Application Type

Business Intelligence solutions enable professionals to access and analyze critical data that describes their enterprise and its markets. Business users take action based on this insight by marketing their products effectively, controlling costs, and identifying important internal and external trends so they can plan wisely. 

ACG specializes in partnering with clients to enhance the intellectual capacity of business and technical requirements for their business Intelligence needs.  This partnering relationship fosters the development of a systems that best addresses business and user needs.  These business solutions are often grouped into following application categories.

Dashboards and Scorecards

Dashboards and Scorecards are executive information systems that simplify and highlight complicated business data.  Key business metrics are typically highlighted in graphical manner with a simple user interface similar to way the dashboard in your car would highlight key vehicle metrics.  For example, by installing a dashboard on top of a complicated budgeting and planning database, the finance executives can quickly read and react based to budget variances based upon the latest financial data.

Corporate Performance Management

Corporate Performance Management (or CPM), is a marketing term which refers to a broad framework of business processes, metrics and technology systems to manage the overall corporate performance including daily operational activities.  CPM is similar to BPM, OPM, and EPM (Business Performance Management, Operational Performance Management, and Enterprise Performance Management) in the marketplace.   

In short, from a technology perspective, these systems take the wisdom gained from business Intelligence and integrate it with the overall business management process.  ACG can provide an array of solutions that allow companies to utilize this technology to make company's CPM vision a reality.

Master Data Management

Master Data Management (MDM) is the process of creating a single, unified view of the enterprise to allow for a precise unified view of customers, products, suppliers, inventory or even employees.  

There are a number of technology vendors that provide an "out-of-the-box” MDM solution. The underlying principle is that by using this technology with your existing applications (BI, CRM, ERP, etc.) you can maintain one business view that will then feed consistent, accurate and reliable data back into these systems. 

The real challenge to building a MDM environment is to determine exactly what constitutes a "customer" or a "partner" etc. and how to resolve discrepancies across business units.  For example, departments need to agree on hierarchies of customers and products and how to resolve inconsistencies.  In addition they need to determine the new business process for ongoing maintenance and ownership of the data.

The root of the MDM problem is in how and where the data is created.  It is no surprise that, no software is going to magically solve your enterprise's data problems overnight.  ACG can help by analyzing your business processes, data sources, and current systems without nepotism. We can then provide recommendations and implementation assistance for your organization to migrate to an integrated MDM solution.

Budgeting and Planning

Budgeting and Planning are the heart and soul of CPM.  Given its importance and the wide variety of companies that require it, ACG is experienced in providing solutions for an array of leading products, such as Oracle Financial Analyzer, Oracle EPB, Hyperion Essbase, Microsoft PerformancePoint Server, and Cognos TM1

ACG’s budgeting and planning practice consists of experienced staff with deep finance and business skills, a thorough understanding of budgeting applications and strong technical expertise including the customization and application extensions.  Our team will have senior members that are experts in areas ranging from GAAP Financial Reporting, P&L Analysis, Activity Based Costing, to database server tuning, sparsity management.

ACG’s goal is to assist our clients in successfully achieving their project objectives in the fastest and most efficient manor possible.  Our approach focuses on rapid design and implementation.  We believe in understanding your vision, and combining specific requirements with best practices that ACG has adopted based on our implementation experience.  Our typical implementation far exceeds the initial stated requirements due to the value-added ideas that our consultants bring to the engagement.

CRM

In the past just having a Customer Relationship Management system was a competitive advantage. Today, times have changed and everyone has jumped on the CRM bandwagon. Having a CRM strategy is a necessity just to keep up. Companies must adopt a broader vision, one that brings together sales automation, marketing, operations, business culture, and analytical functions into one integrated system. A truly useful CRM application must be integrated with several other initiatives throughout your corporation to add value.

If you've done any serious investigation of CRM products, you already know the truth. One size does not fit all. All corporate systems evolve over time and include many unique business practices. Trying to make use of a canned CRM package ignores your company's approach to doing business and fails to leverage the value of experience. Fitting a square peg into a round hole has never proven effective. Customization is the answer. Unfortunately, many times this realization comes too late and attempts at customizing your software are incomplete. The end result is an expensive Calendar and Notes application that does not take your company's experience into account and provides no real added value.

ACG can help you navigate these difficult waters with our team of experienced consultants who have worked on some of the largest CRM implementations in the country with extraordinary success. With a proven methodology, our management team will uncover the uniqueness of your business and document its business rules and the interaction between all your corporate systems. With a technical team experienced in all the latest technologies, ACG will implement the appropriate solution on the proper platform to take advantage of the way you do business, not the way everyone else does. Our goal is to help you implement a unique solution that captures your corporate spirit while recapturing that strategic advantage.

To learn more about solutions with ACG and finding the right product for your company, contact info@acgi.com.