Productivity
Off-the-shelf application software no more. Tailor mine.
Summary: What if application software vendors could perfectly fit their prospect’s requirements? What if application software users could customize their software to fit their ever-changing needs? This article explains how to accomplish both.
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Off-the-shelf application software no more. Tailor mine.Read More »
3 examples of wildly productive IT departments
On our 2013 survey, we asked this question: “What problems keep you from accomplishing your goals?” In other words, what stops your company from addressing all of those pressing needs on your to-do list?
Can you guess the most common answer? For the third year in a row, the winner was…time! No one has enough time.
Now, I get it. Many IT staffs are overworked and understaffed. They have too much on their plate. There’s just not enough time in the day to tackle all of their “urgent” projects.
But, then I read stories like the ones below, and wonder if the issue isn’t a “lack of time” so much as it is an “inefficient use of time.” For instance, here are 3 great examples of IT departments completing big projects in impossible time frames:
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6 keys to a high-performing IT department
Do you want to hear a shocking statistic? According to Forrester Research, 70% of the companies listed on the Fortune 1,000 list ten years ago have now vanished. The reason: an inability to adapt to change.
As modern technology evolves, we’re seeing a shift in the business world. In the age of the web, business agility trumps size. More and more, the ability to adapt to change is critical to a company’s success.
From a technology perspective, this means that IT departments must evolve. Keeping the lights on is no longer good enough. These days, IT must innovate. They must move quickly. They must drive business forward.
However, this is impossible with slow or inefficient IT departments. The question is…how can IT departments become more efficient? What’s needed to create a high-performance IT department that actually pushes the business forward?
We posed those questions to a few successful IT leaders, who delivered some great advice that you can find below. If you want to create a high-performing IT department, you must:
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Modernization with limited resources
Modernization. It sounds like such a daunting task. Just the thought of converting old systems into new, modern systems is enough to make IT executives cringe in fear.
Bimba Manufacturing knew that modernization was a big job, and that their IT staff didnâ??t have the time or the capabilities to take on a big modernization project. In fact, they even looked into ways to put a “bandaid” on their old solution until more time and resources became available. Then, they discovered m-Power. …
m-Power: The modern CIO’s trump card
The modern Chief Information Officer (CIO) faces a daunting task. Gone are the days of simply supporting the business. Gone are the days of hard-to-use technology that’s controlled solely by the IT department.
These days, the expectations placed on the IT department are at an all time-high. CEOs and business executives now demand more business value from the IT department. Tech-savvy end users now bring personal devices and consumer applications into the workplace. All the while, technology continually evolves at a quickening pace.
These days, the modern CIO faces a growing list of challenges. For instance–while their challenges vary by company–most modern-day CIOs must: …
8 advanced BI features that many businesses overlook
When you hear the term, “Business Intelligence”, what pops in your head? Flashy charts and graphs? Executive dashboards? Interactive reports?
If so, you’re certainly not alone. I’d wager that most people associate BI with one or all of those terms. The fact is, those are some of the most common features of Business Intelligence solutions. In fact, I would even add mobile apps to that list. These days, any BI solution worth its salt will include mobile application options.
That being said, I’d like to take a step past those common BI features. Any BI solution will give you charts and graphs. They will all provide dashboards and reports. What features separate the ordinary BI solution from the extraordinary?
Today, I’d like to focus on a few of the more advanced, yet often overlooked BI features. These are features that you may ignore at the time of purchase, only to realize you need when it’s too late. These are the features that will add enormous value to your company, and could even make or break your BI project. So, without further ado, here are 8 advanced BI features that you can’t afford to overlook: …
8 advanced BI features that many businesses overlookRead More »
Build web-based pivot tables (and more) without programming
If your development process is too slow, or if you just want to build web applications without programming, you should really sign up for a free m-Power Trial. It’s completely free, and guides you through the process of creating enterprise web applications using m-Power.
Here’s the best part: We’ve recently updated the m-Power Trial with additional guides to walk you through the creation of even more types of web applications! Now, Trial users can build any (or all) of these web app types:
1. Web-based pivot tables (like this example),
2. Interactive reports (like this example),
3. Database CRUD applications (like this example), and
4. Database lookup applications (like this example).
Each application only takes about 15-30 minutes to build, and the whole process is entirely point-and-click. Want to get started? Sign up for a free m-Power Trial right here.
4 steps to create a more agile IT department
Many IT departments have developed a reputation of being slow and difficult. They make users jump through hoops and then take months to deliver requested solutions. The business users often feel like IT stands in their way, or even holds them back.
The problem is, business users now have other options. Many are bypassing IT altogether and using unsanctioned SaaS options to accomplish their goals. If IT can’t (or won’t) deliver solutions in a timely manner, they find another way.
IT departments have no choice: They must become more agile and responsive to the business user’s needs, or risk being bypassed.
The question is…how? How can a slow IT department become more agile and responsive?
We posed that question to a few industry experts, who delivered some excellent advice. You can read their tips below, as well as some of my own. I hope you find them useful: …
Building an executive dashboard over an aging ERP system
If your company runs on an aging ERP system or has difficulty connecting disparate data sources, here’s a great success story you’ll want to read. A manufacturing company needed a centralized place to access reports on the web. The challenge: It needed to integrate with their aging ERP system and pull data from 9 separate plants. The additional challenge: No one on their IT staff had any experience building web applications.
The result: They built a custom, web-based executive dashboard that pulled data from their 9 separate plants and integrated with their ERP system…in just 12 weeks. To find out how they did it, you can read the whole story right here.