Improving Management of Your Business

All companies have business processes that can be improved. Most companies can benefit from automation or further automation of solutions.

Improving Management of Your Business

Improving business processes is all about a work flow plan, often graphic, and implementation of automating and organizing work processes. It is also a way of defining software architectures and applications. Business process solutions help an enterprise monitor human and automated processes. It can also serve as an enterprise application integration (EAI) tool. Business process management solutions help you identify areas of your business that can be automated and used to apply business rules and guidelines. In practical terms, it acts like a virtual machine that executes process models rather than software code.

Business process solutions take business data and determine how the information is used to perform a task. By creating an overview, a business manager can plan and improve an existing business process. Some solutions also send data through a test set of tasks to ensure that a business process is being followed. These solutions permit a business manager to visually describe, control and trail the flow of a work process. Process solutions generally involve computer systems and software to automate a process.

Technologies used to implement process management solutions include work flow charts, BP-XML languages, ERP (Enterprise Resource Management), software development and EAI (Enterprise Application Integration). ERP is a set of applications that can cover financials, manufacturing, human resources and back-office business administration utilities of an enterprise. It is a business management system that integrates all components of the business as well as planning. On the other hand, EAI software operates as a center that interprets data and messages between different applications.

Improving and automating business processes is the path to gaining huge productivity. These management solutions monitor business presentation by defining a series of tasks that must be performed to attain a defined strategic goal. There are three obligatory requirements - flexibility, reliability and security.

A good solution must help in continuous process enhancement, but managing the huge amount of these processes becomes more and more difficult as organizations become highly complex. Process management solutions give you the capability to satisfy and retain your customers and also maximize your joint venture returns with other businesses.

Remember that business processes define your business, and they can also present your organization with a competitive benefit. If you can make your processes efficient, you will reap better customer relations and profits.

Human-Based Workflows and Project Management Software

Workflows exist in some form at every company, in every industry. Traditionally, the term has been used to describe transactional processes. Credit card information, for example, is submitted on a website. The information is then sent to banks for approval and to a billing system for invoicing, which results in a message being sent to the shipping system for delivery. These types of transaction workflows, primarily relaying data between systems based on a static set of rules, require very little human intervention. They are typically automated using business process management (BPM) software or custom coded applications.

Human-based workflows on the other hand are usually manually managed and tracked. Meetings, phone calls, paper trails, spreadsheets, emails and desktop applications are typically utilized by business professionals as a means to keep the flow of information orderly. In most cases, a lack of efficiency is unavoidable. Using many different tools and methods to track workflows simultaneously leads to chaos. Visibility of a project’s status, and more importantly, what is causing its hindrance becomes increasingly ambiguous.

Many human-based business workflows involve intellectual property or process innovations that give companies an edge over competitors. In a small vertical industry successfully managing workflows can make or break a company. Because of the diversity of workflows and the ways in which they are managed, it is difficult to find off-the-shelf project management software that is flexible enough to adapt to any company’s set of unique workflows and management style. For this reason, many companies feel trapped, worried that the only option is to develop a custom solution. Developing custom project management software, however, is a costly and lengthy process.

Only Interneer Intellect solves this problem, through catering to the human-based business workflow market. It enables the business user to capture workflows using simple drag-and-drop capabilities. It also incorporates many features that automate and streamline the business process: it is web-based, facilitating real-time collaboration; automatically creates databases; automates workflows; and allows easy reporting, document management and project tracking with multi-user support.

As project management technology evolves, the benefits of automating workflows to gain efficiency, visibility and cut costs becomes increasingly apparent. With the advent of tools like Interneer Intellect this can be accomplished rapidly, easily and inexpensively.

How Does Human Resource Management in the Workspace Effect Me?

How often do you find yourself saying: "I wish I knew how to learn more about this topic"

Well, we were listening! And this article is the result.

Today human resources management is opening up new horizons in many different offices around not only the United States, but the world. The reason for this is simply supply and demand. More savvy business owners –even of smaller companies, have understood the value of hiring professionals with experience working in HR. By doing so, and having HR representatives, companies have learned the importance of solid communication with their workforce

The fact is that Human Resource Management exists just for this purpose –to bridge the gap between staff and upper management. In doing so, compromises have been attained which preclude the need for unions or outside arbitration, and thus provide the services that employees feel is their right to have

A company which is not so progressive, on the other hand, neglects HR and the philosophy that goes with it. The result is, employees abandon any thought of fidelity towards their employer in favor of businesses that reward their service in greater ways. Examples of this begin at the most basic level of appreciation. Certificates of recognition awarded on a monthly, bi-yearly, or even yearly basis, for instance, are all that many employees wish.

Now, pay close attention. What you're about to read will help you save hours of frustrating, wasted hunting, and let you hone in on some of the best material on this subject!

Of course, on a more pecuniary basis, more constant raises –whether structured and awarded based on time and/or merit, are always welcomed. Likewise, health benefits are probably the second most important factor, besides these well-earned raises. The HR department is very often responsible for such aspects in the workspace.

Yet, this is only the tip of the iceberg. Surely, the aforementioned has been a part of the American workspace for decades. What staff in HR try to instill are programs and emotional support that make employees feel a part of a winning, caring team –even a family.

This has been actualized by programs such as after-work softball and bowling leagues, on-site day care, free fitness memberships, and even after hours bar hopping and social events with the office staff and the boss. At work, people in HR have implemented office parties where before there were none, office pools, after-hour bingo (for charity or just for fun), and other such activities that create a cohesion within a workforce that makes it extremely difficult for an employee to ever consider leaving. It is just this feeling that managers and owners are looking for and why HR is so important.

This field is open to able-minded people of numerous backgrounds. There is training and certification which is available either in the office or at a local college. A fast growing field, the opportunities are currently expanding rapidly. Not only do people working in Human Resources enrich others, but they also benefit their own well-being in knowing that their job truly makes a difference in others' lives.

So, what did you think about this article? Please drop us a quick note to share your thoughts and comments on it.

For further information, be sure to check out the numerous resources available online on this topic.

Guide to Project Management

A project is an assignment or task taken up to achieve a specific goal. The development and introduction of new services or of a management information system are instances of a project. A project is different from the continuous or day-to-day processes of a company. It is confined within cost, time, and quality constraints. As a consequence to it a special team of expertise is appointed to manage a project.

Project management as the name suggests is all about nurturing or handling a project. This is done with the aid of requisite knowledge about the project, skills and techniques to complete the project within fixed tenure and resources. Project management involves step-by-step procedure along with a prudent approach towards the project.

At first the concerned organization prepares an outline of the project. This includes knowing and writing down what the project is all about, the cost involved in the project, the amount of resources needed. A thought is also given to the tentatively earliest possible time within which the project can be completed. Once the budget and other nitty-gritty’s about the project are known the organization looks for sponsors and a project manager. If the individual sponsoring the project is skilled and efficient enough, he too can be its manager.

The project manager then appoints a team of people to work under him. Together with the team the manager of the project prepares a project plan. This plan is not just about the cost and time factors but also regarding the manner in which the project is to be initiated and covered up later. This requires lot of discussions and settlements between the project manager and the team of employees.

The implementation stage of a project is where the project is put to execution as decided. While executing a project its progress and managing changes need to be carefully monitored. At this point in order to harness the resources well the project manager might feel the need to expand his team. For instance marketing of the product may be suffering due to more heed being paid to its manufacturing or due to lack of good marketing executives. This may also involve contacting new companies and organizations. Thus a set of people needs to be readily appointed to take charge of this. However then it is always at the onus of the manager to equip the new members with a proper and complete knowledge of the project. In some cases training may also be imparted.

After all these stages are over, the project comes at its stage of completion. This is known as the close down stage. Here the project manager safely handles the completed work in the hand of the client or the customer. Once a project is finished and handed over, a project review meeting should be held to study the work done, encourage if something good was discovered during the project and also learn from the mistakes made. These should also be documented and later published in warts and all. This acts as a great help in future assignments.

Free Time Management Software: How Can You Benefit From It?

Today, there is a wonderful opportunity to get your business or personal life in order using free time management software. Searching the Internet today yields several different varieties of free time management software. Using free time management software you can schedule important events, manage key projects, and alert yourself through reminder messages when deadlines are coming up for completing tasks. It is a good idea to use some type of tool or process for managing time, and using free time management software can be an easy and convenient way to balance your priorities.

Free Time Management Software And Your Phone

There may be free time management software available for your cellular phone. By downloading and making use of this, you can bring your daily tasks with you no matter where you go. You benefit from this be being reminded of your remaining tasks for the day and having the ability to add new tasks to your schedule as you move about – no more forgetting update your calendar when you get back to your office. Portable tools such a cell phones with free time management software will help you keep on task all day long and will result in higher productivity.

Other benefits of free time management software are the ability to identify scheduling conflicts, and helping to organize and prioritize tasks when you see that there are too many items to be completed in a single day. Free time management software can also help to identify parts of your day where time may be wasted, showing time that could have been used for goal-centered activities, but was not. Future similar times can be filled with planned tasks that could not be accomplished before, perhaps freeing night-time up that was being used for playing catch-up so you can spend it as you see fit – slowing down to watch a sunset, or getting up to watch the sunrise can be done without feeling guilty for wasting time because everything else is taken care of.

Things To Remember When Selecting Free Time Management Software

Today, you can find almost anything available for free on the Internet. Free Time Management Software is available in the form of online-base tools. Many of these tools offer persuasive benefits, but you should be aware that web-based services could sometime become temporarily or permanently unavailable. This could result in partial or total loss of your valuable information. If you plan on using an online form of free time management software, you should take care to keep a backup of you information to protect yourself.

Free Time Management Software

Today, there is a wonderful opportunity to get your business or personal life in order using free time management software. Searching the Internet today yields several different varieties of free time management software. Using free time management software you can schedule important events, manage key projects, and alert yourself through reminder messages when deadlines are coming up for completing tasks. It is a good idea to use some type of tool or process for managing time, and using free time management software can be an easy and convenient way to balance your priorities.

Free Time Management Software And Your Phone

There may be free time management software available for your cellular phone. By downloading and making use of this, you can bring your daily tasks with you no matter where you go. You benefit from this be being reminded of your remaining tasks for the day and having the ability to add new tasks to your schedule as you move about – no more forgetting update your calendar when you get back to your office. Portable tools such a cell phones with free time management software will help you keep on task all day long and will result in higher productivity.

Other benefits of free time management software are the ability to identify scheduling conflicts, and helping to organize and prioritize tasks when you see that there are too many items to be completed in a single day. Free time management software can also help to identify parts of your day where time may be wasted, showing time that could have been used for goal-centered activities, but was not. Future similar times can be filled with planned tasks that could not be accomplished before, perhaps freeing night-time up that was being used for playing catch-up so you can spend it as you see fit – slowing down to watch a sunset, or getting up to watch the sunrise can be done without feeling guilty for wasting time because everything else is taken care of.

Things To Remember When Selecting Free Time Management Software

Today, you can find almost anything available for free on the Internet. Free Time Management Software is available in the form of online-base tools. Many of these tools offer persuasive benefits, but you should be aware that web-based services could sometime become temporarily or permanently unavailable. This could result in partial or total loss of your valuable information. If you plan on using an online form of free time management software, you should take care to keep a backup of you information to protect yourself.

Fixed Versus Flexible Working Hours in Workforce Management

Flexible working hours have been found to lead to a happier workforce, and to far better customer service and share valuations. However, there is a fear that implementing flexible working hours is complicated and that it could lead to a flood of impossible demands from employees.

Before we look at flexible working hours in more detail, let us take a brief look at the standard working hours.

Working Hours for Employees

Working hours for employees have changed dramatically over the last two centuries. Back in the nineteenth century when industrialization started in Europe, workers were compelled to work even 16 hours a day. In twenty-first century France, however, the government had fixed working hours at 35 hours a week.

Most industrialized countries have regulated the workweek by stipulating the maximum number of working hours per week, minimum daily rest periods, annual holidays and sickness pay. The standard is around 40 working hours per workweek, typically Monday through Friday. Paid vacations range from three to five weeks a year.

Long working hours can lead to stress-related health problems, less time for busy parents to attend to child-rearing, and less leisure to enjoy consumer products and services. Henry Ford introduced low working hours so that his employees would have the leisure to buy and enjoy the cars he produced.

Flexible Working Hours and its Impact

One major problem with fixed working hours is that employees find it difficult to balance the demands of their personal lives and work lives. Flexible working hours can lead to better work/life balance and result in a happier workforce.

Flexible working hours can come in different forms such as:

Part-time working that enables an employee to be free during business hours to attend to personal matters. For employers, it could mean engaging employees during peak workload hours, and reducing overall payroll costs
Flexi-time working where employees work extra time when needed by employers and bank the extra hours/days off for arranging their personal commitments
Annualized hours is an arrangement where times worked and times off are balanced across the year as a whole. Extra hours are worked during peak business seasons and less during lean seasons. Employers can retain experienced employees instead of hiring inexperienced casual or contract staff
Customized flexible working hours during special events to enable employees watch, say, world cup matches and yet meet their work time requirements


Studies have indicated that flexible working hours produce tangible benefits to employers in the forms of:

Reduced absenteeism and employee turnover
Lower recruitment costs as they can retain their existing staff
Higher staff morale leading to better work performance, customer service and even company stock performance


A survey even revealed that employees preferred flexible working hours to substantial additional pay.

Implementing Flexible Working Hours

Employers must know when they have peak workloads, needing more employees. This is not too difficult to assess with today's technologies like EPOS and computerized systems that can record transaction times.

Once the requirements are identified, flexible rostering software can generate rosters to fit the workload. This software would then help to optimize the rosters to meet:

Work contract requirements
Sociability factors, and
Employee work preferences to the extent possible

Where employee preferences cannot be met in full, the software would show the employees why this happened. This creates greater trust in the employees that their needs are being genuinely attended to.

Conclusion

The standard practice so far has been fixed working hours arranged in different shifts. This can lead of difficulties in balancing employees' personal and work life demands. Flexible working hours help better work/life balance and lead to a happier workforce. A happier workforce results in less absenteeism, better customer service and higher stock performance.

Finding The Right Expense Management Solution For Your Company

In recent times, initiatives such as the Sarbannes Oxley Act in the US have dramatically raised the profile of compliance within the corporate world. As a key element of any corporate compliance policy, expense management has shared some of the limelight. As a result, an Expense Management Solution (EMS) is now critical to any business concerned with corporate compliance. But what is an Expense Management Solution (EMS)? Does your company need one? And where do you find a good one? Just as importantly, how do you successfully implement and integrate an Expense Management Solution (EMS) into your corporate environment. This article sheds some light on these issues.

What is an Expense Management Solution (EMS)?

The term “expense management solution” has been used to describe quite different commercial products and services. In the context of this article, an expense management solution is defined as a technology based system that processes:

(i) transaction records received from a credit card issuer (detailing employee use of corporate credit cards0; and

(ii) cash reimbursement claims originated by an employee.

In practice the target application is Travel and Entertainment expenditure. A robust Expense Management Solution (EMS) will also support procurement (pCard) activities as part of a broader strategy of effectively managing lower value, high volume business-to-business transactions.

The three core steps of any expense management process are:

1. the acceptance/input of validated source data;
2. the application of predetermined rules of handling expense records; and
3. the posting of transactions to a corporate repository such as an ERP system.

What is the purpose of an Expense Management Solution (EMS)?

The objectives of an expense management solution implementation should include the following:

1. to automate the preparation, submission, approval, and auditing of travel & entertainment claims, thus improving the productivity of account holders and reducing the time and cost of accounts staff;

2. to support the implementation of a standardized best practice method of managing high volume expenses through the use of corporate credit cards; and

3. to increase the transparency and enhance the governance of financial transactions conducted on behalf of the enterprise.

Sources of Expense Management Solutions

Australian and international organizations now have access to a range of quality expense management solutions which are well suited to driving down administration cost whilst meeting corporate compliance requirements. There are essentially three sources of “expense management solutions”:

1. ERP systems;
2. systems offered by card issuers; and
3. best-of-breed solutions.

Each will have their own merits and will suit organizations in different circumstances.

Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) Systems

ERP sourced expense management has the attraction of being fully integrated within the financial suite of software, therefore offering a standard look and feel to all users of the ERP. With ERP sourced expense management functionality, the ERP supplies the core software, and the enterprise needs to customize and configure the system to reflect its own structures and rules regarding the management of staff expenses. If you're considering the option of using their ERP for expense management, you need to be conscious of a number of factors, including:

• the actual functionality available within their specific installed ERP system;
• the backlog of work on the ERP system accumulated for the IT department; and
• the deployment time and the cost of the project (which will usually be substantial).
License costs can be an issue if an enterprise if your company has not paid a license fee that will cover all card account holders and cash claimants.

Card Issuer Systems

Some card issuers promote “expense management” solutions which can range from a computer generated report through to an online system with some embedded workflow concepts. The attraction of card issuer expense management solutions is that they are offered as part of a card deal, sometimes (apparently) for free. If you're considering a card issuer expense management solution, you need to know:

• will you be 'locked in' to the card issuer?; and
• will you be able to configure the expense management solution to adequately reflect internal requirements?

Best-of-Breed Solutions

Best-of-breed expense management solutions from specialist providers can be relatively seamlessly interfaced to an organization's internal systems such as HR and ERP, but will not present a common look and feel to the ERP system. You would usually choose a best-of-breed expense management solution if you want:

1. your company to be independent of a particular card issuer;
2. to achieve a fast implementation; and/or
3. to configure the solution to its own unique rules and policies of expense administration.

Best-of-breed expense management solutions are typically deployed as either an ASP (Application Service Provider) or self hosted solution. Although exceptions are common, small to medium enterprises tend to appreciate the lower up-front cost of an ASP expense management solution, and larger enterprises are attracted to the control available through a self-hosted expense management solution. ASP expense management solutions are typically paid for on a per statement per month basis, and self-hosted expense management solutions have a range of options available from up-front license fees to monthly license rentals.

Overcoming the Cultural Resistance to Expense Management Solutions

Some Finance Directors still have an aversion to corporate credit cards. It's not uncommon to hear a finance director say “if I give everyone a card, they'll spend us broke!”

However, the benefits of an Expense Management Solution are apparent as soon as the Finance Director considers the difficulties of controlling the expenditure behavior of thousands of employees using a manual system of reimbursements which is largely based around a set of uncoordinated spreadsheets. Basic activities such as enforcing travel policies, calculating tax implications, reconciling, posting to a chart of accounts at a detailed level and auditing, are so difficult as to be more honored in the breach than the observance...

Viewed from a different perspective, a company with revenues of $700m $50m in EBITDA, and $20m in annual employee business expenses, can make a dramatic impact on its bottom line using an expense management solution without increasing revenue. If automation reduces these expenses by only five per cent in the first year, the savings alone have the same impact on the bottom line as $14m in new revenue. It isn’t surprising that the return on investment of an expense management project is often achieved within its first 12 months of operation.

Expense Management Solutions also play a vital role in Fraud Control. “Fraud” in this context takes many guises, not all of which are the sort that land perpetrators in court. Information taken from our own customer experience and from publications of the USA Association of Certified Fraud Examiners identify the top four categories of fraud:

1. Mischaracterized expenses
2. Overstated (exaggerated) payments
3. Fictitious expenses
4. Multiple reimbursements

Research in the USA has pointed to as much as 1% of company revenues being lost to employee expense mismanagement. Expense Management Systems will not, in their own right, eliminate this but they are a vital tool in creating an environment that drives down the level of mismanagement.

Conclusion

Over the past 18 months, our company has observed a change in motivation for expense management projects. Whereas formerly expense management solutions were an exercise solely in the reduction of administration costs, now governance is equally a driver to implement technology based controls around high volume expenditure. The Sarbannes Oxley (SOX) act in the USA has captured the attention of any enterprise active in the USA. However, inside or outside the USA, the senior executives must warrant that their company has implemented adequate financial controls that prevent fraud and give a true and correct record of the enterprise’s financial activities. As a result, the Corporate Travel Manager who pitches a proposal on expense management to the senior executive team currently finds a willing audience.

Finding A Document Management Solution - In-House vs. Hosted Solutions

Before we get started, some of you may be asking what is document management?

Document Management is the ability to manage all of your paper documents in an electronic format. Let's define "paper documents in electronic format".

Basically, there are two types of document management systems, either an in-house solution, or an outsourced hosted solution.

So,which one will best suit your needs? Good question. Most companies base their decision on available staff to maintain these systems, and the technical abilities of those staff members. Cost of a solution is also a deciding factor. While the cost of an in-house solution is higher up front, having the technical staff to support it, it typically pays off in the long run due to the calculated Return On Investment (ROI). The lower cost of a hosted solution is appealing to many companies because this solution puts the technical responsibilities on the solution provider. It's also beneficial in that most of these solutions are web-based. While some companies can truly benefit from the hosted solution, many can't due to confidentiality of the information contained within their organization.

Finding a solution to fit your company's needs can be a time consuming venture. We recommend you first determine what solution fits your organization best, then shop for a solution with the features best suited to your business needs.

How much office space can I save? Good question. It depends on the amount of paper files you have taking up your valuable office space.

In most offices, there are filing cabinets everywhere. We've become attached and dependant on our paper files. Since most companies are mandated to hold their records from 3 to 7 years, that adds up to an exhaustive amount of paper needed to be maintained and stored. Where do you store it? In your office? A records storage company? What are those costs? All these questions lead this topic in a new direction. Why are you keeping these records in paper format? Why not an electronic format?

OK, let's look at some statistics. But before we do that, let's set the standard office environment so we have a reference point to start from. Now for the breakdown:

A typical filing cabinet drawer holds about 3000 pages when full.
So a full 4 drawer cabinet holds about 12000 pages.

A lateral file drawer holds about twice or 50% more files.
So a full 2 drawer lateral cabinet holds about 12000 pages.

The Simple Math

Ok, now that we know what we have in the space of our filing cabinets, let's look at space on storage media.

A standard 8 1/2 x 11 page scanned at 200x200 DPI (dots per inch) is about 50k in size (average)
There is 1024k in 1 megabyte of space.
There are 700 megabytes of space on a CD.
There are 4,700 megabytes of space on a DVD.

Ok, here's the simple math.

1,024k (1 megabyte) divided by 50k (standard scanned document) = 20.48 documents per megabyte
700 megabytes (1 CD) x 20 (scanned images per megabyte) = 14,000 documents per CD
4,700 megabytes (1 DVD) x 20 (scanned images per megabyte) = 94,000 documents per DVD

So here are the facts.

1 CD = 1 filing cabinet full of paper documents (12,000 documents)
1 DVD = 7 filing cabinets full of paper documents (84,000 documents)

Once these documents are scanned and placed on a CD or DVD (write once only media) they become legal documents that can be archived and retrieved later in the event you would like to print, fax, or email them.

Extracting Real Benefits From Travel & Expense Management

For your company to truly reap the rewards of a structured corporate travel policy, it must focus on one thing above all else: compliance. Unfortunately, while the explosion in convenient Self Booking Tools gives you a lot more freedom of choice, it also makes compliance a great deal more challenging. Any technology that supports an increase in compliance to policy has merit; it will save your company money and bring back the benefits of corporate travel.

Today's diversity of choice in self booking tools makes compliance through denial of access a very difficult protocol to enforce. What you really need is a funnel through which 100% of your company's travel activity must pass. In the corporate world, the only viable funnel is the payment mechanism – getting paid is the ultimate leveler. If you use a corporate credit card as the payment mechanism, supported by an expense management solution, and suppliers who can report back to you a reasonable level of data, you stand a very good chance of supporting the compliance objective.

A compliance-friendly Expense Management Solution (EMS)
An expense management solution which processes card transactions (and possesses decent workflow) requires the traveler to personally justify all deviations from policy to their supervisor – on a transaction by transaction basis. Just as importantly, the warehoused individual transactions give the corporate travel manager the opportunity to conduct spend analysis and examine individual and aggregate behaviors.

You might argue that this is after the act, but it still encourages compliance. As per all card based procurement systems, if an employee consistently deviates from company policy, they may be penalized (e.g. card withdrawal, official warning, employment termination, etc.). The threat of negative repercussions acts as a deterrent to card misuse, thereby increasing the level of compliance.

The benefits of policy compliance

80% of the business case benefits of corporate travel will come from travel policy compliance. This requires:

• Sound policy and procedures;
• A comprehensive communication strategy;
• A gate through which all activity can be channeled (the card and the expense management solution); and
• Tools to monitor and measure compliance.

There will also be some peripheral benefits to be gained from an expense management solution in the pre-trip phase:

For instance:

• The traveler can use the work flow component of an expense management solution to create travel request and approval records rather than using something less structured like emails.

• Using the expense management solution, the traveler can create a “commitment” record at the time of booking for subsequent matching of the credit card transaction when it comes through.

• You can obtain a download of trip data from your TMC, and travelers can seek to match that against trip card transactions, thus reducing the quantity of manual entries required of the travel coordinator.

• The expense management solution provides travelers with a real-time log of commitments beyond what might be recorded in a personal diary.

How does it apply to your company?

In looking at the business case for this exercise, you do need to closely examine a number of factors to determine the benefits you will actually realize:

• There are no industry-wide standards, and the market tends to work as a series of isolated closed provider loops – your efficiencies will be greatest if can conduct your business entirely within one closed loop. It is up to you to determine if you can obtain maximum purchasing power in this environment.

• The importance you place on understanding the cumulative value of travel booked but not yet paid.

• The extent to which you can source the data you require from your travelers via a TMC data feed and, consequently, the keystroke savings you can achieve for those travelers.

• The productivity gains you will obtain for your travelers by virtue of them setting up trip details in your Expense Management Solution (EMS) at time of booking rather than at time of arrival of the card transaction.

The combination of Electronic Travel Management and Expense Management is an important subset of eProcurement, and it is subject to the same challenges facing all eProcurement initiatives over the past 10 years – industry standards, supplier participation, and a seamless marketplace. Until these elements are all in place, greatest advantage will be gained by companies that focus on the big picture of where they can achieve maximum purchasing value with reasonable purchasing productivity – usually based on being able to perform an analysis of spend patterns and behavior.

Employee Performance Management

Fixation of compensation or wage rates for different categories of employees in a company is an important task of management. The employees are not only concerned with the wages received but also concerned with the level wages received by same level of employees in similar organizations. Hence wage structure may be considered very important. The relative wage-rules must be fixed carefully, because they have implications for promotion, transfer, seniority and other important personnel matters.

Wage plan should possess certain fundamental characteristics if the long term interests of the worker, management and the consumer are to be served. The wage plan must be linked with the productivity of the workers. Unless higher pay scales of workers are linked in some way to the productivity of workers, a wage plan will not be fair either to the management or to the consumers.

Basic wage for each job classification should be related to skill job requirements of job. Due consideration should be given to such factors as skill, length of time required in learning, versatility required and working conditions. In all fairness to management, the plan should usually result in a reduction of unit cost of manufacture, making possible lower prices and higher profits.

In all fairness to the consumers a share of higher efficiency should be passed on to them by way of lower price. This will be possible when there is reduction in cost due to higher efficiency. Thus the wage plan must ensure that all participate share the gains of higher productivity. The wage plan should include an incentive system for the efficient workers. The system should ensure higher pay to the workers who perform work at higher level of efficiency. The wage plan should guarantee minimum wage to protect the interest of workers against conditions over which they have no control.

Effective List Management Can Save You Big

Let’s talk about how to keep your postage costs down.

So far you have been following my advice and mailing to the same list more
than once. At some point you find lists that will produce returns continually, but you notice that you are receiving more returns than when you started mailing to those lists.

You may see things like "Undeliverable as Addressed" or "Forwarding Order Expired." Every time you mail to an address and that prospect has moved or cannot be found for any reason, you have just paid for the postage with no possibility of getting a response.

Obviously it is a pretty big waste of money to continue to mail to this address, but what do you do about it? You could simply go into the list of names that you have purchased and delete the returns. No more bad addresses, no more wasted postage, right? That is one option but there is a better way to handle the situation.

The US Postal Service has an NCOA (National Change of Address) System that a limited number of companies are licensed to access. These companies are able to take the list that you have purchased, or compiled yourself, and check it against the USPS system. You will receive a report that will let you know if anyone on your list has moved, gone out of business, or even if the zip code that contact was in was changed by the Post Office itself. Along with the report you will receive a new copy of your list that has been cleaned and updated.

The cost for having your list checked is very economical (about $5.00 per thousand records) and will allow you to keep getting your message out to as many people in your list as possible.

At times you can see up to a 10% undeliverable rate, and it can even be higher on older lists that you have been using for a while. Average is more like 5% undeliverable so let’s take a look at the numbers at that rate.

If you mail 10,000 and get 5% back for bad addresses: 10,000 x .05 = 500 pieces.

You will have paid postage on 500 pieces that did not reach their destination.

So if you mail to your list again without cleaning it you have just wasted: 500 x $0.23 = $115.00.

If you were to NCOA that list at a rate of $5.00 per thousand you would have spent: 10 x $5.00 = $50.00.

So you have three choices when faced with a list that needs cleaning:

1. Spend hours deleting every return that you receive from your list.

2. Waste $115.00 or more in postage every time you mail to that list.

or

3. Have the list checked by an NCOA service and get back in touch with customers that may have moved, for around one tenth the cost.

The NCOA service is the easiest and most effective way to keep your postage costs down.

Effective Data Management

Mining data is one of the keys to running an effective business. Here’s a primer on effectively managing your business data to maximize the efficiency of your business.

Effective data management plays an essential role for any growing business. Information technology has generated advanced tools for analyzing and managing data. Use of these tools can improve the performance of almost any operation. Steps made in capturing mass data electronically have developed the need for effective management strategies. Getting more and more data and transforming it into usable information is a major concern of today’s services and industries.

New technologies require new expertise, internal procedures and decision-making methods. Earlier companies were creating electronic databases, which were non-relational and difficult to use. Now with the use of highly sophisticated software and high-speed computers, businesses are reaping huge benefits from the computer/information revolution. Businesses are continuously making steps in managing data by using various tools to optimize information for sorting, searching and presentation in meaningful formats.

Many software programs and database applications are available on the market that enable companies to manipulate data in real time, capture knowledge for future use, ease the progress of operations to save time and costs and also to coordinate operations with partners.

The amount of data storage necessary and the duration it is kept online is growing swiftly, yet resources to manage data are limited. Data storage is a test to those companies wishing to maximize the value of their available data and also a huge task for storage professionals to manage and protect this data. Enterprises are struggling to bring together highly reliable platforms that can recognize where data is located in a company and whether it is utilized efficiently. Data management solutions must track, monitor and be vigilant of the conditions of your company data. It should also manage and distribute data efficiently. It should unify and simplify the administration of storage infrastructure.

Data is growing exponentially. Companies need maximum scalability, performance and production for data rigorous applications. They also need an easy to use, backup tool that provides transparency to where and how data and storage is utilized. Before choosing such and important process as data management, be sure to research your options and go with a solution that is flexible and scalable.