GI Solutions Group is a rapidly evolving marketing support services group with three divisions: GI Direct, which manages the complete direct mail production process; GI Insight, a database marketing organisation, managing customer analysis, retention and development; and GI Solutions, providing print management and print procurement.
Being in the data handling business itself, GI understands the value of being able to interpret key data clearly and quickly. However, with various legacy systems, business acquisitions and the creation of new divisions, the need emerged to improve the monitoring of all aspects of business operational activities. In addition, being able to monitor and identify exceptions is critically important to the GI management team in measuring performance against its ISO Quality and Environmental Standards accreditations. In this fast-evolving and rapidly growing business environment, there was therefore an urgent requirement for managers to be able to gain real-time access to key operational and financial data, in a format that was easy to assimilate and to act upon.
GI identified Active Dashboards as providing a cost-effective solution that solved all of these challenges. The initial focus was on monitoring order intake and the status of sales enquiries. Displaying this data on-screen using clear graphical representations of performance against targets and showing trends over time offered the opportunity for better planning and use of resources to improve response time. CASE STUDY MARKETING SERVICES SECTOR Active Dashboards
In a business where service levels are critical, being able to monitor activity in real time without wading through pages of numbers makes a real difference to our customer service levels and to our conversion rates.
Robin Welch, Group Managing Director
Implementation was conducted by an expert Dynistics consultant, working closely with GI’s IT team. This process identified the areas where the initial deployment could have the greatest impact and how this could be achieved. For GI, this meant retrieving and presenting financial information from its existing Pegasus Opera II financial system and production figures from an existing in-house Microsoft SQL database. Active Dashboards integrate seamlessly with both and immediately produced real-time accessible data, which the whole business could view, interpret and act upon. During the implementation process, the IT function was provided with the support they needed to develop their in-house skills so that they would be able to produce new dashboards as future requirements emerged. “The smoothness of the implementation process has been impressive”, comments Group Managing Director Robin Welch, “I’ve been able to see the data I need, and in the way I’d like to see it, from day one.”
“The capability of Active Dashboards to work with data that has been created using different software, in some cases proprietary, in other cases completely bespoke, has been a key strength,” says Andy Jackson, Database and Development Manager. “We’ve not found anything that Active Dashboards can’t ‘talk to’ easily and that flexibility is proving to be invaluable.” Active Dashboards are now being taken into the production environment. “Currently, compiling production summary statistics and then printing and displaying these on notice boards is a time-consuming, wasteful process, and the data is quickly out of date,” says Simon Lisser, Financial Controller. “The plan is to introduce plasma screens onto the production floor to show KPIs in real time, using Active Dashboards. This will increase efficiency and cut out reams of reports that are currently printed, reducing our carbon footprint and upholding our ISO environmental commitments.” The way in which the sales and customer service teams respond to orders and to enquiries has been trans- formed, as a direct result of seeing data more clearly in Active Dashboards. “The impact has been immediate”, says Simon. “And reaction has been positive throughout the business. As a result I genuinely believe we can now do things that our competitors can’t.” Group MD Robin Welch sums up the benefit of Active Dashboards: “I can now obtain a clear picture of our key business indicators at a glance. In the past I had to ask someone to provide me with that information, now on-screen I can see the real-time position for myself.”
Rapid return on investment through productivity & efficiency gains. Quicker responses to issues, dashboards providing an ‘early warning system’. Higher service levels, through better responses to clearly displayed data. Improved information sharing, with data from different systems displayed in a standard format. Reduced carbon footprint, eliminating the need for thousands of printed reports.
All the critical information about our business is displayed on the one screen using clear graphics, without having to access each of the software applications where the information is stored – a simple but brilliant solution.