Integrating finance and CRM systems for effective project

management:

ODI’s Information Systems Integration Project

Peter Gee

• ODI is an independent think tank on humanitarian and international development

• Last year celebrated its 50th anniversary• It is a charity, but not a membership

organisation• Is expanding from current staff of 150, to

around 200 next year, plus research associates, contractors, consultants and interns.

• Apart from some major funding streams from DFID and The Gates Foundation, the majority of funding is project-related, from a range of institutional funders.

• Website screen shot

• ODI’s main earners are its 70 + research staff.

• Continuing to bring in enough project funds to cover all our costs is crucial

• Managing finances has always been challenging but with tighter margins has become even more so

Responding with IT• To meet this challenge ODI computerised its

finance systems back in 1989, with:– financial accounting using TetraPlan coupled

with – management accounting and reporting through

a parallel spreadsheet system• For more than a decade this system worked

generally well, but depended on a few long-serving members of staff, using poorly documented systems.

• Overhauling the financial system in early 2000’s proved to be difficult and more expensive than envisaged.

In-house solutions tried:

• develop our own reporting systems and customised billing system, integrated with SharePoint using Microsoft SQL Reporting Services - partially successful – but highlighted problems with accuracy of project data – a more integrated system was needed, and our developer left us.

• Working group on systems development & integration, with some SQL database and SharePoint –but with very limited time and budget progress was slow.

Case is made for systems integration

• Perception that finance and other systems still don’t deliver: – inefficient, fragile, disconnected systems, multiple re-

entry of data, cannot be scaled up, highly dependent on a small group of specialist finance staff.

– do not support • tracking the ‘profitability’ of projects;• producing basic financial information; and• preparing research proposals.

• Consultants brought in (Sayer Vincent)• Management team decide to make the case for

substantial financial investment in a systems integration project

Consultants report

• Benefits identified:– reduced staff stress; – increased financial stability – increased external cohesion and impact

• Options for software solutions– Ranging from integrated practice management type systems

( as used by lawyers and accountants) through modular systems to separate systems with bespoke integration

Solution/supplier selected

• Preliminary sifting with demonstrations• Shortlist of four suppliers

– Two with mainly Microsoft solutions; two others.– Each presents to representative project team, which score

aspects of their solutions• Nov/Dec: two suppliers make detailed presentations

with prototyping– Reference site visits– Further detailed evaluation

• Final decision made shortly before Christmas 2009 – With high level of agreement from the project team at all

levels – FD Systems with solution based on Sage 1000

About the Selected System

• Given the complexity of ODI’s requirements, no single product could meet all our needs.

• The system selected involves several different software components requiring detailed configuration– core Sage 1000– ‘cloud’ based Replicon time recording/expenses– Sage CRM– Qlikview for flexible reporting

What is ISIP?

SHAREPOINT

SAGE 1000CRM

REPLICON

Info on Customers / Suppliers

Info on projects / budgets

Project documents

Time & expenses info

QLIKVIEW

Project title and ID number

Wee

kly ti

me /

expe

nse

claim

s

Project title and

work tasks

Hyper

links

to re

levan

t da

ta

Project Progress Reports

Project / programme financial reports

Individual / Programme target

reports

Budg

et d

ata

Actual ti

me / expenses

data

Information outInformation in

Finance reports

Key:

Personal / team time reports

ISIP component software - REPLICON

ISIP component software – Sage CRM…with bespoke elements

ISIP component software - QlikView

Managing projects - The CRM Workflow

System Design and Key Implementation Decisions

• Implementation phase for 2010 and 2011 – not always smooth.

• Some key decisions made during the implementation– Significant alteration of the proposed integration

points– Phased roll-out with a temporary solution while

development continued– Include some bespoke elements (with a .NET

budget tool application)

Reflections in October 2011 with Stage 2 live [almost]

• The original timescale was optimistic, and some slippage was probably inevitable

• Nevertheless Stage 1 went live within a couple of weeks of target date. Stage 2 took far longer than any of us envisaged, eventually to launch in June 2011, and there have been some outstanding issues since then.

• A key challenge has been availability of staff on both sides – the complex timetable agreed with the contractor could be easily thrown out. During 2011 a shortage of developer resources at FDS has caused many further delays.

• Workshops with staff were problematic in configuring and delivering complex elements

• Some staff had strong ownership of the old system and were reluctant to support the new before full end to end demonstration

• Challenge of ‘scope-creep’• Practical difficulties in testing the whole system before completion• Overview of what the project should deliver

ISIPCRM: Projects Replicon:

Timesheets

Sage: Finances

BI & Qlickview:

Reports

Reduced staff stress • Input efficiency• Retrieval efficiency• Process efficiency

Increased financial stability • Winning business• Mobilising resources• Delivering the work

Increased external coherence and impact

• Better management reports• Better donor reports

• Business integrated with public-good activities

• Portfolio management of projects• Strategic management of clients• Improved strategic decisions

Built-in workflow and approvals

Better donor “records”

Aggregated donor project information

Live tracking of time and other costs

Automatically generated donor reports

Better understanding of time use

Single project info system User-configurable dashboards

Easy budget / input changes

Pre-configured reports

Can aggregate info in multiple dimensions

An extensive training and support programme has been put in place:

Questions?