To maximize the potential of their investments, businesses must manage product information, yet for many businesses product information is scattered and duplicated in many systems, which leads to duplication of effort, incorrect information about product descriptions and prices and improper tracking of products, all of which increase costs and waste time. At the same time, for marketing products and streamlining their distribution through sales channels, making product information accessible to...
Read More
Topics:
Master Data Management,
Sales,
Sales Performance,
Supply Chain Performance,
Operational Performance,
Business Performance,
CIO,
Customer & Contact Center,
Information Management,
Commerce,
Product Information Management
I recently started a series of blog posts on what CEOs (and for that matter, all senior corporate executives) need to know about IT. The first covered the high-level issues. As I noted there, it’s not necessary for a CEO of a company to be able to write Java code or master the intricacies of an ERP or sales compensation application. However, CEOs must grasp the basics of IT just as they must understand basic corporate finance, the production process and – at least at a high level – the...
Read More
Topics:
Big Data,
Mobile,
SaaS,
Sales Performance,
Social Media,
Supply Chain Performance,
Customer,
ERP,
Operational Performance,
Business Analytics,
Business Collaboration,
Business Performance,
Cloud Computing,
Complex Event Processing,
Customer & Contact Center,
Financial Performance,
In-memory,
Information Management,
Workforce Performance,
CFO,
CEO,
PaaS
I’ve been examining how corporations plan and budget for more than decade. One clear pattern that has emerged is the difficulty that using desktop spreadsheets imposes on the process. Ventana Research recently published findings from our trends in business planning benchmark research, and the research once again confirms this observation. It shows that companies that use dedicated applications are consistently more satisfied (and much less dissatisfied) with the software they use than users of...
Read More
Topics:
Big Data,
Planning,
Sales Performance,
Supply Chain Performance,
Office of Finance,
Reporting,
Budgeting,
driver-based,
Operational Performance,
Business Performance,
Customer & Contact Center,
Financial Performance,
Workforce Performance,
Financial Performance Management,
Integrated Business Planning
Business analytics has become the highest ranked technology innovation, according to our benchmark research on business technology innovation, but a lack of trained resources and inefficient technology have hampered the best of organizations when they attempt to roll out analytics. Our benchmark research on business analytics in 2012 found that the majority of analysts in organizations spend more of their time on data-related activities than on analytic tasks, and our 2013 research on business...
Read More
Topics:
Big Data,
Sales Performance,
Social Media,
Supply Chain Performance,
Narrative Science,
Operational Performance,
Business Analytics,
Business Collaboration,
Business Intelligence,
Business Performance,
CIO,
Cloud Computing,
Customer & Contact Center,
Financial Performance,
Information Applications,
Information Management,
Workforce Performance,
Expert Systems,
Digital Technology
Read More
Topics:
Sales Performance,
Social Media,
Supply Chain Performance,
IT Performance,
Operational Performance,
Business Intelligence,
Business Performance,
CIO,
Customer & Contact Center,
Financial Performance,
Information Applications,
Information Management,
Location Intelligence,
Operational Intelligence,
Twitter,
Workforce Performance,
CMO,
COO,
Industry Analyst,
Technology Vendors
Read More
Topics:
Sales Performance,
SAP,
Social Media,
Supply Chain Performance,
Peoplefluent,
Planview,
Research,
Splunk,
IT Performance,
Operational Performance,
Business Analytics,
Business Collaboration,
Business Intelligence,
Business Performance,
CIO,
Cloud Computing,
Customer & Contact Center,
Financial Performance,
IBM,
Information Applications,
Information Management,
Location Intelligence,
Operational Intelligence,
Workforce Performance,
Ceridian,
CFO,
CMO,
COO,
Datawatch,
Saba,
Technology
The business/IT divide is a barrier that prevents most companies from achieving their true performance potential. The divide has remained a constant impediment since the dawn of business computing six decades ago. It’s not necessary for a CEO of a company to be able to write Java code or master the intricacies of an ERP or sales compensation application. However, that CEO must master the basics of IT just as he must understand basic corporate finance, the production process and – at least at a...
Read More
Topics:
Big Data,
Performance Management,
Sales Performance,
Supply Chain Performance,
Human Capital Management,
competition,
executive,
Operational Performance,
Business Performance,
CIO,
Cloud Computing,
Customer & Contact Center,
Financial Performance,
In-memory,
Workforce Performance,
CFO,
IT,
CEO,
FPM
People have been complaining about the budgeting and planning processes in their organizations for decades. If you’re old enough, you may recall President Carter’s failed attempt to use something called zero-based budgeting to impose discipline in federal outlays. (In his first year in office the federal government reported a whopping $54 billion deficit.) Some complaining is almost inevitable, but some reflects the one-way nature of the process. People spend time on creating a budget and don’t...
Read More
Topics:
Big Data,
Planning,
Sales Performance,
Supply Chain Performance,
Office of Finance,
Reporting,
Budgeting,
driver-based,
Operational Performance,
Business Performance,
Customer & Contact Center,
Financial Performance,
Workforce Performance,
Financial Performance Management,
Integrated Business Planning
Organizations engage in a range of forward-looking activities. Sales organizations have pipelines to forecast sales. Manufacturing organizations set and reset demand plans and near-term production schedules, often in response to longer-term production plans that determine what they will make and where and how they will make it. Logistics people plan inbound and outbound shipments. Marketing departments plan advertising and promotion campaigns. HR departments project staffing requirements and...
Read More
Topics:
Big Data,
Planning,
Sales Performance,
Supply Chain Performance,
Office of Finance,
Reporting,
Budgeting,
driver-based,
Operational Performance,
Business Performance,
Customer & Contact Center,
Financial Performance,
Workforce Performance,
Financial Performance Management,
Integrated Business Planning
The idea of devising and using maturity assessments to improve business performance has been a staple of management, functional and strategic consultants for decades. It’s based on two unassailable principles. One is the general assertion that companies differ in their ability to do anything along a range from nonexistent to advanced. The second is that at any time it’s possible for a knowledgeable individual to construct a scale of competence for some business function from least to most...
Read More
Topics:
Performance Management,
Sales Performance,
Social Media,
Supply Chain Performance,
Customer Experience,
Governance,
IT Performance,
Operational Performance,
Business Analytics,
Business Collaboration,
Business Intelligence,
Business Performance,
Cloud Computing,
Customer & Contact Center,
Financial Performance,
Governance, Risk & Compliance (GRC),
Information Applications,
Information Management,
Location Intelligence,
Operational Intelligence,
Workforce Performance,
benchmark,
FPM