Business Consultants

Archive for July, 2009

In many companies, most of the company seems to operate by a completely different set of rules and communicate in a different language than those the IT or computer services sector of the business. This division is somewhat artificial and partially maintained by the IT people themselves because of a certain culture technical people have about their specialized knowledge and application areas. But at heart, those strange people down in IT have the same goals as every other business person which is to succeed both personally and corporately in shared projects.

But those of us on the business side of the corporate landscape depend on the computer folks to let us know how things are going with that highly valuable asset that we have in our IT systems, hardware and software. Most medium to large businesses run very high capacity computers or multitudes of computers connected through a network and those systems must perform at top capacity each day to accomplish the goals of the business.

The upgrade and maintenance budgets for the computers that run your business no doubt represents a fairly sizable percentage of the corporate budget each year. But because those systems are what make you competitive in the marketplace, that investment is worth the money to assure that the mission critical jobs those powerful systems do get done on time each week and month.

When a computer begins to show signs of straining under the load of work, we are giving it, that can be a cause of significant concern for a business. If your business paradigm dictates that the load of traffic or system resources could be pushed to beyond what the computers can do with their existing computing power, that weakness in the IT infrastructure represents a significant risk to the company should the system become overloaded when there is a large body of work to be done by these machines.

What not every business person knows is that there may be a hidden goldmine of computing capacity already resident in your IT resources that simply is not being tapped to its fullest. You know that it isn’t uncommon for your IT professionals to report that your systems are at 80-90% capacity and must be upgraded to handle the next big increase in business.

That hidden goldmine is a discipline that has actually been around for quite sometime but is infrequently tapped in the modern business world. That discipline is called “capacity planning”. By implementing a capacity planning office and monitoring function, you can put the tools and the talent in place to precisely measure scientifically if your computer systems are at capacity of if there is just a need for system tuning or realignment of computing schedules to get more out of the systems you already own.

Recently a large oil company in the Midwest noted that many of its mission critical functions were being delayed in processing, seemingly because the computer systems were overloaded and in dire need of an expensive and time consuming upgrade. Capacity planning measurements were taken and the system was diagnosed to determine what the real problem was and it was found that job priorities of new functions were not tuned to the load of the system at critical time frames. The adjustments were made by talented systems administrators and the IT infrastructure continued to perform at top-notch capacity and the delays were eliminated with no additional hardware or upgrades needed.

By utilizing capacity planning software tools and enabling your IT team to take advantage of this highly scientific computer measurement and prediction method, the business can get the most out of its computer resources and use its corporate resources to further the business objectives of the company. And that benefits everyone.

It does not matter what project you are going to undertake. It is not important what industry you are going to be assessing. What is important is you know what you are going to do. You must as questions. You must find what it is the client wants. Presented is a list of obvious questions every good business analyst should know the answer to when starting a project.

1. What problem is this business having that you hope to solve by developing this project? It should be obvious as to why you would ask that question. If you do not understand what the problem is then you can not help to solve it. Also, when reading the project program it may not be clear as to what the client actually wants. The scope may only tell you what they would like to see happen. It could and often times is not focused on what the true issues are.

2. What is the business doing at present to alleviate or solve the issue? What has been tried in the past? You must understand what the client is doing in order to understand what must be done. You do not want to develop a project plan overview only to have someone tell you it has been tried. Listen to the customer. Find out what they have done. Ask questions while you are listening. On your toes brainstorming so to speak. Listen to what has not worked.

3. What inside resources will this project be utilizing? What outside resources will be necessary? You will want to determine where your help and team players are coming from. You may be familiar with most of the IT, but if the client wants to outsource it is a different game. You may have to make a list of external interactions. Define the company’s strengths and weaknesses. This can be most advantageous.

4. Have you determined a vision for the project? The business analyst will compare this scope with the one he or she will develop to ensure consistencies and a parallel outlook. In other words make sure you are on the same path. This is sometimes easier said than done. Communication is the key to success with this question.

5. What risks to you foresee and are you willing to take them? A conservative client may not be inclined to take large risks. Getting them to be specific can help when generating the project program. You may also be able to overcome some of their fears or doubts by explaining the risk factor more thoroughly.

6. Are you under any type of time constraint? There has to be a set time frame for the outcome. A goal can be reached for any project if time is not a factor. Most clients have time constraints which affect every avenue of business. You will want to know what these are and plan accordingly.

7. What is the projected cost of the program? An aggressive business analyst may be blunt and honest by wording the question like this. What is the projected budget and can it be deviated from? There are times certain steps must be taken which can cause a project to run over budget. Other plans of action may not need implemented because management was not fully aware of certain assets available. It is best to know exactly what is going into this project for the project program to succeed.

8. Who is the end user? What support will they have? You will need to know this in order for the program to even fulfill it’s purpose. Marketing data must also be collected to incorporate what the end user is asking for. The goal is to reach the objective with everyone satisfied. A business analyst can not do this without talking and listening to everyone involved.

Catalog retail is a world all it’s own. Many considerations that other retailers don’t have to deal with are of utmost importance to a catalog retailer. To name a few, the ordering process, warehousing and shipping must be streamlined for maximum efficiency. Maintaining a top notch inventory control and receiving department is also very crucial to business success. Above all, however, a catalog retailer must have a quality business phone system.

Considering the fact that the majority of customers will reach you over the phone, it is paramount to be able to not only handle call volume during peak times, but also to provide your customers service representatives with the features they need to do their job well. Business phone systems should be capable of not only putting your customers in touch with you, but also offer routing flexibility, voicemail and forwarding options for the administrative side of your company. Often, the difference maker for catalog retailers is not the products they sell, but the service behind those products. People who want to buy will have questions regarding an item that a simple picture and brief description will not answer. Most companies have service reps who take orders and product specialists who are familiar with the inventory.

It is essential for the product specialists to have access to a phone system that will accurately and easily allow them to receive and transfer calls between departments. After the initial contact by the sales representatives, the most common transfer of waiting customers will be to product specialists and hopefully back to the sales reps. A customer who is dropped accidentally during this transfer is likely to not call back. Additionally, customers who are made to hold for extended periods of time without an automated message thanking them for their patience are a primary example of lost revenue that could be curtailed by the proper business phone system. All in all, a well thought out business phone system is an integral necessity for any company, but it is especially important for catalog retailers.