Advance Practice PIQ

Advance® Practice IQ is the final expression of the OLAP process. Advance Practice IQ represents a collection of the most comprehensive reporting methods available to professional service organizations. Advance Practice IQ presents key practice information in tabular or graphical format drawn from the organizations preferred structures and dimensions and delivered in dynamic web page format for viewing within Microsoft Outlook or from within a web browser or Intranet.

The information is organized in a hierarchical structure thereby allowing users to "drill down" into the detail behind. Advance® Practice IQ and the APS OLAP Cubes can be customized for that information, which is of specific importance to the organization.

Click here to view seperate screenshots of the Advance® Practice IQ System with additional information

Doing things right with the right things
APS have identified three key technologies that support the solution to Performance reporting:

• Microsoft® SQL Server™ 2000/2005
• Microsoft® Analysis Services™ (OLAP)
• Advance® Practice IQ

These technologies provide the mechanism to compute and record the business transactions of the enterprise, these systems are known as online transaction processing (OLTP) systems.

SQL Server is the chosen database platform for most of our clients. A comprehensive database solution, SQL Server delivers the performance, scalability, and reliability that demanding Web and enterprise line-of-business environments require, simplifying data access and interchange. Enhanced availability features maximize uptime; advanced management functions automate routine tasks, and improved programming tools and services speed development. Significantly these database systems have become affordable for professional service organisations in recent years and are no longer the considered as the technology acquired by 'Blue Chip' companies.

SQL Server can handle 688,220 transactions per minute! SQL Server has established its position as the fastest database in the world. On the TPC-C performance list, SQL Server now holds the number one position, four of the top five, and five of the top 10 results.

Business Drivers
Additional pressures in the business world demand that we make our businesses as efficient as possible especially in the way we manage business information. The reasons we need better management systems are:

Management no longer has the time to sift through reams of management reports which contain information about every process and transaction that has taken place in the business - the systems need to identify the exceptions for us.

Because our "back office" systems have become more "on-line", the value of paper reporting is greatly reduced. For example in an accounting practice using Advance® timesheets to capture time, the value of Work in Progress may change every minute of the day. A manager looking at a printed WIP report that was produced 3 days ago could potentially make business decisions for billing or employee assessments based on stale management information.

Practices need to relieve themselves of the massive administrative bottleneck, which often exists at the partner level by making management and junior staff more responsible for making basic day-to-day decisions and "pushing the responsibility down the line". The only way however to expect individuals to be responsible is to ensure they have sufficient information to measure their performance and that of their team. For example, using the Advance® Practice Management system, individuals can quickly identify any tasks that they are responsible for, how much time has been budgeted for its completion and how much has been spent to date. Overdue tasks or over budget tasks are also identified.

Additional pressures from clients demand that we become more reactive. The correct action can only be taken if the right information finds its way to the right people and is presented in a clear, concise manner. Taking the example above, one of the key performance standards of the practice may be that any job which is 10% or more over budget or more than 2 days overdue should be reported on.

The Advance® Practice IQ focuses on streamlining the delivery and presentation of key business intelligence to the right people at the right time