selecting a performance management solution built on...

Selecting a Performance Management Solution Built on Leading Technology

Prepared By Prophix Software

2012


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Executive SummaryIn today’s market, businesses are challenged to be more effective at identifying, defining, tracking, and acting upon key performance indicators (KPIs). Especially with recent changes to financial reporting legislation, the finance department requires flexible, yet powerful analytical tools to increase visibility to operational drivers. Performance Management solutions are now becoming a global initiative amongst businesses to accomplish these goals in order to allow executives to take more strategic and tactical actions.

Implementing new solutions usually have the perceived implications of heavy IT reliance and extensive installation and maintenance. However, best-of-breed Performance Management solutions incorporate the technology that minimizes IT resource requirements, extends the sense of data ownership, promotes collaboration, and offers low total cost of ownership.

The following sections provide a detailed explanation of key business needs and the corresponding technology solutions that best-in-class companies have implemented to remove the responsibility of powerful performance management from IT. Instead, business finance users become accountable for their own data analysis and gain the ability to create and monitor their own drivers.

The successful adoption of a best-in-class performance management solution is based on the solution’s ability to meet the specific business needs of an organization. While the solution requirements may vary from organization to organization, it is vital that these are met by the performance management application—ensuring an ongoing return on investment.

The software solution is meant to facilitate better planning and decision making by streamlining the planning, budgeting, and reporting process as well as enhancing analytical capabilities. Specifically, the solution should meet the following business needs:

• Shorten budgeting, reporting, and forecasting business cycles• Remove the complexities associated with Excel based-budgeting, planning,

and reporting• Eliminate manual data manipulation• Enable in-depth data analysis• Increase visibility on key performance indicators via dashboards and

scorecard management reports• Analyze and monitor plans, budgets, forecasts via variance and exception

reporting

Business Needs


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• Provide the ability to model and adjust business processes quickly and easily (centrally manage user and administrator modeling capabilities)

• Data entry template and report routing through inherent workflow and approval processes

• Provide role-based user security• “What-if ” and scenario-based capabilities• Drill-down and drill through analysis capabilities• Ability to store and execute repeatable business processes, e.g. allocations• Capacity to grow as business assumptions and business models change

An integrated business performance management solution helps organizations spend less time gathering, assembling, and validating data and more time analyzing budgets, forecasts, and key performance metrics that drive the growth of the business. In day-to-day use of the system, a key success factor is the overall technical architecture that supports the system and its ongoing use. The selected technology can either aid or hinder the successful implementation of a solution.

Today, an organization’s adoption of best practice financial planning and management processes are generally constrained by the chosen technology, user acceptance, and the ability to satisfy business needs. Many organizations leverage a series of linked Microsoft Excel worksheets to prepare annual operating cost budgets, quarterly expense forecasts, and long term strategic financial plans. Budget data is generally loaded into the general ledger system for monthly variance reporting and analysis while forecasted financial and operational data is kept within Excel models for high-level variance analyses.

Due to the challenges associated with developing and maintaining Microsoft Excel models, organizations devote significant amounts of time and resources to the collection and manipulation of data required to produce budgets, forecasts, and performance reports.

Many planning and reporting systems in place are not sufficiently scalable, do not offer functionality required for a dynamic organization, and are too demanding on organizational resources. Best-in-class organizations recognize that upgraded technologies enable the company to more effectively manage their business. Implementing best practices fill key planning and financial management information gaps and maximize opportunities to increase productivity. To support such requirements, the performance management solution should incorporate the following best-of-breed technology components:

Technology Required to Support Business Needs


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1. Open Connectivity Platform Open connectivity platforms, including the database, source, and target systems, such as SharePoint, permits seamless data flow.

2. OLAP TechnologyBuilt-in OLAP database services empower users to perform in-depth analysis in a GUI and with great speed.

3. Data Integration Seamless data integration to multiple sources i.e. Excel, text, flat files, ODBC connectivity allows connectivity to all data sources as well as output using many standards.

4. Central ApplicationFor the maintenance of dimensions, hierarchies, business drivers, business rules, and workflow procedures a central application exists—data refreshes automatically and immediately recalculates to provide a single reporting and planning platform without extraneous integration.

5. Scalability Various deployment and data scenarios allow organizations to distribute its logical tiers to several servers and provide instant flexibility for adding new business units and end users and making business model changes without sacrificing performance.

6. Low Maintenance Centrally managed end-user profiles and no programming requirements for modeling, querying, etc. is best to minimize IT support development for ongoing application administration.

7. Role-based Security User/role-based security to apply multi-level security at the cell and account level allows administrators to control exactly what end users can see or plan.

8. Workflow Sophisticated workflow capabilities route budget templates, standardized reports, enable review and approval processes and provide complete auditing and tracking capabilities.

9. Automation Center An inherent process manager center allow end users to set up a defined set of business rules for accomplishing specific business process without any prior computer programming knowledge and run them on a manual or scheduled basis.


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10. Spreadsheet interfaceThe spreadsheet is still the most widely adopted and understood user interface; planning and reporting solutions must include a user interface comfortable to users.

An all-in-one performance management solution that encompasses full integration, scalability, limited maintenance and reliable security best supports the needs of the business user and increases adoption rates. Prophix satisfies the business needs of the day-to-day finance end-users while minimizing the ongoing maintenance and support requirements from the IT department. Figure 1, “Business Requirements Matched to Required Technology,” summarizes the inherent technology utilized by Prophix that meets the needs of the entire organization.

Figure 1. Business Requirements Matched to Required Technology

Business Requirement Supporting Technology

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Shorten Budgeting, Forecasting, and Reporting cycles • • • • • • •Remove reliance on Excel based-budgeting, planning, and reporting (maintenance, Excel too complicated)

• • • • • • • • •

Eliminate manual data manipulation • • • • •Value-added analysis (increase) • • • • • •Availability to monitor KPIs via dashboards • • • •Monitor and analyze plans, budgets, forecasts via variance and exception reporting

• • • •

Centrally managed user and admin modeling capabilities • • • • •Data entry template and reporting routing through workflow and approval processes

• • • • • • •

Role- and cell-based user security • • • • •“What-if ” and scenario-based capabilities • • • • • • •Drill-down and drill through analysis capabilities • • •Ability to store and execute repeatable business processes, i.e. allocations • • • • • • •

Ability to grow as a business changes • • • • • •


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Open Connectivity PlatformProphix is built on industry-standard Microsoft SQL Server technology that offers an open architecture. This allows 100% integration with various line-of-business systems and other Microsoft products, such as SharePoint, Reporting Services, and Office applications. The open connectivity allows these systems to provide front-end access to data or back-end source data. Implementing Prophix in existing infrastructures involves simple integration and data aggregation, promoting efficient system management. When applications share a common infrastructure and a common set of administrative tools, IT can manage new users and add new hardware to the environment more efficiently. In addition, managing application data in SQL Server removes the reliance on a challenging Excel-based process.

Figure 2. Architecture Diagram

Powerful OLAP TechnologyOnline analytical processing (OLAP) is a technology that provides an interactive connection to business information—the foundation for powerful multi-dimensional data analysis such as drillthrough to underlying data, slicing and dicing, multiple dimension hierarchies, and trend analysis between versions and time periods. Prophix leverages Microsoft Analysis Services, the leader in OLAP database services.

With OLAP, there is no need to compile numerous spreadsheets since all data is shared on a centralized server across the organization; therefore, everyone is always looking at the same data. Even further, multiple roll-ups in OLAP allow users to view the same data from multiple points of view with a simple click of the button. Data is aggregated and summarized across multiple business units quickly

How Prophix Leverages Technology to Maximize Performance Management Business Needs


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and securely providing different consolidation and sub-consolidation levels on the fly.

Figure 3. Excel-Based vs. OLAP-Based Budgeting. OLAP-based budgeting no longer requires a myriad of complex, consolidated spreadsheets. The direct connection to and from your data sources, such as your General Ledger, gives users the ability to “interact” with data.

Being multi-dimensional, OLAP business models allow users to analyze data across multiple business perspectives. The ability to analyze data in an ad hoc manner is inherent in the technology and can further be exported to Excel for other uses. Drillthrough capabilities (e.g. from reported data to transactional details) are also integral in the product. OLAP gives users the ability to drag and drop and slice and dice the data to manipulate information to test different scenarios or find answers to business questions. Detailed as well as high-level consolidated data can be reviewed and analyzed within seconds without the need for IT resources.

Seamless Data IntegrationWizard-Driven ImportsData imports are wizard-driven and does not normally require IT assistance. The initial role of IT is to set up the appropriate connections to source data but as an advantage of this wizard-driven approach is that data structures are automatically created behind the scenes, relieving IT resources from routine access and maintenance to data. On the fly or automatically on a schedule, end users can perform data imports for both actual and historical data using a step-by-step wizard.

Open Database Connectivity (ODBC) and ETLSource data is sometimes transferred from flat text files, but in most cases, Open Database Connectivity is used. Prophix interfaces seamlessly with virtually any ODBC-compliant data system or data warehouse. ODBC provides extensive access to data because hundreds of ODBC drivers exist for various data sources (e.g. Sybase, Informix, IBM UDB DB2, Oracle, MySQL, MS SQL, and Pervasive SQL).


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Data is transferred directly from the ODBC-compliant source to Prophix using an ODBC driver.

With ODBC connections and OLAP, ends users gain additional analytics with the ability to drill down into source data. OLAP allows users the ability to interact with data. Data queries can range from the simple “who” and “what” questions to the more complex “what-if ” and “why” queries. Detailed as well as high-level consolidated data can be reviewed and analyzed within seconds.

Another advantage that Prophix offers is its extract, transform, and load (ETL) capabilities. ETL enables companies to move data from multiple sources, reformat and cleanse it, and load it into Prophix. This combined with ODBC connectivity ensures that the correct data is imported properly from Line of Business systems.

Figure 4. ODBC Connectivity


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Central ApplicationProphix data, including business assumptions, rules, and calculations, is centrally stored in a secure database. Therefore, when changes are required, it only needs to happen once, not several times on individual worksheets and/or templates. For example, when a change is made to the structure, Prophix automatically updates the rest of the model. Formulas and assumptions are protected, and consolidations are automatic, all within a secure database. No incorrect formulas, no broken links, just simple and efficient collaboration. When adjustments are made, you can watch the effect cascade down through the organization and hit the bottom line, significantly reducing maintenance issues.

To ensure ultimate flexibility, Prophix permits calculations to be performed in a variety of ways utilizing both the server and client as calculation engines. Centralized, server-based calculations frequently involve manipulating large data sets across several dimensions, therefore, easier to maintain and apply global changes. Server-based calculations are performed directly on the server and may leverage the Analysis Services and SQL Server processing engines.

To simplify the setup of calculations for non-technical users, Prophix introduces a simplified user interface that includes a set of functions for constructing formulas. Formulas entered in the Prophix Formula Editor are translated into MDX, the underlying expression language used by Analysis Services, and are saved as part of the cube definition, which do not need to be maintained by Prophix users. For advanced technical users, formulas can be directly customized using MDX or SQL. From general-purpose business calculations to complex calculations created with database languages, Prophix satisfies the needs of users with ranging technical expertise.

Prophix also allows client-based calculations, which may be necessary for creating specialized calculations directly on financial reports, for example. These formulas are added directly to spreadsheet-like templates, which is simple for users familiar with Excel.

Information stored in a central database retains productivity amongst the users and provides more control over the budgeting, planning, forecasting processes. Data pulled across various business cycles and/or models work seamlessly. There is no integration required as data is centrally stored. Unlike Excel-based environments, users no longer need to collect and verify multiple sources and passes of data. Approved budget numbers are updated directly to Prophix’s central database, where data is immediately recalculated. All users work from the same source, ensuring accuracy and saving time.


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ScalabilityAs business requirements change, the flexibility of adjusting an existing application is crucial. Prophix makes it simple to adapt to various circumstances:

• Multiple servers• Different business models• Several connectivity options

Server ConfigurationsEvery Prophix implementation is unique as per the customer’s requirements. Some implementations may have complex formulas for the account rollups and others may have a large user base. Flexibility and scalability become significant factors in deployment especially when it comes to company growth and business requirement changes. Prophix deploys in various environments to conform to different types of infrastructure changes. The flexibility provides instant availability for new business units, as well as additional application users.

To support large scales of concurrent users and various performance requirements, Prophix was designed to allow organizations to distribute its logical tiers on several servers and implemented to be accessed via various configurations. Prophix supports single and multiple server configurations—from all components installed on a single combined server to separate components installed on two or more servers. Server farms can also be used to load balance and distribute across a number of identical server configurations. Even after the initial implementation, scaling out to multiple servers only requires minimal downtime, avoiding any lags in performance.

Virtualization Support. Companies of all sizes are re-aligning their IT strategy to take advantage of Virtual Machines. Prophix is fully supported on virtual machines and images including technologies such as Microsoft Virtual Server 2005 R2, Windows Server 2008 Hyper-V and VMWARE.

Multiple ModelsAs an all-in-one performance management system, Prophix can be used to create one or more business models for different applications and specific business requirements, e.g. revenue planning, financial consolidations, and personnel planning. Business rules are managed separately in Business Model Manager, yet data can be shared easily between models. Data from multiple models is integrated automatically and can be presented on a single report.

Connectivity OptionsRemote Connectivity. Citrix or Terminal Services may be used for remote application usage. Prophix is a Citrix-Ready application and has been certified on


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the Citrix platform. In addition to this, basic testing has been done on Windows Server 2008 Terminal Services while ensuring application integrity.

Offline Capabilities. With the use of template distribution, users can be part of the budgeting and planning processes without logging into Prophix, which is beneficial when users do not have Internet connectivity or access to Prophix. Templates are distributed to a list of users via e-mail, enabling anyone with an e-mail address to be set up as an Offline user and enter data in an Excel workbook. As Excel workbooks are sent back, Prophix’s offline service automatically updates the data in the model.

Low MaintenanceProphix was built with the business and finance users in mind. Models are managed with user-friendly screens, without the involvement of IT; i.e. model design, report creation and distribution, security access, and automation is all built within the application. Other features that support low maintenance include

• Formula Editor – Account calculations can vary from being simple to quite complex. The Prophix Formula Editor makes it easy for users to create formulas, providing a free-form text box and various options for additional functions, where custom programming is not required.

• Smart Client Technology – Prophix is a Smart Client application that utilizes Microsoft’s “ClickOnce” technology, which makes upgrades simple with minimal effort. Deploying or updating an application is simply a matter of updating files on a server with no impact on other applications; no need to manually upgrade every client. Upgrades are non-destructive; i.e. data integrity, metadata, and formulas are all retained. Regression testing is not required, which eliminates the need for in-house technical resources and consultants.

• SmartViews™ – Prophix allows users to create specific view of data that target a certain subset of information. These sets are reusable in multiple parts of the application—from data entry templates or ad hoc analyses. SmartViews is a simple way of querying the data—without any programming knowledge. This can easily be performed by non-IT users and used repeatedly throughout Prophix. They are simply created using drag and drop editor and can be view in a formatted layout. The reusability aspect of SmartViews makes it simple for templates and reports to adapt to business change management. As data changes, SmartViews are automatically updated in all instances, removing any maintenance efforts.


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Role-Based SecurityMultiple security mechanisms ensure that data is protected and access is controlled. Prophix leverages Windows Authentication and Active Directory integration in credential verification and access to multi-dimensional OLAP data, while an additional level of authorization lies in role-based security within the application. This level of security is managed by the application administrator, normally someone within the Finance department.

Application administrators control the model assumptions, calculation methodology and user access to data. Prophix automatically prevents any user from working with data to which they don’t have access. However, given the proper roles, users gain the ability to work with reports interactively to jump straight into analysis. Users can slice and dice data or drill up, drill down, and drill through to source data systems using a simple drag-and-drop interface. Security is tightly integrated in reports; therefore, report and template distributors can ensure that users can only view the data to which they have permissions.

WorkflowManually managing the budgeting cycle can result in lost data and the time-consuming task of backtracking. Prophix eliminates these risks by incorporating an internal workflow system that allows for collaboration across the organization—whether users are onsite, remote, or offline—and records all workflow task status in an audit log. The powerful workflow facilities control the process by routing templates for submissions and approval tasks and co-ordinating automated processes. Department managers can submit their completed plans for approval, and their managers can then submit their plans, until the entire version is approved.

Workflow is a robust automation tool for directing templates and tasks to the responsible users throughout the budgeting cycle. Relevant files and templates may either be physically transferred between users via e-mail, or they may be maintained on the server; in both methods, Prophix maintains security access for the appropriate users.

The workflow system also provides an e-mail monitoring system integrated with various e-mail applications such as Microsoft Outlook. In a workflow system, notifications can alert certain stakeholders and task owners when items are overdue, which ensures that work is completed through the cycle in a timely fashion and approved by the appropriate users. Managers can monitor tasks and activities, and then trigger the next steps—whether it is allocating data, distributing reports, or notifying other managers that the budget is finalized.


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Automation CenterProphix provides an effective, automated, and secure process manager that ensures the highest level of accuracy, reliability, and consistency throughout all of your planning, consolidation, and allocation processes. The automated Prophix Business Process Manager runs with its own service that is set up once and then maintained by the application administrator.

Many business processes consist of disparate systems and multiple business units; therefore, tight integration is a necessary component of process automation. Taking a server-centric approach to managing business processes promotes quality error management, avoids human error and saves resources, time and money spent on fixing mistakes. From data import and allocations to intercompany eliminations, Business Process Manager allows users to create a defined set of rules of accomplishing specific business process using an intuitive wizard-driven interface—no need for any programming expertise. Best-of-breed Performance Management solutions deliver more value by eliminating instead of restricting functionality. For example, InfoFlex™ is an easy-to-use process to make a global change to a reforecast. Users simply select the accounts and time period for the reforecast version and can transform the data with a click of a button.

Finally, a more intuitive way to develop business processes for non-technical business users and more integrated automation center to streamline and eliminate repetitive, manual tasks. With Business Process Manager, the Finance department can create a multitude of reforecast versions and scenarios for more sophisticated analysis, and the company as a whole gains greater organizational efficiency.

Spreadsheet InterfaceProphix offers a familiar user interface that promotes a short learning curve. Utilizing a central database with a spreadsheet-style GUI retains the easy-to-use features, such as formatting, charting, and formulas and provides additional functionality, yet eliminates the maintenance and challenges related to Excel. The interface provides useful tools such as top-down spreading, multiple scenarios, and drill through analytics, which gives more power to the users without complicating the GUI.

Prophix’s spreadsheet-style templates and reports are built with SmartViews, powerful building blocks of OLAP data that provide specific views of data, from any database or data warehouse within the organization. Budgeting, planning, and reporting cycles are more efficient because of the familiar Excel interface lying on top of a powerful OLAP database—offering easy data entry, template creation, and data analysis.


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Introducing enterprise-wide applications within an organization not only affects the end users but also makes an impact on IT resources. The key in finding the best solution that minimizes time, costs, and efforts mainly lies in the technology.

Implemented in as little as three weeks, Prophix delivers the functionality that fits the needs of both the IT professionals and business users. It is designed to fit in any environment with minimal to no impact on the existing infrastructure and offers the scalability to grow with the organization.

With administrator-protected role-based security, users gain a sense of ownership and become accountable for their own data. Based on SQL technology, finance users can create their own reports and easily slice-and-dice information in a spreadsheet-style interface without impeding IT resources. Seamless import processes using the Prophix Automation Center simplify data aggregation from multiple source systems and give the users a central repository of relevant data. Yet, Prophix offers an open connectivity platform to allow third-party integration to extend the data even further.

This industry-leading technology lends itself to diverse capabilities and is the basis for all the Prophix solutions: Prophix Performance Management, Prophix Financial Reporter, Prophix Planning, and Prophix Financial Controller. Today, over fifteen hundred customers worldwide are using Prophix to solve budgeting, planning, forecasting, reporting, consolidation, personnel planning and other advanced financial challenges.

Conclusion

350 Burnhamthorpe Road W.Suite 1000Mississauga, OntarioCanada L5B 3J1Telephone: 905-279-8711Fax: 905-279-2232E-mail: [email protected]

www.prophix.com

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