Measuring Your Success with Enterprise Software

Companies need to constantly measure key performance indicators (KPIs) to ensure that they are achieving their operational and financial goals. Over the last few weeks, we have discussed how best-in-class organizations use enterprise software to become more profitable. One of those best-practices is that these companies can measure their performance and understand how their actions help them to reach business goals.  In fact, best-in-class distributors and wholesalers are twice as likely as their peers to use KPIs to track their business success.

In our first blog on this subject, (See How Do Your Business Systems Compare to Best-in-Class?), we showed that best-in-class companies have better inventory accuracy, timeliness and profit margins than their peers. These organizations understand the importance of monitoring their performance so that they can act to improve their operations using enterprise software. Best-in-class wholesalers and distributors are twice as likely to have a centralized repository for metrics and KPIs. They also provide instant access to the KPIs with a user interface that is tailored to the employee’s needs.

Top-performing companies use business intelligence integrated with their enterprise software to provide real-time insight into key processes and data. ERP systems like Sage EM (formerly known as Sage X3) and Sage 300cloud (formerly known as Sage 300) provide tools for analyzing, fine-tuning and improving business processes. Insight into business information and data is a high priority, but this is not the only value of business intelligence. Let’s look at four benefits of business intelligence integrated with your business systems.

Increased access to business information with enterprise software

Enterprise software can provide you with a clear understanding of the transactional history in your database so you can forecast and plan for your business’ future. The amount of data and business information that needs to be processed grows on a daily basis, and companies have no way of keeping up. With limited time and resources to sift through and analyze data, many companies miss out on key opportunities they could have gleaned from their business information and data.

With integrated business intelligence, you can:

• Generate reports automatically from real-time data in your company’s databases, improving your visibility and allowing you to see what goes on in your company at any given minute of the day.
• Drill down within your reports to quickly examine the underlying data to certain metrics and take corrective measures, if necessary.
• View dashboard reports to understand the current state of your company’s goals. These dashboards will display current metrics and key performance indicators (KPIs) in graphs so trends are instantly visible.
• Run standard reports and customize these according to your requirements or create your own reports.
• Customize reports to combine information from a variety of sources (including your ERP, CRM and HR software solutions).

Time savings and increased productivity

Business intelligence can help automate the reporting process so your employees can focus their attention elsewhere. Using enterprise software, reports can be created using real-time information at the click of a button, and data is delivered in pre-formatted spreadsheets and dashboards so executives can drill-down into transaction details.

Users can also automate a variety of management reports so business executives get real-time, accurate, and well-presented reports to assist with their decision-making. This eliminates the need to sift through massive amounts of data and information to get a simple answer. By automating and streamlining the reporting process with your enterprise software, executives can get the answers they need to make effective decisions for the business. By providing real-time reports on demand, business intelligence increases productivity, saves time, and allows companies to using the data and information in their system more effectively.

Improved decision-making 

As we mentioned above, business intelligence can positively impact business managers’ ability to make effective decisions for the company. With real-time information at your fingertips using enterprise software, you can see business trends and make estimates based on facts. Business intelligence also encourages collaboration across the business, giving more people access to the information they need to make better decisions, faster. This insight increases productivity and creates a more proactive environment across the business so you can take advantage of opportunities early on.

Immediate return on investment (ROI) 

By investing in business intelligence and enterprise software, your business can increase its visibility, improve operational efficiencies, streamlines processes, and increase productivity. All of this combined will give you a rapid ROI and help you realize your strategic vision.

If you would like to implement enterprise intelligence and measurement into your business practices using enterprise software, give us a call today. For more information on using business intelligence as a tool to achieve better performance, download our whitepaper, ERP in Wholesale and Distribution: A Logical Solution to Logistical Challenges.

Our small and dedicated team specializes in helping small-to-medium size Canadian businesses and non-profits select and adapt Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP), Customer Relationship Management (CRM), Human Resource Management (HRMS), and IT services. With IWI’s 15 years in business and 100 plus years of combined experience, IWI has helped hundreds of food manufacturing, distribution, and financial service companies gain efficiency, grow, and lower their operating costs.

With the unique combination of industry knowledge and diverse technology expertise, IWI provides cost-effective solutions to help clients gain a competitive edge.  As a Sage business partner servicing the Greater Toronto Area, we support evaluation and implementation of operations and finance systems to optimize technology, ensuring high return on investment with a quick and painless transition to new software.