by gfcpartners | Jan 24, 2023 | Business, Manufacturing & Distribution
QuickBooks is widely recognized as an accounting software that supports small businesses with managing accounts, inventory, payroll, taxes, expenses, and budgeting. For companies starting out, deploying QuickBooks is a good first step towards operational improvement. But there comes a point in each expanding company’s journey where QuickBooks doesn’t support the changing needs of the organization. Perhaps it’s an increase in manual processes and offline spreadsheets to track information outside of QuickBooks. It could be the need to add third-party software to handle repetitive tasks that QuickBooks is lacking. Maybe the data needed to make decisions isn’t available from QuickBooks. Or, reports aren’t actionable, with a snapshot of the past rather than a real-time view into your operation.
Additionally, many construction or project-based small businesses require more than QuickBooks to meet their needs right off the bat. We’ve worked with construction companies who have found QuickBooks hindered their operations due to the lack of project-based accounting features, field service, and payroll capabilities.
Our clients have often come to us frustrated with the limitations of QuickBooks, including:
- Limited functionality for job costing and progress billing.
- Inadequate reporting capabilities for tracking project expenses and profitability.
- Difficulty in tracking change orders and managing subcontractor invoicing.
- Lack of integration with scheduling and estimating programs.
- Limited support for multi-currency transactions and foreign currency exchanges.
- Difficulty in tracking retainage and progress payments.
- Limited ability to handle complex job-costing and inventory management.
- Inability to handle complex union compliance and certified payroll requirements.
- Limited ability to track and manage equipment and asset management.
- Limited support for construction-specific tax regulations.
If you’re using QuickBooks now and experiencing any of these frustrations, read how Acumatica, the Cloud ERP construction solution is helping construction companies solve issues and grow.
Compare QuickBooks to Acumatica for accurate project-accounting and construction software.
The pressure to stay up to date on current projects has been a thorn in the side of many contractors. Poor communication has derailed countless construction projects, causing them to finish late and over budget. Acumatica’s cloud ERP software tailored to the construction industry has advantages that QuickBooks does not. Here are a few:
- Real-time access to project data from anywhere, on any device.
- Modern accounting features can help you streamline and automate Accounts Payable workflows, such as entering invoices and obtaining approval for payments. Additionally, it provides real-time project costs related to labor, materials and equipment.
- Project Management allows both office and field teams to access current information from a central, streamlined system, improving field-to-office communication.
- Reduced response times with instant notifications and message alerts.
- Robust document storage – view and store important documentation such as RFIs, jobsite progress photos, and project issues.
- Ensure adherence to regulations by processing waivers, certificates, and status changes quickly. Additionally, create alerts for staff and vendors about expiration dates and other essential data.
- Customer Management offers real-time customer activity management (e.g. contacts, quotes, orders, invoices, payments, support cases and service calls) as well as a customer self-service portal.
- Adaptable workflows to automate, control and increase the efficiency of accounting and back-office processes.
- Thorough and up-to-date reports that keep you informed about the progress of each project.
- Comprehensive view of your business with Role-based Dashboards.
- Comprehensive Connections: Link with popular construction applications.
- Unlimited users.
Switching from QuickBooks to Acumatica Cloud ERP: A Big Change, But Worth It
When you look at the pros and cons, you realize the benefits that newer technology can bring to your business.
For example, communication – with the right tools, your field teams can complete their construction projects more efficiently allowing you to manage your projects more effectively.
We know that switching the system that you run your business on can seem like a risky, big endeavor. For this reason, partnering with an experienced solution provider is a wise choice. The team at GFC knows construction and ERP, and believes that Acumatica for Construction is a right-priced, low-risk solution.
Let us show you how a modern solution can give you the tools you need to grow your business, keep projects running smoothly, make your customers happy, and turn a reliable profit.
Read more about 5 Benefits of Cloud Construction Management and then give us a call to discuss your unique business needs.
Construction firms can no longer stay competitive by relying on paper-based processes, manual workflows, and an endless barrage of emails. Smart, forward-thinking firms are moving their businesses to the cloud. With cloud-based solutions, they’re finding the powerful communication tools and automated workflows they need to maximize the profitability of every project.
Don’t get left behind on yesterday’s technology. Take the first step towards a better bottom line today.
by gfcpartners | Jan 10, 2023 | Business, Manufacturing & Distribution
Technology has made powerful, flexible measurement systems with KPI capability both affordable and user-driven.
“KPIs are a standard business management tool that is becoming both more powerful and at the same time easier to use thanks to packaged Business Intelligence and Executive Information Systems applications that are part of a comprehensive back office software system.”
Every kind of manufacturing company, in all industry segments including automotive, food and beverage, health and beauty, electronics, industrial machines, metal fabrication, plastics, etc., rely on measurements to monitor business activities and performance, document successes and challenges, and help direct management decision-making.
Of course, while we measure a number of parameters simply to comply with mandatory accounting and reporting requirements, smart management will incorporate those measurements into valuable intelligence that helps run the business more effectively and more efficiently.
“KPIs are a standard business management tool that is becoming both more powerful and at the same time easier to use thanks to packaged Business Intelligence and Executive Information Systems applications that are part of a comprehensive back-office software system.”
Download this free whitepaper from Acumatica and learn:
- What is a key performance indicator
- Types of KPIs and those specific to manufacturing
- How to use and reap the benefits of KPIs
- Ongoing KPI maintenance including adjustments and expansions
- anytime, anywhere.
Historical and Predictive KPIs – Which Should You Use?
There are two basic types of KPIs. First, ones that tell you where your business has been and where you are headed. The other, shows you the overall health of your business.
Historical KPIs allow you to easily measure past activity, and showcase where your business will likely go in the future based on that history. They can be set up with alerts and warnings to monitor and detect exceptions, based on historical data, and call attention to issues. These systems can even alert you via email or text.
The second type of KPIs are predictive. These can provide multiple lines of insight into where your business could go in the future. By utilizing all your business data, predictive KPIs can help you make better decisions for your business. In other words, predictive metrics don’t rely on the experience of previous tasks. These metrics show future results according to which the optimal production scenario for the whole factory is made evident. For example, when production runs smoothly, peripheral departments such as sales, supply chain management, etc. are affected positively, as their value-added activities are conducted in alignment with the shop floor.
As performance indicators of the future, Predictive KPIs usually contain information around:
- Inventory – Total inventory value, raw material inventory, WIP inventory, finished goods material value, and others
- Resources – Productivity, OEE, manufacturing time, setup time, capacity load and others
- Products and Customers – Production quantity, manufacturing cost, contribution margin, profitability, and others
- Orders – Earnings, profit, profit ratio, cumulative employee costs, cumulative total costs, and others
One thing to note, you want to make sure your predictive KPIs exist for the entire planning period as well as pre-determined shorter planning periods. This forms an important pillar for making effective management decisions in every case, which is the reason that every manufacturing company today requires an end-to-end planning solution.
Example KPIs for Manufacturing
Plan vs. Actual Hours & Cost
This KPI compares different areas of the shop, different processes, and different products. By keeping a close eye on these metrics, you get an indication of how effectively your business is operating and how to improve overall results.
Utilization & Capacity
The ability to plan optimum utilization of resources is key to a lean shop. Resource load balancing can help save on costs and improve on-time products, reduce overtime and expediting costs, and improve on deliver promise dates. Utilization and capacity KPIs, also referred to as Work Center Dispatch KPIs, can easily be modified to fit your business so you’ll always know what each center is working on and what’s in the queue for completion.
Production Scheduling
This metric is a little bit more granular but offers better insight into workflows and resource utilization. Many manufacturers use this as a starting point for defining a display of released orders in the plant and the current location and status of each. By using this production schedule KPI and the work center dispatch KPI, you can easily see the overall status of each work center and schedule across your departments or the entire shop.
Profitability by Customer by Category by Item
We all know that not all customers are created equally. Some of them are highly profitable and others might cost your company money. And this is true for products too. It’s wise to review profitability of both customers and products on a regular basis. This example of Sales and Profitability by Item Class and Item gives you plenty of data to better understand your business.
KPIs may have originated in large, complex organizations but their value us universally recognized, and technology has made powerful, flexible measurement systems with KPI capability both affordable and user-driven so smaller organizations can benefit as well.
Many KPIs are historical in nature, focused on summarization, presentation, and analysis of data commonly found in manufacturing management systems. User-managed alerts and alarms highlight activities and business areas that need attention, relieving busy managers from the need to pore over endless reports and screens. Built-in tools enable fast, intensive analysis to get to the heart of the problem and make sound, informed decisions.
If you need better insight into your manufacturing business, talk to GaleForce. We have the experts you need and solutions to match your unique business and pricepoint. ERP solutions have evolved immensely over the past years and enterprise level features like KPIs are readily available for SMB level businesses. Let’s talk. Contact us today.
