ISG Software Research Analyst Perspectives

The Right Software is Crucial for Effective Planning

Posted by Robert Kugel on 27 November 2012

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...

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

Hewlett Packard Charges Fraud at Autonomy– Lessons Learned?

Posted by Robert Kugel on 24 November 2012

Many people enjoy mystery stories or crime thrillers; in the same vein of savoring the whodunnit and howdunnit, I like a good accounting scandal. My fascination with cooking the books started when I was young with the “great salad oil swindle”, which wound up causing losses in excess of $1 billion in today’s money and even threatened a Wall Street collapse. This disaster was averted by the...

Topics: Fraud, Governance, GRC, Office of Finance, audit, IFRS, Business Performance, Financial Performance, Governance, Risk & Compliance (GRC), Hewlett Packard, Meg Whitman, SEC

What Every CEO Needs to Know About IT

Posted by Robert Kugel on 18 November 2012

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...

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

What’s Wrong with Today’s Planning and Budgeting

Posted by Robert Kugel on 15 November 2012

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,...

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 Planning Benchmark Shows No Improvement in How Companies Plan and Budget

Posted by Robert Kugel on 13 November 2012

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...

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

Using Maturity Assessments to Improve Performance

Posted by Robert Kugel on 30 October 2012

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...

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

SAP Takes Business and Finance Mobile Using SAP HANA

Posted by Robert Kugel on 22 October 2012

SAP has inaugurated a new series of business applications it calls Enterprise Performance Management (EPM) OnDemand as a cloud-based subscription service. The applications are part of SAP’s EPM version 10 suite, which it introduced last year. It’s a first step in what is likely to be a portfolio of general-purpose, lightweight and relatively low-cost apps designed to be used on mobile devices....

Topics: Big Data, Performance Management, Sales Performance, SAP, Supply Chain Performance, Office of Finance, expense, Operational Performance, Analytics, Business Analytics, Business Collaboration, Business Performance, Cloud Computing, Customer & Contact Center, Financial Performance, Workforce Performance, Business Applications, FPM, HANA

Oracle Fusion Financials: Boring is Cool

Posted by Robert Kugel on 16 October 2012

There weren’t any headlines (or even many tweets) about Oracle Fusion Financials emanating from this year’s Oracle OpenWorld (#OOW12) conference. Maybe that’s by design, because it’s not in Oracle’s best interest to kick up a lot of dust about ERP migration. The financial applications software market is mature, and market share leaders such as Oracle have less interest in getting customers to...

Topics: Performance Management, ERP, Office of Finance, financial, Business Performance, Cloud Computing, Financial Performance, Oracle, Workday, JD Edwards, PeopleSoft

Putting XBRL to Work in the Mortgage Market

Posted by Robert Kugel on 09 October 2012

Unless you have some combination of a very strong credit rating, a high income-to-debt payment ratio and a relatively low loan-to-value ratio, it’s not especially easy to refinance a mortgage these days. That’s a shame, because there are plenty of people who have stayed current in meeting their credit obligations and whose mortgages are comfortably below current market value who could benefit...

Topics: Office of Finance, XBRL, Analytics, Business Analytics, Business Performance, Financial Performance, finance, capital markets

Cloud Computing Challenges On-Premises for Software Preference

Posted by Robert Kugel on 05 October 2012

Salesforce.com’s recent Dreamforce user conference got me wondering about how far the market for cloud-based software has come. To answer that question, I looked to our own research. For the past several years Ventana Research has routinely asked participants in its benchmark research what preference, if any, they have for deploying software they use to support the activity we are benchmarking....

Topics: SaaS, Sales, Sales Performance, Salesforce.com, Supply Chain Performance, Operational Performance, Business Performance, Cloud Computing, Customer & Contact Center, Financial Performance, Workforce Performance, Software

Encountering New Bottlenecks with Oracle’s Breakthrough Technology

Posted by Robert Kugel on 03 October 2012

Two key themes that emerged from Larry Ellison’s Sunday night keynote at this year’s Oracle OpenWorld were faster processing speed and cheaper storage. An underlying purpose to these themes was to assert the importance of Oracle’s strategic vertical integration of hardware and software with the acquisitions of Sun. I try to view technology keynotes like this from the perspective of a practical...

Topics: Big Data, Customer Experience, executive, IT Performance, Business Analytics, Business Performance, Data Management, Financial Performance, In-Memory Computing, Information Management, Business Process Management, Data, FPM

How Effective Is Your Company’s Planning for Long-Term Investing?

Posted by Robert Kugel on 27 September 2012

Effective capital planning and capital investment are vital to a company’s long-term success. The choices a company makes – how much to invest and in which facilities or projects – have a profound effect on its long-term success. For that reason, companies take pains to ensure that these decisions support their long-term strategies and are made as rationally as possible. Because Ventana Research...

Topics: Planning, Office of Finance, Reporting, Business Analytics, Business Performance, Financial Performance, finance, capital budget, capital spending, FPM

Salesforce Helps Midsize Company Dreams Come True

Posted by Robert Kugel on 21 September 2012

I cover the meat-and-potatoes aspects of corporate computing. I also pay attention to the special needs of midsize companies (by our definition, those with between 100 and 999 employees), which are unlike those of either small business or large corporations. After attending this year’s Dreamforce conference, Salesforce.com’s annual user meeting held this week in San Francisco, I can appreciate...

Topics: Sales, Sales Performance, Salesforce.com, Social Media, ERP, Office of Finance, CRM customer service, SMB, Business Performance, Cloud Computing, Customer & Contact Center, Financial Performance, Dreamforce, finance, Security, FPM

Rethinking Budgeting for 2013

Posted by Robert Kugel on 07 September 2012

Budget season is about to open at most companies that operate on a calendar year, so this is probably as good a time as any to rethink the process. Almost all companies will undertake the construction of a budget this year the same way they did it last year, despite widespread complaints that it is a monumental waste of time. One major reason why budgeting never changes is that it isn’t important...

Topics: Big Data, Planning, Sales Performance, Office of Finance, Reporting, Budgeting, Controller, Operational Performance, Business Performance, Financial Performance, CFO, Compensation, cash management, FPM, Integrated Business Planning

Tagetik Offers a Suite Spot for Financial Performance Management

Posted by Robert Kugel on 05 September 2012

If you’re considering purchasing a financial performance management (FPM) suite, you shouldn’t overlook a recent entrant in the category, Tagetik (which sort of rhymes with “magnetic”). The company, which was founded in 1986 and is based in Lucca, Italy, began by focusing mainly on Europe, but has extended its efforts in the United States in the past two years. Tagetik 4.0 is an elegant...

Topics: Big Data, Planning, Office of Finance, Reporting, Budgeting, close, Consolidation, Controller, SharePoint, XBRL, Business Analytics, Business Collaboration, Business Performance, Dashboards, Financial Performance, Workforce Performance, CFO, Tagetik, FPM

What a Bugatti Can Teach Us About Information Management

Posted by Robert Kugel on 29 August 2012

One of the community groups to which I donate my time is an organization that puts on a Concours d’Élegance – a vintage car show. Such Concours date back to seventeenth-century France, when wealthy aristocrats gathered to see who had the best carriages and most beaudacious horses. Our Concours serves as the centerpiece to a broader mission of raising money for several charities. There a many such...

Topics: Big Data, GRC, IT Performance, Operational Performance, Business Analytics, Business Intelligence, Business Performance, CIO, Financial Performance, Information Management, Operational Intelligence, CFO, finance, Talent Management, FPM

Good Data Stewardship Is Critical for Business Analytics

Posted by Robert Kugel on 24 August 2012

Our research consistently finds that defects in data are the root cause of a wide range of problems encountered by modern corporations. The magnitude of the problem correlates with the size of the company: Big companies have bigger headaches than midsize ones. Data issues diminish productivity in every part of a business as people struggle to correct errors or find workarounds. Issues with data...

Topics: Big Data, Predictive Analytics, Sales Performance, Supply Chain Performance, GRC, IT Performance, Operational Performance, Business Analytics, Business Intelligence, Business Performance, CIO, Customer & Contact Center, Financial Performance, Information Management, Operational Intelligence, Workforce Performance, CFO, finance, FPM

Midsize Companies Find ERP in the Cloud Increasingly Attractive

Posted by Robert Kugel on 23 August 2012

Midsize businesses “pay” for their use of entry-level accounting systems by not having the essential information they need readily available and by using up valuable time that could be better spent generating business, finding issues or responding to opportunities sooner or simply enhancing the efficiency of the organization. Nevertheless, the transition from an entry-level accounting package...

Topics: Sales Performance, Customer Experience, ERP, Office of Finance, end-to-end, finance cloud, Business Performance, Cloud Computing, Financial Performance, Business Process Management, CFO, finance, accounting software, business process execution, financial systems, FPM

Making Better Use of Ratios in Analytics

Posted by Robert Kugel on 17 August 2012

For the past several years Ventana Research has focused more on analytics and their importance to improving business performance. We’ve done extensive benchmark research in business analytics, detailing how they are used generally in business and in major functional areas of companies as well as their application in specific industries. We adopted this focus because technology advances are...

Topics: Big Data, Performance Management, Planning, Sales Performance, Supply Chain Performance, Human Capital Management, Modeling, Office of Finance, Budgeting, driver-based, Operational Performance, Analytics, Business Analytics, Business Performance, Customer & Contact Center, Financial Performance, In-memory, Workforce Performance, best pracices, business value, cash management, challenge, financial planning

Put a Smile in Your Last Mile of Finance

Posted by Robert Kugel on 15 August 2012

People used to use the phrase “the last mile” solely to refer to a condemned prisoner’s path to execution. Then the telecommunications industry picked it up to describe that part of a circuit between a major trunk line and a subscriber. Later still a defunct software company, Movaris (now part of Trintech), used the phrase in an analogy to refer to the set of activities that take place between...

Topics: Customer Experience, Governance, GRC, Office of Finance, Reporting, audit, close, Consolidation, Controller, XBRL, Business Performance, Financial Performance, Governance, Risk & Compliance (GRC), CFO, compliance, FPM, SEC