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Examples of Guide+ Helping Companies Solve Business Problems Today An Accounting firm differentiates its services with a Guide+ "Knowledge Bank" Hospital improves profitability with real-time cost monitoring and analysis Bank builds up business by improving customer service University increases funding with better performance Retail company streamlines for more cost-efficient operations IT empowers departmental decision support for improved productivity An Accounting firm differentiates its services with a Guide+ "Knowledge Bank" The Business Problem: A regional accounting firm has over a dozen offices in several states, each of which has a staff of consultants servicing a growing local client base. The firm wanted to build a Knowledge Bank that would enable all of the consultants across the different offices to share knowledge gained in solving client problems. They needed a central repository for problem resolution information and a readily accessible, easy to use mechanism for accessing the Knowledge Bank. The Guide+ Solution: Using Guide+ they were able to set up a comprehensive client and incident tracking system in a matter of days. Guide+'s flexibility let them create a system that contains the exact information the accounting firm wants to keep on file about clients and incidents. The centralized Knowledge Bank can be accessed with a touch of a button by the consultants from any of the company's offices or from client sites whenever they need information. Guide+'s sophisticated, object-oriented, building block approach to user interface presentation allowed each office to easily customize its information delivery screens and reports to meet its own specific needs. Thanks to the Knowledge Bank and Guide+, the firm now delivers faster, more effective solutions to their growing roster of very happy clients. Return to top of page Hospital improves profitability with real-time cost monitoring and analysis The Business Problem: Many hospitals today can no longer charge what it really costs them to deliver services, since payors such as Medicare and HMOs dictate what they will pay for these services. Thus, they need to closely monitor the profitability of departments and quickly analyze areas that are losing money to determine what corrective measures can be taken. However, the information that enables effective cost analysis was only available in voluminous detail on thousands and thousands of pages of reports. Not only was the information out of date before the reports could be prepared, the hospital's department managers simply could not afford the time to dig through these massive reports to find and research the problem areas. The Guide+ Solution: The hospital was able to easily and quickly develop and implement a comprehensive Service Line Cost Monitoring and Analysis facility with Guide+. Taking an executive dashboard approach, they defined a series of at-a-glance information delivery screens that display a summarized, high level view contrasting the cost and revenue contribution for each of the hospital's major service lines. Managers can select a service line and view the sub-lines that comprise the service offerings ranked by relative performance. Areas with profitability issues are clearly flagged at the top of the list as needing attention. The manager can rapidly drill down from there into any problem area to identify the doctors, payors, etc. that are associated with the areas that are losing money. With the touch of a button, the manager can also view historical trends to obtain additional insights. As a result of the managers having exactly the information they need on their desktops via Guide+, the hospital can stay on top of potential profitability issues and take corrective measures well before the problem hits the bottom line. Order our free brochure on Guide+ For Health Care! Return to top of page Bank builds up business by improving customer service The Business Problem: Regional financial services providers and mid-sized banks operating in specific geographic areas face intense competition for a finite local customer base. This regional bank was feeling the competitive pressure mount. The bank's managers knew that they had to find ways to retain customers, build loyalty and identify opportunities to sell additional services to their existing customers if they were to be successful. The managers needed to have better visibility into the satisfaction levels of their customers and to know what products and services the customers were getting from the bank if they were to provide superior customer service. The Guide+ Solution: The bank used Guide+ to set up a Customer Relationship Management system. The CRM system draws customer and loan information from across a variety of existing bank files and combines it with supplemental information to assess customer satisfaction. The information is synthesized by Guide+ and distilled into concise information delivery screens that provide the bank's managers with an up-to-the-minute view of customer satisfaction levels, highlighting any individual customers requiring attention. Guide+'s ability to collate information from any number of disparate systems enables the CRM system to track customer buying and service utilization trends. By viewing these trends, managers can assess popularity and profitability of the bank's products and services and identify which customers are most likely to be interested in which current and new products and services. With their Guide+-powered CRM system, the bank is building solid customer loyalty by making its customers feel special and personally cared for, and at the same time, cost effectively building its business by targeting its marketing efforts intelligently to meet customer needs. Return to top of page University increases funding with better performance The Business Problem: Academic funding is increasingly based on performance criteria such as enrollment and financial performance factors. The administrators at this university needed to forecast more accurately, track performance more effectively and improve overall operating efficiency. In addition, cuts in federal funding meant colleges and universities were more dependent on tuition revenue. As a result, the school was feeling the effects of the growing competition for students. Administrators needed to have a clear and accurate picture of the ethnic, geographic and gender mix of the student body, and an understanding of the most popular courses and programs in order to target their student recruitment efforts for maximum effect. The Guide+ Solution: Guide+ gave the administrators in each key performance area superior visibility into the specific information they needed to effectively manage their individual areas. For example, in Admissions, an executive dashboard-style screen immediately shows the level of applications, evaluations, admissions and enrollments for each department. Drill-down options display the level of academic achievements, the gender distribution, ethnic mix and other balancing factors. Current enrollment is projected and student mix elements are compared to historical patterns so that admission parameters can be adjusted as needed. Order our free brochure on Guide+ For Higher Education Return to top of page Retail company streamlines for more cost-efficient operations The Business Problem: This retail company felt they could improve company performance if they could find a way to manage their business in a more proactive, rather than reactive, manner. Unfortunately, this was almost impossible because the primary reporting for senior management consisted of over fifty detailed spreadsheets that were printed and delivered daily. It took considerable time to gather the raw data and produce and deliver the spreadsheets, so even though the reports were delivered daily, the information in them was often already out of date. Because the reports were so extensive and detailed, key information was frequently buried in the piles of reports and as a result, overlooked. Each report reflected only the information from one system, so there was no easy way to get an enterprise--wide view of the business, and key ratios and trends were difficult to see. The Guide+ Solution: Guide+ allowed them to implement a powerful Executive Information Delivery System. The Guide+ system automatically collects data from the different systems across the company and synthesizes it to provide a comprehensive, top-down view of operations. The information is delivered via a custom-tailored screen to each manager first thing every morning. Individual executives are able to drill down immediately to get more detailed information on their specific areas of responsibility. Guide+'s ability to seamlessly merge related data makes key ratios and trends clearly visible. Abnormal conditions are highlighted so that effective corrective action is initiated quickly. Guide+ gives this company's executives the exact information they need at the appropriate level of detail to make informed, proactive business decisions. Return to top of page IT empowers departmental decision support for improved productivity The Business Problem: This large manufacturing company builds and markets products in a highly competitive industry. Being able to make well-informed, low risk business decisions quickly is critical to their operations. As a result, the IT department was inundated with requests for rapid access to all sorts of business critical information and processes. The IT manager was struggling just to handle the strategic information processing needs at the enterprise level and did not have the resources to adequately service all of the special requests from individual departments. The IT shop needed to provide the departments with some standard tool or mechanism that would enable them to be more self-sufficient. It had to be easy to learn, easy to use and it had to allow the departments to modify their specific applications to a large extent on their own. The Guide+ Solution: The IT shop utilized Guide+ to provide the individual departments with their own Self-Service Information Centers. Guide+ let IT set up connections to selected ERP data files and subject area data marts. Because Guide+ information delivery applications are easily defined through a menu-driven process that assembles selected pre-fabricated components, it requires no programming. As a result, the departments can now set up their own databases, adding in their own supplemental information as needed. Using the library of pre-defined user interface building-blocks, the departments can each create their own customized screens and reports that bring together all of this information exactly the way they want it. With Guide+, IT was able to empower the departments to be more independent. They are now able to get the information they need, when they need it, for maximum productivity. Return to top of page  Copyright © 2004, Cornus Corporation, Inc. - http://www.cornus.com 4100 Payne Road, Medford, Oregon 97504 - Phone: 541 535-7800 - Fax: 541 535-7600 info@cornus.com
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