What Can We Do For You

Let us earn your trust and respect.

We take time to listen and understand your needs before offering a solution. The following is a list of general services we offer. We believe there is no "one size fits all" solution but instead allow each organization's unique needs determine our approach. Because of this, our perspective is different from most IT consultants. Additionally, we do not claim to be "a jack of all trades, yet masters of none." Inevitably, in some cases, it's not who you are, but who you know. We are geniuses in many things but should we find our skills lacking – we don't fake it 'till we make it – we'll hook you up with the guru's that know what's up in your specific area of need.

Outsourced IT Support & Infrastructure
Unhappy with your IT service and help desk support? Join the club! This is the number one complaint we hear from our clients. And frankly, we're starting to get annoyed at these hapless losers giving IT guys a bad rep! Too many companies feel that IT is just not responsive to their needs. And while this may be the case, our experience has shown that, instead of adding more support resources, a better approach is to solve the underlying causes of help desk issues. This means not focusing purely on "user satisfaction" but going deeper to the heart of the problem. The result you may ask? An organization that can no longer blame IT as the catchall bottleneck responsible for the failure and doom of every project even undertaken. Whether this makes your employees happy and productive or not, is of course, another issue entirely. Additionally, because we fix the problem at its heart, without simply throwing extra resources at it and hoping one will stick, our clients realize significant long-term savings as they no longer need to pay for additional IT support resources. We support networks, desktops, lap tops, servers, and other every type of business hardware. We are the go-to guys for back-end systems such as email, website servers, and databases. We recently completed a Microsoft Exchange Server 2010 upgrade with full Outlook deployment to over 100 users.

IT Management
Whether it is for a single project or the entire IT function, we can provide management that matches your needs. If you already have staff dedicated to technology, we can help your current team achieve more. One of our favorite ways to engage a client is to spend time with senior leadership understanding the objectives of an organization then align their IT resources to this. Look at the strategic section for information on virtual CIO services.

We are certified project managers and experienced IT managers who have led teams in all areas of technology. We approach projects and teams with lightweight methodologies that better reflect the entrepreneurial spirit of small to mid-sized organizations. This approach results in faster projects and reduced costs.

Business Process
We are constantly amazed at how many businesses do NOT take advantage of new technology to improve their internal business processes. Frequently, organizations will see dramatic improvements in efficiencies and quality through very simple business process improvements. For business process re-engineering projects we can engage at many levels. For simple low hanging fruit projects we can quickly recommend changes and a new system to support the changes. For deeper engagements, we thoroughly evaluate current business processes, discuss findings with senior leadership , then decide together where it makes sense to apply new processes and technology to achieve optimal results. We will also help establish checkpoints and long-term metrics to build in flexibility and ensure success. These projects invariably achieve significant results such as increased customer satisfaction, higher profits, better informed leadership, and more productive employees.

Business Applications (SaaS and Cloud Computing)
There are many business applications that an organization can benefit from such as Customer Relationship Management (CRM), Marketing Automation, Accounting Software, HR Information Systems (HRIS), Learning Management Systems (LMS), Project Management, and Customer Service Portals. These types of applications have reached a very mature stage and most have moved from server and desktop deployments to being hosted on the internet. For small to mid-sized organizations, the best option is often purchasing a subscription to these applications using the Software as a Service (SaaS) model. Many of these applications have moved into cloud computing which usually provides improved performance and is less expensive.

Instead of installing these applications on your local servers or computers, companies simply access them through their internet browsers using their high-speed internet connection. This provides many simple benefits such as access from anywhere, increased availability, secure data, guaranteed support, and on-demand training.

Since these applications are now hosted over the internet, small to mid-sized enterprises see significant long-term cost savings. It was not long ago when only larger companies could afford the hugely expensive systems that provided the high-end features. Now almost every organization has access these types of systems. We can help you select and deploy any of the systems we have named and many more.

Sales and Marketing Automation (CRM)
Every organization can benefit from sales and marketing automation systems. Customer Relationship Management (CRM) systems are now considered to be a must-have application for organization the same as an accounting or email system. CRM typically manages the entire view of a customer including sales, service and marketing information. CRM will manage a customer through its entire life cycle including lead acquisition, qualification into a prospect, conversion into a client, and customer retention. There are many excellent CRM systems in the market for every size organization.

Companies with less staff and resources need marketing automation to maximize their ability to get new clients and keep current ones. In its simple form these marketing systems are simple mass email management systems that allow organizations to easily create, send and manage email marketing. More sophisticated systems provide better automation and complex workflows such as lead routing and automated service responses.

We are experts with these systems and have over ten years experience working with them. We can help you select, implement, maintain, and improve both CRM and marketing automation systems. Our expertise is not just in the systems but also with the actual sales and marketing processes that flow through these systems. We have completed several business process re-engineering projects with sales processes.

Business Intelligence & Analytics
Every organization needs to be able to obtain key data about its health. Capturing data in sales and operations systems is one step but making that data meaningful requires thought and effort. We have helped organizations to systematically review their data and to look at their business in better ways. Our expertise includes business intelligence applications such as Excel, Crystal Reports, SQL Server, and OLAP. Our real strength is that we understand the underlying business processes and the business applications that support those processes such as CRM. Understanding the context of the data is just as important as printing summaries of that data.

When we start with a new client one of the first questions we ask is what are the key measurements for the organization. This is the starting point for most technology. If key measurements are unclear or need improved, we can work with managers and senior leaders to develop realistic metrics that can be obtained from their business systems. If there are areas where the data is incomplete or inaccurate, we will resolve these issues with a business process analyst who can identify if there is a process issue or a better business application is needed.

VoIP Phone Systems
Small and mid-sized organizations have not caught onto this technology as much as larger companies. This is partly because in the past the cost of setting up reliable phone systems using VoIP was cost prohibitive. These costs have now reached the point where it makes sense for every size organization to embrace this technology. Not only will there be significant cost savings over traditional PBX systems, the feature set and abilities of a good VoIP system, will increase productivity and increase customer satisfaction.

We recently completed an enterprise VoIP deployment with 150 telephones that resulted in over $200,000 in cost savings. Please read more about this in our Featured Projects section.

Software & Website Development
We have led software teams for many years. Our applications range from simple Excel automation to PHP web development all the way to enterprise level systems written with C#, ASP.NET, and SQL Server. We have worked in all areas of the software and web development process including requirements definition, system design and architecture, building, and quality assurance. Our enterprise systems run in a 24/7 global environment.

As stated in our Services Philosophy, we see the need for custom software less and less as off-the-shelf and web applications become more pervasive. We specialize in helping organizations determine what makes the most sense: to build or to buy.

Strategy
You can have a CIO level advisor on your staff without having to pay for the salary. We work with senior leaders so they can take an honest look at their current strategy then develop short and long-term plans for the organizations to achieve success. This is who we are at our best! It is in these scenarios that clients realize the largest value from their IT investments. Our years of experience in working with senior leadership has allowed us to better understand how technology can best support an organization in achieving its goals and objectives. This allows you to have a virtual CIO as part of your team.