that it produces a lengthy invoice with individual billing sections for each billing type. The fee billing phases can be combined into a single billing block, but each T&M phase must be billed separately.

So how can this be resolved?
Full Sail Partners' custom department has tackled this issue with several of our clients and has designed a solution to this problem. The invoice design can be used with any of your existing Vision Invoice Templates and combines all of your Fee, Time, Consultant and Expense billing into a single billing block:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

In the sample above:

1. Pre-Design and Schematic Design phases are hourly with a limit (Budget)

• The actual value of the billable time entered on these phases is displayed in the JTD Billed Column
• The percent complete is calculated by dividing the JTD Billed into the Budget
• The Fee Remaining Column is another new feature that can be displayed or suppressed (hidden)
• Design Development is hourly without a limit/budget

• JTD Billed = the value of billable time on the phase
• Percent Complete is not displayed when there is not a limit/budget
• Bidding and Negotiation is Percent Complete by Phase

• The Percent Complete is entered in the Fee tab of Billing Terms
• JTD Billed is calculated from the % Complete, as in typical % Complete Billing
• Reimbursable Charges are actual charges with a limit/budget

• Like the Labor phases above, the actual value of billable expenses is displayed in the JTD Billed column
• The percent complete is calculated by dividing the JTD Billed into the Budget
• The Fee Remaining Column is another new feature that can be displayed or suppressed (hidden)

By using this new invoice design, an invoice that might have been 2-5 pages long can now be presented to the client on a single page. Additionally, Billing Backup displaying the details for the time and materials phases can be added to the invoice by selecting that option in the billing terms, as normal.

One other feature that is included with this invoice design is the ability to present the Fee and Labor Phases in the block format above, while displaying Consultant and Reimbursable Expense charges in their traditional sections following the Fee/Labor billing block. This is accomplished by the use of custom fields in the project info center which allow for individual selections for Consultant Charges, Reimbursable Expenses and the option to display or suppress the “Remaining” column above.

View the video for a demonstration of this flexible new invoice design or contact your Full Sail Partners representative. Your clients will love it and your invoices will be easier to read.

It looks like the world will not come to an end! So back at it campers. Let's learn some quick tips about Deltek Vision.

As the first of our Deltek Vision Tips & Tricks Series we would love to hear if you find the information helpful. Recently I came across a question about how to know who modified a record. Of course the audit reports can provide this information, but there are two easier ways to get this information.

In every info center you can hover over the name of the record at the top of the record. It will tell you who created the record and on what date. Additionally, it will tell you who last modified the record and on what date. So in the image below for item #1, the mouse is hovering over the word Paul A. Collier in blue. If you need to know what field was modified then you would need to run an audit report.  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Additionally, you could set-up a field that displays who modified the record. This is accomplished through a workflow. First create a new character field. (Note: An employee field will not work.)  In this example it is named Modified By.  See image item #2 above. 

Then set-up a User Initiated Workflow. Choose the Application, which in this instance will be the Contacts. Click Insert on the Workflows grid. The Workflow Table will be Contact Record and the Workflow Type will be Change. This simply means every time the contact record is changed, the workflow will trigger.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Now on the Actions grid click Insert to add an action. Choose Column (Field) Change for the Actions column. Next, choose the field to update. In this case it is ContactCustomTabFields.CustModifiedBy.  Then set-up a SQL Expression. The expression is simply, a field that already exists: [:Contacts.ModUser]. Find that code and click Add Column. Then click Save. Be sure to add descriptions so you know what the workflow is related to and then Save the workflow. To test it, change something on a Contact record. You should see the users login name filter in.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Check back in 2013 for new blog entries related to Deltek Vision tips. Let us know if you learned something new by leaving a comment. Wishing you a wonderful 2013!

 

When a request for a custom solution is received, be it a report, workflow, or external data automation, many clients are surprised the first items we review are the standard functions available in the particular system they are looking to customize.  “Are you trying to talk us out of having you perform the programming work?” I had one client ask me incredulously, after I had shown her a way to accomplish getting the information she had wanted in a custom report within the native Vision Reporting system. 

My response is always the same.  We would love to work with your firm on a custom initiative; however our top priority as your Consultant is to ensure that you receive the best value for any work we perform.  There are times where custom programming is going to be the best path forward, but if we can accomplish the same (or relatively the same) results natively, in less time – you’re going to be happier as our client, and we may have an opportunity to work with you on a customization effort that will truly be valuable for your organization in the future.  As your consultant, we are ultimately advocates and partners in helping you be successful and getting the most out of your system. 

Sometimes the native functionality is not quite enough for an organization and so customization is the right step to make. In some circumstances, it’s natural to start to look at custom programming to help overcome those hurdles. Those might include:

• Cultural requirements in the organization to have data represented a certain way
• Manual processes require a tremendous amount of repetitive effort
• It takes two or more reports to get one set of information the organization requires
• Additional systems that are used in the organization may require a duplication of effort
• Information is stored in house and in the cloud, and you wish to simplify the effort of keeping these separate silos of data up to date
• Aesthetics of a particular report or information set may not match with the firms brand or be overly complex for the information needed 

When evaluating if engaging a consultant on a custom programming effort makes sense for your firm, here are some key questions to ask your internal team:

• Have we identified the motivating factors for requiring the custom programming effort?  
• How much time is spent manually today to get our desired result?
• How much of this time will be saved by incorporating the custom programming?
• Have we explored the native Vision system capabilities and found we cannot reproduce what we need?
• Have we considered how close we can get using the native capabilities in Vision and can we operate within those parameters, or is this a definitive organization need?

As you embark on asking a colleague or consultant to customize your system, here are some questions to ask prior to having them moving forward:

• Do you have advanced knowledge of Transact SQL?
• Have you worked with the structure of the Vision database and functionality of the Vision application?  (I can’t emphasize this point enough!)
• In developing this report, will we be able to reconcile the custom work to native Vision reports? (Whether through a single report or a combination of multiple reports)
• Is there a way to already accomplish something similar with the native functionality of Vision?
• Do you have experience writing web services for Deltek Vision and ?
• I have an example of what I’m looking for, do you see any issues with providing it in this format or with this information and do you have any suggestions for how we may be able to do this more effectively.  

Our library of custom solutions continues to grow every day. Some of these solutions can be purchased at a flat fee and utilized as is or further customized.  This is a great way to minimize costs and get results quickly.  We welcome you to reach out and find out if something similar has already been created. We are committed to helping you find the right solution to fit your unique needs.

In my day-to-day conversations with companies I am often discussing IT support issues surrounding their firms’ backup plan for their firms’ key financial and marketing data. As I speak to these firms I inquire about steps they are taking to protect this critical data.  I often pose this simple question “How long could your firm survive without access to this critical data?” Most firms indicate that they could not afford to be without access to this data for more than a day or two. Yet most have not taken precautions to have a 1-2 day restoration plan/ disaster recovery plan. In many cases these IT support issues seem to be a direct correlation to the firms’ reduction in IT support staff (internal & external) over the last several years. In many of these discussions it is often discovered that there is no backup plan for the firm’s critical data, no testing of backups to verify the integrity of the backups and no off-site backup storage.  Two fairly typical conversations have occurred over the last couple months (names omitted to protect the guilty).

The first required assistance to move their financial database from a crippled failing server to a new server. In the process Full Sail Partners’ Consultant requested to have the firms IT support to provide a backup of the Live Date. Upon restoring the backup provided it was discovered that the firm had been backing up a sample database for over a year and had never backed up their “Live” database. Thankfully disaster was avoided when Full Sail Partners’ Consultant was able to successfully make a backup up of their “Live” database on the dying server and restore it onto the new server (before failure happened), prepare accurate backup plan and validate the backup to verify that it was actually the “Live” database. Not sure they know how lucky they were to still be in business.

The second conversation was not quite as fortunate. This conversation started after they had their production server crash in a fluke lightning storm. Full Sail Partners Consultant was able to get the firm back up and running in less than 3 hours. However, after several attempts to recover their database, it was determined that the most recent valid database backup was over 3 months old due to not having regular off-site backups.

Often times firms hear these stories and ask how can they help their firm from becoming another story. I typically tell them that they need to make sure that their IT support either internal or external need to be verifying the integrity of the their database backups and also need to be storing these backups off-site. For those firms that may not have the desired level of IT support, Full Sail Partners now has both Hosted Solutions as well as On-Premise solutions for Deltek Vision to protect your firm’s critical data.

View our past webinar to learn more about what your firm can do to protect your data and ensure you have a back-up checklist.

Hurricane Sandy spreads her reach to 13 states wide and the evaluation of the damage and impact begin to be accessed. After the superstorm subsides, the ability to communicate to family, co-workers, and clients becomes vital. This is then followed by returning to a sense of normalcy. Events like this provide a new perspective that we sometimes overlook, the ability to access our data. You don't have to wait until you lose your data or don't have a quick restore to address this issue.

For nearly five years, Full Sail Partners has been responsible for our hosted Deltek Vision clients a guarantee of 99.5%.  To meet that uptime guarantee, a way to monitor, maintain, and protect our clients was mission critical.  Three services are now available to all Deltek Vision clients who maintain their own on-site server with our best of breed tools and techniques.

Bulletproof

On a monthly basis Full Sail Partners will conduct an eyes-on, comprehensive inspection based on a checklist of over 30 parameters, deploy the latest Full Sail Partners scripts and tricks to maximize uptime, install the latest hotfixes, and perform a soup-to-nuts database restore to test your backup plan to ensure your backups are something you can count on.  We’ll also set up that restored database as a hidden test database so you have the ability to try/test/play without disturbing your production data.

Overwatch

Chances are good there’s more information in your database today than yesterday, and the database isn’t getting smaller or using less resources.  Most companies only discover these conditions when it is too late and Vision is already ‘down’.  That would be unacceptable for our hosting clients, so we developed ‘Overwatch’, a real time monitoring system tailored to all of the Vision critical metrics and services.  Overwatch allows us (and now you too!) to check the health of your Vision servers via a webpage and see up to date information 24 hours a day, 365 days a year.  Additionally, even when you’re not looking, Overwatch is.  Warning and escalating emails will be sent to your staff whenever something like memory usage thresholds are reached.  This allows IT to be aware of issues in time to react before they become showstoppers.

Catastrophe Protection

Even though Full Sail Partners utilizes multiple hosting locations and redundancy, we wanted the additional protection of an independent, standalone backup solution for our client’s database archives, logos, and custom work.  We felt so strongly about this strategy that we decided to make our solution available to our on-site clients.  If there is absolutely nothing else you do to protect your Vision data, a dependable, tested, offsite backup solution is critical.  In addition to providing anytime access to your encrypted database backups, we also include 30 days of free hosting and will have your database online and available within 24 hours of your loss of server casualty.

To learn more about implementing these solutions in your disaster prevention, protection, and recover plans view our Comprehensive IT Services to Plan, Protect, and Prevent.

Full Sail Partners, offering business consulting, technology solutions, and application hosting for Deltek Vision, is proud to unveil Vision Unleashed™, a multi-platform solution for Deltek Vision.  Vision Unleashed will allow users to access Deltek Vision from most mobile device or non-windows platform. 

This multi-platform solution is perfect for firms with business developers, executives, or project managers needing convenient access to Deltek Vision on the road. With the ability to access Deltek Vision data anywhere, anytime, Vision Unleashed allows project staff to work on the fly, independently of their standard windows-based office computer.

“For many years our clients have been asking us if they can access Deltek Vision from non-windows devices. Full Sail Partners is extremely honored and proud to be able to provide any Deltek user with a multi-platform solution for Deltek Vision that is both easy to obtain and use,” said Scott A. Seal, Director of Service Development at Full Sail Partners. “We believe that the ability to use Vision Unleashed to access Deltek Vision anywhere, on any mobile device, will allow Vision users to work more conveniently and effectively.”

Currently, Vision Unleashed is approved for compatibility with the following devices:    

• Smartphone (iPhone, Android, etc.)
• Tablets (iPad, Kindle, Galaxy, etc.)
• Non-Windows Platform (Mac or Linux)
• Many more

For more information about Vision Unleashed™, and to learn how your firm can start accessing Deltek's Vision try it for FREE.




About Full Sail Partners

Full Sail Partners specializes in client-focused technology solutions for architects and engineers, energy and environmental consultants, and professional service firms across the country. Full Sail Partners offers business consulting, technology solutions, and application hosting for Deltek Vision. Partnering with more than 1000 clients nationwide, Full Sail Partners builds long-term relationships and seeks to identify the critical resources to create a faster, more efficient, and cohesive business infrastructure.

Full Sail Partners – Keep Your Business on Course. | For more on Full Sail Partners profile and background on the Full Sail Partners crew, visit us at http://www.fullsailpartners.com.

It's not a matter of if, but when a failure will happen! During a recovery effort, your firm's need to recover quickly is vital to your firm's existence. The lack of access to data can impair production. The longer the delay the more it can cost your firm and even result in failure of your company.

It recent article by Gartner, they discussed how IT failure can bring down a company and the writer, Richard Hunt, made some great points. "The interesting thing isn’t that some companies have failed when their IT failed; the interesting thing is that the risks are almost certainly increasing. Plenty of executives don’t yet understand that while IT spend only represents 5% or less (on average) of enterprise revenues, the impact of IT on revenues is far higher than that. To put it another way, many executives don’t yet realize that their businesses don’t run much, if at all, without IT, and when IT is misused or fails, the impacts can be very large indeed."

So, do you have a backup & recovery solution?  How quick is your data recovery? Would you lose any of your data if:

• Your computer was stolen?
• You have an IT system failure?
• You have a hardware failure?
• There was a fire?
• There was a natural disaster?
• Your backup solution didn't work?

Are you confident that you'd be back up in less than a day if any of the above items occurred? Could you be up in less than an hour? Next to hardware and software malfunctions, human error is one of the biggest reason for data loss. Doing a back-up is only half of the equation. Verification is the most important part of data back-up. Statistics show that 77% of tape backups fail.

Below are data recovery statistics that demonstrate the likely hood of failure and the impact to businesses when they are unable to recover. For firms that want to be proactive and eliminate preventable failures and learn how to recover quickly when a failure does occur, view our webinar.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 Infograph presented by Dell

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

In today's world it's important to make sure your resources are effectively allocated and outsourced expenses are doing all they can to keep you ahead of the pack. No matter whether your IT support is outsourced, dedicated, or part-time, there are expectations your firm should have to ensure your Deltek database is properly managed. We invite you to take the IT challenge to see how you can improve. 

IT Challenge 1:

Question:

Is your database being properly backed-up, tested, and verified?

Answer:

Common mistakes include: A back-up is conducted, but the back-up wasn't tested and verified. Meaning it wasn't restored to verify the integrity of the database. Don't assume it will work just because there is a file! A separate archive is not conducted on the following files linked to Vision: custom reports, images, and invoice templates. The data is only part of the back-up.

Lesson Learned:

Full Sail Partners has had dozens of clients that have come to us over the years thinking their data was properly backed-up yet to find the last good back-up did not include up-to-date data. Can your business afford this mistake? What would you do if you had no back-up at all due to corruption or failed standard operating procedure (SOP)?

IT Challenge 2:

Questions:

Do you have the latest Vision updates of your software version, service pack, and/or hotfixes? Can your hardware support the latest version of Vision?

Answer:

The current version is Vision 6.2 Service Pack 1 with Vision 7.0 set for general release in 3rd Quarter. The impact on your business includes:   For firms running payroll, improper tax filings or withholdings can result when the latest tax information update is not applied. Newer versions resolve known issues. Lack of updates can result in inefficiency and unnecessary errors. New releases from Microsoft and other technology platforms can result in incompatibility. Software is an evolution and requires a dedicated resource. Aging hardware may not support future versions of Vision. For the current hardware document requirements click here.

Lesson Learned:

Lack of infrastructure investment can result in increased future expenses. New features like download enhancements and grid view capabilities improve efficiency for your staff. Your enhancement requests are being addressed with each hotfix and new release. Being on the most current version provides your staff the ability to take advantage of these new features. In Deltek Vision 7.0, some of the new enhancements include: contract management, simplified security updates, custom info centers, and much more.

IT Challenge 3:

Questions:

Do you have a disaster recovery plan that includes off-site back-up?

Answer:

In the event of a natural disaster or loss of your Vision server, it is important to be able to access your data at a remote location. Some potential scenarios to think about: Make sure your back-up is not on the same server as the Vision server. A server failure can result in loss of your current system and back-up data. Ensure that you have a back-up that is taken to a location outside of your building. If a disaster occurs at your current location, then again your current system and back-up is lost.

Lesson Learned:

The best scenario is to have a back-up that is outside of your current city. Additionally, think about how you will restore the data should you lose your server to maintain business continuity and how long will it take you to restore.

Did You Pass the IT Challenge?

Full Sail Partners can assist you with any of these concerns to ensure your IT staff is providing your data the security your firm needs. In addition to these services, our hosting division can offload the expense of servers, peripheral software, redundant back-ups and allocation of resources to address your Vision IT needs. Our hosting professionals only provide hosting services for Deltek Vision and coordinate with Deltek support on known issues. This specialized expertise comes with years of hands-on experience and provides your organization a high level of confidence that your data is secure. Outsourcing your IT Management of Vision with Full Sail Partners allows your firm to focus on your core business, while we ensure your IT landscape is fully prepared.

To find out more about how Full Sail Partners' application hosting can ease your worries and save your firm money, visit our website. To speak to someone about these services, contact Scott Seal at sseal@fullsailpartners.com or 888.552.5535 x118. We look forward to relieving your IT worries and helping your firm Reach Full Sail!