News & Views

180 View – There are many comments about this video. One of them was “This is a beautiful video. It says so much about how the smallest things we do can make a huge difference in someone’s life. Little acts of kindness can have far-reaching effects that we may never see, so next time you think you aren’t helping to change the world, just watch this video and maybe you will think differently.”

180 View – something to add to your new year’s resolutions.

180 View – You will enjoy this video once Larry Ellison starts to rant.

180 View – Thanks to Lawrence Young for passing this on.

On October 20, The Financial Technology Show is back in Toronto. I will be speaking there at 1 pm. My topics this year are:

1. Latest technology trends. Cloud computing will be the primary trend that will be discussed with both the pros and cons.
2. How to negotiate a software contract
3. Top 10 items to consider when making an investment in a new system
4. The challenges of benchmarking and a solution for doing it

180 View – We hope this is a hoax.

We are busier than ever which hopefully reflects that the economy is getting better despite all the financial woes in the US. We are looking for part-time or full-time consultants in the Toronto area who have many of the following qualifications:

• Business process review experience
• ERP system selection experience
• ERP system implementation experience
• Project management experience
• Expertise in multiple industries based on 5+ years experience
• Excellent oral and written communication skills
• Accounting designation
• Bachelor’s degree in Business or Computer Science.
• MBA

Please contact us by email at hr@180systems.com if you’re interested or pass this on to someone that you think would be interested. Thanks

180 View – Something to laugh about.

180 View – Something to think about.

November 7, 2010 from TechCrunch – “…And while no one explicitly desires cumbersome technology, we keep buying it because we’ve built a strong correlation between the number of features a solution has and the likelihood it will solve our problem. That, and you won’t get fired. While building or adopting the most feature-rich service looks great on paper, in practice it means that customers have signed themselves up for technology that can never be upgraded, unhappy end-users, and (paradoxically) inertia to move off tools that required so much time to implement and experts to maintain….”

180 View – The author, Aaron Levie, is a 26 year old CEO of Box.net who was written up in Forbes on January 26, 2011 – see http://www.forbes.com/forbes/2011/0214/technology-aaron-levie-box-net-enterprise-free-software.html?partner=alerts. It appears that he has been successful in applying his keep it simple approach to his file storage and collaboration system. It will take a lot more effort to do the same for ERP, which is complex almost by definition. The definition of ERP is automation of business processes across departments and many ERP systems span multiple industries. So an ERP system needs to handle lots of complexity out of the box. However, this is not to say that the user interface needs to be complex or that ad-hoc enquiries or adding fields should only be done by programmers.

January 2011 from CFO Magazine and written by Intacct – “…Cloud-based ­financial management and accounting systems achieve on average 75% to 500% annual return on investment. Some of the ROI is from IT – the capital and operating expense savings from not having to run systems internally are considerable. Other ROI drivers are due to the extensive automation and integration capabilities built into the more modern cloud-based systems – they go a long way toward increasing productivity by eliminating manual data entry and paper-based processes and getting rid of spreadsheets. Because cloud systems are inherently web-based, live and real-time, they greatly speed time sensitive ­financial processes – from collecting cash faster and reducing DSO to more rapid consolidation and close processes. Time is money, and cloud systems drive tremendous ROI through time savings and process efficiencies…”

180 View – This article is really an advertisement by Intacct, who just happen to develop and sell cloud-based financial systems. The ROI numbers appear to be highly suspect. We don’t recommend you spend much time on this article.