Previous Page:
Key Functions of CBS - The Benefits

Business planning is one of management's key responsibilities. Managers need to direct, structure, organise, instruct and control every aspect of an enterprise. They have to allocate a significant proportion of their time to both the collection of data on which their decisions are to be based and the creation of the resultant plans. There are many types of planning like: regular management planning for business functions such as marketing, human resources, operations and finance; the more strategic areas of Corporate Planning; Change Management; Risk Management; and so on.

Modern management practices now require the preparation and maintenance of fully documented management plans. These plans include budgets, statements of intent and expected outcome, analysis, proposals, priorities, structures, designs, diagrams and flowcharts, project development papers, critical path timelines, gantt charts and implementation schedules. Then there are the documents relating to day-to-day operational co-ordination, tactical management and project control.

Increasingly, over the past few decades, Corporate Planning has become an important part of senior management's role. It covers a wide spectrum of strategic work, including the definition of the enterprise's mission and purpose, vision, strategic goals and objectives, corporate values and policies.

It involves market and business research, analysis of the corporation's life cycle, economic and financial forecasting, the interpretation of the findings and the development of alternative strategies and concept discussion papers directed at change.

It is now widely accepted that, to be effective, change itself, needs to be managed. Getting buy-in, managing feelings and handling new technology, are key issues that have to be addressed.

More recently, corporations have come to realise that risk management is another aspect of the business that requires serious data gathering, analysis and planning.

But business planning is a tough task. Many managers find it very difficult to actually commit their plans to writing. Making your facts, assumptions, intentions and expectations explicit can be quite tiresome. Do your plans and communications all make sense not just to one but to all the (multiple) audiences that need to be informed? Good plans and good communications require exceptional writing and thinking skills. That's where Compass Business Suite comes in.

CBS has an application module, purpose-built to support business planning. Named the "CORRIDOR™", it prompts and facilitates the capture of all the information about your enterprise plans from top to bottom and links those records and other reference papers together so that it is always clear just what is intended and the reasons why. Its unique structure helps to ensure the meaning of your plans is always clear.

This software also facilitates management meetings and board presentations and encourages real-time refinement of wording by the team. Decision-making is always better when all the information and detail is at your fingertips. All cross-functional projects and multi-disciplinary team information can now be seamlessly integrated and shared. And sharing information is far less risky when there is no room for misinterpretation, ambiguity or loss of clarity during the transmission. Using CBS helps you to be more concise and clear. With CBS on board it's truly win-win-win ... the business benefits, the members of the team benefit, and so do you.

The CORRIDOR™ allows you to plan, when it is convenient for you to plan. You do not have to wait for the whole team to get together. CBS drives action by communicating tasks to people at every level, inside and outside your business. Its security clearance and user profile controls are well designed and provide a high degree of flexibility and precision for your message control. Specific instructions can be delivered to operational staff, at every level, right down to the shop floor, just at the right time, when they are needed. This way, staff action can be controlled and staff performance and outcomes monitored.

The CORRIDOR™ also acts as a living documentary repository for future reference. This feature allows plans and related information to be fine-tuned progressively and updated from time to time with version history preserved. Version control also makes peer review and management coaching a lot less burdensome yet more effective.

Sophisticated access control allows you to ensure specific security for each document or record, so that only those allowed to view the data, can. This also controls who can amend a plan once it has been drafted.

Compass Commercial Australia can assist enterprises develop or refine their business plans. CCA management consultants have 19 years experience in Corporate Planning, Strategic Reviews, culture surveys, business design, change management, project management, etc.

Our consultants have the direct support of a CBS database to capture your intent and reasoning. You are then in a position to make it available to those involved in the planning process, implementation or deployment. Strategic planning and operational management just got a lot better ... easier ... faster ... and less costly, too!

0320