Customer Success Story
Stendel + Reich Architects
Deltek Vision� Helps Canadian Architectural Firm Create a New Blueprint for Organizational Efficiency
The Challenge
As an established Canadian architectural firm, Montreal-based Stendel + Reich has a strong reputation in the marketplace built on innovation and client satisfaction. Their 40+ employees go above and beyond to deliver for their numerous commercial and industrial clients. However, when it came to managing elements of their business - time and expense tracking, accounting, and project management - the team was growing frustrated.
"Our existing systems just couldn't keep up," said Sheldon Reich, Principal of Stendel + Reich. "They lacked the flexibility and built-in integration we needed to enable us to move away from our manual job and resource planning, as well as our independent timesheet and accounting/payroll software packages." Reich continued, "When we had to compile reports on the various facets of our business, even the simplest reports would not be readily accessible because we had to rely on the one system expert who could pull together the data we needed."
Their decade-old system's lack of automation, flexibility and simple reporting had a direct impact on the ability to bid on new projects and keep tabs on existing ones. As their business grew, Stendel + Reich management recognized the improvements they needed to make in their business. Reich stated, "Our prior system was, for lack of a better word, primitive. It simply could not provide administrative and project management personnel with an easy way to obtain needed information in order to proactively monitor and complete work."
The Solution
Stendel + Reich explored several options, and they found that most commercially available solutions lacked "must have" functionality or were simply too expensive for the value they provided. Working closely with Deltek consulting partner Kennedy Vomberg, and based on previous positive experience with Deltek solutions, Stendel + Reich chose Deltek Vision.
While Stendel + Reich liked many of Vision's capabilities, the unique ability to manage their complicated dual tax structure helped Vision stand out from competing products. "We have to add both provincial and federal compounded value-add taxes to every invoice total," Reich recalled. "No other solution had the flexibility to give us two tax fields."
Vision's flexibility wasn't the only feature that made an immediate impression. "Besides meeting our specific tax needs, Vision's resource planning module was the deal-maker for us. We immediately recognized theb immense impact and benefit it would have on what had historically been one of our most time-consuming tasks," Reich said.
Specifically designed for professional services firms, Vision is a flexible, scalable solution with modules that automate and integrate the planning, tracking, and administration of both resources and projects, improving efficiency and enabling effective business decisions.
Besides resource planning, Stendel + Reich also deployed the accounting, billing, visualization, and time and expense modules, taking a phased approach to migrating their legacy data. "Working with Kennedy Vomberg, our implementation went very smoothly, and Vision was fully rolled-out on the timeframe that we wanted. Kennedy Vomberg was a great partner to work with," Reich reported.
The Benefits
After the Spring 2008 implementation, Stendel + Reich began to see the benefits immediately, beginning with the ability to not only create a work breakdown schedule within the resource planning module, but also to tie it directly to a project. "Now we can see staff utilization and the status of our projects in real-time, and use the information for baselining our business - in minutes instead of days," Reich said. "Vision helps us ensure that we're starting every project with no information gaps and tracking projects as they progress."
Vision also provides fast access to important reports and eliminates the need for manually comparing project status and costs to timesheets and budgets.
An unexpected benefit of the solution was a change in employee behavior, specifically in timesheet submission. With Vision's automation and full integration into Stendel + Reich's payroll, late timesheets mean no paychecks. "Timesheets used to hold us back billing-wise because people sometimes lagged up to a month in submitting them. This caused a situation where we wouldn't bill for the previous month until more than three weeks into the next month," Reich recalled. "Now, by billing two days into the month, all timesheets are in and approved, and billing goes out up to three weeks sooner which has improved our days sales outstanding (DSOs)."
"All in all, Vision is a solution that made us wonder why we lived with our previously manual processes for so long. Tasks that used to take days are now completed in minutes. Vision was the best choice for us, and it makes our business more efficient than ever," Reich concluded.
Stendel + Reich Architects At A Glance
Company Name: Stendel + Reich Architects
Headquarters: Montreal, Quebec, Canada
Primary Business: Stendel + Reich is a Canadian architectural firm based in Montreal. They provide a range of planning and design services to commercial and industrial clients, including expertise in office buildings, residential and hotels, retail and restaurants, and manufacturing, processing, and warehouse facilities.
URL: www.stendelreich.com
Implementation Partner
Kennedy Vomberg
Kennedy Vomberg Inc. is based in Toronto, Canada and provides business advisory and software consulting services to the professional services industry throughout Ontario and beyond. In partnership with Deltek, Kennedy Vomberg markets and implements the Vision line of business management solutions to organizations that sell and deliver formally constituted projects.
| The Deltek Advantage |
The implementation of Deltek Vision enabled Stendel + Reich to:
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