Tim Phelan's Tech in Perspective

Tech in Perspective - Living a Balanced Life

Entrepreneur

5 Ways Technology Consulting Firms Benefit from ERP Partnerships

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In today’s rapidly evolving business landscape, technology consulting firms are vital in helping organizations adapt to digital transformation. One crucial aspect of this process is enterprise resource planning (ERP), which enables companies to manage core business functions efficiently. Technology consulting firms can form strategic partnerships with ERP publishers to enhance their ERP offerings. This blog post will explore five ways technology consulting firms can benefit from these partnerships.

1. Access to Cutting-Edge Technology

By partnering with an ERP publisher, technology consulting firms gain access to the latest advancements in ERP technology. This enables them to offer their clients innovative solutions and stay ahead of the competition. Close collaboration with the ERP publisher allows technology consulting firms to gain insights into the product roadmap, future enhancements, and upcoming features. This knowledge helps them provide comprehensive and up-to-date advice to their clients.

2. Expert Training and Support

Working closely with an ERP publisher provides technology consulting firms with expert training and support. The ERP publisher offers in-depth training sessions, webinars, and certification programs for consultants, enabling them to enhance their skills and stay updated with the evolving ERP landscape. Additionally, direct support from the ERP publisher ensures that consultants can quickly resolve any technical issues or challenges faced during implementation or support activities, leading to a seamless client experience.

3. Marketing and Sales Support

A partnership with an ERP publisher allows technology consulting firms to leverage the publisher’s marketing and sales resources. Consulting firms can reach a broader audience, generate more leads, and increase brand visibility by collaborating on marketing efforts. The ERP publisher can provide sales guidance, collateral, and access to potential clients, strengthening the consulting firm’s sales capabilities. This collaboration helps attract new clients and expand the consulting firm’s customer base.

4. Enhancing Consulting Portfolio

Technology consulting firms can enhance their portfolio through an ERP partnership by offering a comprehensive range of ERP services. This enables them to meet the diverse needs of their clients, whether it be ERP implementation, customization, integration, or post-implementation support. With access to various ERP modules and add-ons, consulting firms can tailor solutions according to their client’s specific requirements, ultimately providing more value.

5. Competitive Advantage

Partnering with an ERP publisher gives technology consulting firms a competitive edge in the market. By aligning themselves closely with a renowned ERP brand, consulting firms can build a reputation as trusted experts in ERP technology. This association enhances their credibility and differentiates them from other consulting firms. Furthermore, technology consulting firms can capitalize on the ERP publisher’s brand reputation, leveraging it to attract new clients and secure long-term business partnerships.

In conclusion, forming partnerships with ERP publishers offers numerous benefits for technology consulting firms. The advantages are manifold, from accessing cutting-edge technology and receiving expert training to leveraging marketing and sales support, enhancing consulting portfolios, and gaining a competitive advantage. These partnerships empower consulting firms to deliver exceptional ERP services, stay at the forefront of industry advancements, and ultimately drive business growth.

More Focus More Profits

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Entrepreneurs have three things that loom largely in the back of their heads when thinking about their business. First, what is the next innovation or service that will add value to customers, attract new customers, and create competitive edge. Secondly, entrepreneurs know “cash is king.” It is critical that they ensure that there is adequate capital to pay people and bills while still investing as much as possible into growth. Thirdly, to reduce risk by containing and cutting costs.

The salesman in me wants to believe that we can always sell our way to the next goal. That sales mentality is risky because most salespeople have rose-colored glasses, and costs have a sneaky way of rising proportionally with sales. As a recovering accountant, I view cost containment essential to organizational health. Strong sales while containing costs enhances the ability to grow by investing profits, leveraging core competencies, and increasing velocity to GTM plans. Before you go sharpening your pencils and pouring over cell phone plans, I submit that one of the biggest, yet seemingly undetectable, business costs today are transition costs.

Transition costs are the time it takes to switch our focus and mindset from one task/topic to another. These add up. The more desperate the task/topics, particularly on the creative to pragmatic spectrum, the more time this takes. The American Psychological Association asserts that “even brief mental blocks created by shifting between tasks can cost as much as 40 percent of someone’s productive time” (“Multitasking: Switching costs”). In a business-world where being ADD is a badge of honor, there is conversely a simultaneous and tremendous impact in productivity and efficiency. Transition costs—wait, I just got a call from my son to discuss how badly Clemson beat Alabama in the National Championship game—so, what was I saying? Oh right, transition costs. Factors that increase transition costs on an individual level are the complexity/variety of activities required, span of control (the number of direct reports vying for attention), and also how well one takes care of themselves (proper rest, diet, etc.). The most insidious part of these transition costs is the difficulty quantifying the actual costs. Therefore, these costs are easy to overlook, shrug off, or ignore completely.

There are a number of fantastic resources and professionals that focus on assisting professionals in minimizing transition costs. and I have listed a few below. A few things that I have begrudgingly found effective are:

  • Batching Like Activities – Pretty simple, just arranging my schedule to do similar types of tasks in the same time slot.
  • The 1,440 “rule” – I read this somewhere. The notion is you only have 1,440 minutes in a day (24 hours), and only 480 minutes in an eight hour work day. With that perspective, I become more protective of my time, particularly when someone drops by saying “hey, can I run something by you for a few.” An excellent article on this topic is “What are You Doing with Your 1,440 Minutes? And Only 480 Minutes are in Your Eight Hour Day” by Jack Heimbigner
  • Do Not Disturb – I thought this was the most horrendous thing ever, and it took every ounce of willpower I had to start and stick to it. Cell phones have “do not disturb” functions where the user is not notified if a call or text comes in. Thankfully mine also has an exceptions list such as if a caller calls multiple times, or If a call/text comes from a specific person or group of people (instructions for the iPhone I use). Over time, do not disturb has become “my time” that I value and enjoy.
  • E-mail “times” – I have specific times in the day slotted to review and respond to e-mail. It takes discipline to do this and know that you will have to educate your less-patient folks on why they are not getting instantaneous responses. Yet, it has assisted me greatly in remaining focused and present. Of note: there is also a function in Outlook that I use that sends me a text if I receive an e-mail from certain people to whom I must be particularly responsive.

Curbing transition costs takes constant diligence. Think of it as life-hacking and make it fun. Like any other cost, if you spend the effort to minimize its impact, you will be amazed by the bottom-line results over time.

Resources:

Melissa Gratias PhD – Productivity Psychologist

LeadCrunch

IFTTT

StayFocusd

The Freelancer’s 6-Question Guide to Knowing When to Outsource

5 Tips for Getting the Most out of Your Business Intelligence (BI) Initiative

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Gartner stated that over a third of business intelligence initiatives fail. Implementing a BI tool properly can deliver actionable information out of the seemingly endless amounts of data enabling organizations to be more agile, get to market quicker, and to save time by managing by exception. This can become a competitive edge, particularly in industries that are fast-changing.  BI is not an expensive undertaking though, and the better prepared you are the more likely success will come on time and in budget.  Here are 5 tips that can make the difference between competitive edge and failure:

  1. Be clear on the desired results – Too often entrepreneurs and executives get bogged down in the power of the data sources, how wonderful it is going to be to have so many desperate data sets from different systems normalized and at their fingertips. While planning the data architecture is certainly important, it can quickly eat up the entire budget.  Think backwards from the finish: what information do you want and how do you want to see it?  With this information your internal IT Department or outside consulting firm can then best design the data structure to goal, not to be all encompassing of any goal you may ever have.
  2. Get references, good and bad – If you are using a professional services organization, rest assured they should be versed well enough in the technology to make it sound like your initiative is right in their wheelhouse at a technical level you may not be as knowledgeable. It is imperative that you have the ability to talk to other managers, executives, or business owners like yourself that have had success with the firm.  I stress managers/executives/business owners because talking to an IT professional can lead to an accurate and wondrous story of a data warehouse that provides absolutely no business value.  Be sure to speak with the person who benefits from the work.  Because technology by its nature is sometimes not as reliable as one would like, it is also important to speak with a client that faced major challenges in their implementation. Granted, nobody is going to give you a terrible reference.  At least though you will get a sense of how the firm deals with unanticipated challenges in time, budget, or expectation setting.  A quick word to the wise: unless you have a segment of your IT team dedicated to data administration, reporting and has implemented a BI solution many times before, outsource it.  The disruption from normal duties and potential of losing someone who otherwise is an excellent team member over perceived cost savings that may never materialize.
  3. Chose a flexible platform – There are thousands of BI platforms to choose from that are for small business, mid-sized business, enterprise, industry specific, etc.  Connectivity will largely depend on your current data sources: accounting, production, marketing, CRM, project costing, time & attendance, and so on.  Be sure to ascertain how the final information or dashboard will be delivered to you. Important questions include: Is it shareable (can I send a file to a colleague)? Is it device dependent (can I see it from my laptop and my iPhone)? Ultimately, how you and your teams work will determine what the best option is.  Beware of solution specific clients.  While sometimes unavoidable, it is always preferable to use non-proprietary viewers.
  4. Proof of Concept – If possible, a proof of concept is an excellent way to see what and how you are going to get on a small scale.  Often, you can negotiate a fixed price that will go towards the full deployment thereby not costing additional.  Even if it is an additional cost, it is a way for you to mitigate the risk of not being happy after a much larger investment.  This is also a viable option if your internal IT is leading the project. Find a small, quickly achievable key performance indicator (KPI) and run that piece as a mini project and upon approval you move forward with the larger project.
  5. Solid Project Management – Strong project management (ideally from the consulting firm and your organization) is be the best way to ensure that expectations are met and challenges overcome in a timely and mutually beneficial manner.  This includes sign off on scope, milestone targets, billing milestones, reporting and feedback procedures, and change of scope documentation and procedures.  Make sure that whether you are using an outside firm or tackling your BI project internally that you have a project lead who is responsible for monitoring and reporting back relevant details, issues and accomplishments.

BI transforms the way we think of information.  Executed properly, key information is put in the hands of those who can act on it quicker, interpret trends, and hopefully keep the organization a step ahead of competition.  Take your time before committing resources to the project.  Follow these guideline and find a good BI provider to partner with and you will be amazed that you ever waded through those seas of reports that monopolize so much time.  Good luck and make it a great day!