Daryl knocked on the open door. “Hi, Esther!”
“Hi, Daryl,” replied Esther. “Come on in.”
“Thanks.”
Daryl made himself comfortable in one of the three chairs in front of Esther’s desk. Jennifer joined them shortly afterwards.
“Well,” started Esther. “As you both well know, our small business accounting software is fast becoming obsolete. Daryl, you worked with me yesterday on the issue with Thomas’ timesheet and Jennifer, you’ve worked side-by-side with me through other headaches our software’s caused.
“Enough is enough. Daryl, I want you to research four companies around the area that offer business software alternatives to our small business accounting program. Jennifer, once he selects prospective vendors I want you to set up meetings with their reps within the…“
“Esther?” Daryl slid forward to the edge of his seat.
“…Month. Yeah?”
“I’m excited about where we’re going with this, but if you’re putting a team together to look at some options, I suggest including John as well. I know he’s new to the company and more on the development side of things rather than operations, but his experience evaluating software should help us. Also, it sounds like we are moving from a small business accounting program and spreadsheets to a small-midsize company ERP.”
“What’s ERP?” Jennifer asked.
“Enterprise Resource Planning software,” Daryl replied matter-of-factly. “It basically means software that helps us manage a variety of activities involved in the important parts of our business. For instance, it should help us manage our accounting, contact management, jobs, projects, the hours people work and more, all in one package.”
Esther nodded. “That’s a great idea, Daryl. Jennifer, will you please see if John can join us?”
Jennifer left to track down the company’s CTO. John was the Dr. Jekyll/Mr. Hyde of the team. He was both an analytical and a driver. This meant his natural style was to be a top performer, but he actually balanced the need to deliver results on schedule with a high attention to details. The challenge at times was he could get personally conflicted as part of him wanted to just get something done while another part of him was eager to gather more details or think about it more.
It only took a few minutes to have John join the meeting. “Wow, this sounds great,” said John once he was brought up to speed. “Have you come up with a list of what our top needs are for this new software?”
“Not yet,” said Esther. “However, now is an excellent time to start.”
Over the next hour, the four of them came up with a list of what they need most from their next generation of business management software:
•Time Management: Employees must have an effective and user-friendly way to log hours worked into the system.
•Expense Reports: A reliable process for accepting, approving, managing and reporting on expense reports by department.
•Tracking Subs: A system for tracking the work done by sub-contractors with task assignment, real-time status, billing and reporting options.
•Client Self-Service: A simple way for clients to initiate support tickets, view the status of their requests and a comprehensive audit trail of client interactions regarding each ticket.
•Notifications: Automated notifications so clients and our employees/managers are notified when tasks are completed or work goes beyond estimates.
•Project Management: Track or review the status and details of all active/inactive projects in our portfolio including by defect or enhancement.
•Reporting: Compare unbillable versus billable time, overtime, missing time and much more.
•Task Management: Assign tasks, track progress toward due dates and report by task—available real-time to approved team members and client contacts.
“Thanks again for taking the lead on this project, John,” said Esther. “The four of us will participate in each vendor meeting, but you guys decide on the five vendors we should consider.”
Esther picked up the business card she had laying on her desk. “I only ask that you include the KOQB Group in the final group of five companies to present to us. Here is Marie Arnold’s business card. They were the first company that approached us a year ago with alternatives to our small business accounting program and I declined. I was very impressed with her company at the time. Let’s see what they’ve got.”
“Of course,” said Daryl, taking the card. “We have to do some work to identify all possible vendors and narrow it down to five. We can accomplish that by Friday. Then we can schedule two presentations, back-to-back, during weeks two and three, and one the final week. I suggest Tuesday afternoons so we have time to gather any last minute details before your next non-profit board meeting. Does that work for everyone?”
After nods circled the room, Esther moved to close the meeting. “As you know, our profits have slipped despite increasing revenues. I want a solution, the right solution, fast. I feel like we’re in small business accounting software and spreadsheet hell. I want to get out of it now.”
Chapter 9
Preparation
James looked down at the small stack of folders organized neatly in front of him on the conference table. His controller, Victor, and vice president of operations, Sally, were seated immediately to his left; his vice president of tech services, Travis, was to his right.
When hiring for these positions, James intentionally found behavioral types to balance his tendency towards analysis paralysis. Victor and Sally’s natural strengths were similar to Esther. They helped James keep focused on the “big picture” and make decisions faster rather than get lost in the details. As a highly skeptical analytical, Travis was wired more like James, but he naturally avoided conflict and communicated effectively with others throughout projects.
“The time has come for a change,” began James, “As you know, and I expressed to you in my email meeting invite, our small business accounting program is killing us. As much as it pains me to admit, we need to research and implement new business accounting software to support our growth. I hope you all have come to this meeting prepared to define our greatest current and future needs.
“Rather than start with my thoughts, I want to hear from you,” he continued, opening and closing the dry marker in his hand as he stood in front of the whiteboard. “We have always been smarter as a team than I have been on my own. I need your help. Each of you has complained about our current system. The sooner we get comfortable with our true needs, the faster we can get this situation resolved. So, how about ladies go first? Sally, what is the critical functionality you want from this new system?”
Over the next half-hour, James and his executive team defined a long list of capabilities their mid-sized project-driven firm wanted from its business management software. At the top of the list were:
1.Budget Tracking Assistance: Track all additional purchases made on projects on a real-time basis.
2.Invoice Management: Record invoices as they are submitted.
3.Expense Reporting/Tracking Management: Submit expense reports and automatically categorize them with the correct department.
4.Change Order Management: Track up-to-date data in order to support change-orders before the work is done.
5.Timesheet Management: A reliable process for managing timesheets to capture job costs.
6.Competitive Bid Assistance: A dependable system