| Business Benefits |
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Work Centres provide the flexibility within Job Cost to arrange the financial data in a multitude of formats matching the funding bodies’ requirements. This makes it easier to report and acquit funding. Saving time and money and audit costs. |
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Greentree brings organisational processes up to 21st century best practice. |
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Tree analysis enables more accurate tracking of project time and cost. This tips the bargaining power balance in favour of management when it comes to proving organisational competency during the project pitch process. |
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Greentree scalability easily accommodates the growth in project numbers and complexity. |
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“blueStar Business Solutions provides the peace-of-mind confidence that support is readily available. They’re great at presenting all the options and working through them with us to achieve the most optimal outcome.”
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Peter Hughes, Finance & Administration Manager - EnviTE |
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 If ever the expression 'can't see the forest for the trees' was more apt, it's in this case. When the efficient management of environmental projects got bogged-down in 3,500 general ledger codes, Greentree showed the way.
The business scenario
EnviTE is a not-for-profit organisation providing employment, training and environmental services in the NSW north coast region.
At any given time, there can be over 200 projects and jobs on the go, each at a different stage of completion. The Peachtree based accounting system could not cope with the rapid growth of the organisation and eventually 3500 general ledger accounts were used to track projects as well as jobs. Finance & Administration Manager Peter Hughes found project management had become a logistical "nightmare".
Key requirements in a new system were integration to eliminate the need for manual re-keying of data and advanced job costing and project management capability, which is why Greentree was chosen. The bonus of local expertise and experience with the Greentree solution is provided by Greentree business partner, blueStar Business Solutions.
Greentree pulls together data from multiple disparate systems
Since most of the systems BIGA uses are reasonably complex and by and large do what they are supposed to do, the decision was made to replace General Ledger since it was the most cost effective and easily understood. Greentree’s Open Database Connectivity handles the extraction of data from multiple proprietary sub-systems whilst Excel handles financial reporting. Of course, none of this works unless something tells all these systems what to do and how to do it and this is when Greentree’s flexibility for customisation and local support becomes strategic.
Project management prowess
 Greentree's Job Cost module includes user definable Activity Codes and Work Centres, which provides the flexibility to present project costs in a format which is relevant to the funding organisation. Peter explains, "We can present financial data for Environmental Trust projects, for example, using their funding headings. Greentree ensures project managers can view reports in the funding body's format. This makes it much easier to ensure that projects are on track and complying with the individual funding body’s requirements. Previously, lots of time was wasted converting standard accounts to the form required by the funding bodies for reporting and acquittal."
With only a two year view of data, it was difficult managing projects spanning several years. Greentree matches data availability with the duration of the project so management have high visibility of projects and resources as they progress. Peter says this has been empowering for the management decision making process, enabling managers to make strategic decisions with confidence. This has been critical for attracting new and ongoing funding and growing the organisation’s project capability.
The 'need to know' flexibility of the Excel Reporting functions, allow project data to be converted to a few key items including 'days worked per project and days remaining'. Having this critical information allows work to be scheduled up to 12 months in advance and ensures that the on-ground work force is allocated to meet EnviTE’s commitments. Peter says, "Greentree has made a science out of project planning which was previously a hit or miss art".
'Kicking and screaming' into 21st century accounting
Peter concedes that it wasn’t until they began scrutinising existing systems, procedures and IT infrastructure that they realised how far behind they had fallen.
"Implementing Greentree forced us to grow up fast and get a bit more sophisticated about how we do things. If we hadn’t been forced to do this, EnviTE would not have the capability to take advantage of the opportunities that are now arising from funding bodies seeking complex overarching projects in their drive to reduce costs and achieve better outcomes. In fact, we are now providing project and financial management for other organisations that do not have the capacity to handle complex projects," he says.
Tree analysis improves project bargaining position
EnviTE “bundles” community projects in the district councils which fall within its geographical region. Projects are no longer stand alone activities with support and resources required from all stakeholders. “The tree analysis allows hard data when negotiating with councils to be at our fingertips. This required a level of sophistication that simply wasn’t available with Peachtree.”
Greentree now enables EnviTE to capture and analyse data using Tree Analysis codes to separate and group similar data sets. This helps to identify activities which are costly and areas where the allocation of additional resource would bring the project back on track.
Peter says that without doubt, Greentree provides the tools required to report the statistical facts about projects. This effectively arms management with the evidence to prove organisational performance which significantly improves EnviTE’s bargaining position when it comes to pitching for restoration and labour market projects.
Scalability matches growth
Although the level of manual data processing reduced, the number and complexity of projects increased which had the overall effect of doubling staff numbers. Peter points out there’s plenty of scope for growth, “we could quadruple turnover with the same staffing level and not bat an eyelid since Greentree will be absolutely scalable to whatever level we might require in the future. We envisage using it for a good few years to come.”
Scalability matches growth
With an increasing level of understanding of the Greentree computing environment, Peter says he constantly figures out how he can leverage more of its functionality to improve the business. He’s currently looking at how the collection of time sheets from remote staff could be accommodated using Greentree’s e-timesheet capability. For this, he will leverage the expertise and experience of blueStar Business Solutions who listen to his ideas and explain the options in plain English.
Peter is absolutely confident that blueStar’s open minded approach plus his growing understanding of the possibilities Greentree presents will return the original investment back to the organisation many times over.
About EnviTE NSW
A not-for-profit organisation, EnviTE works closely with local communities and government to successfully complete environmental restoration projects in the NSW north coast region. EnviTE is a leader in providing custom and accredited training to a broad range of participants. EnviTE has been also been delivering employment related work experience and training programs since 1993.
For more information visit: envite.org.au
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