Technology Management Concepts (TMC) is very pleased to announce that we have successfully renewed our Microsoft GOLD Competency in Enterprise Reporting Platform.  The Microsoft GOLD Competency in ERP is designed by Microsoft to recognize the very best of their Dynamics partners, and TMC has now earned this prestigious honor for consecutive years.

GOLD Competency demonstrates the best-in-class expertise within Microsoft’s marketplace. Earning a gold competency is evidence of TMC’s deep, consistent commitment to a specific, in-demand, business solution area, along with the distinction of being among only 1 percent of Microsoft partners worldwide that have attained this outstanding degree of proficiency.

The Enterprise Resource Planning GOLD competency provides TMC with a unique opportunity to develop a trusted advisor relationship with our customers’ key decision makers. By providing solutions that address critical business priorities, TMC can build the foundation for longer-term, deeper customer relationships.

Earning a GOLD Competency in Enterprise Reporting Platform is a team effort, requiring virtually every one of TMC’s Management team, Consultants and Developers, and the Sales Team to have demonstrated the highest level of success and achievement within the Microsoft realm.  TMC has met or exceeded every requirement for this prestigious accomplishment.

On March 31st, 2011, Technology Management Concepts (TMC), held a free Training Class on Microsoft Dynamics GP (formally Great Plains) FRx and Management Reporter. The class was open to all interested and aimed at educating Dynamics GP users to fully utilize the powerful reporting tools, and in doing so, bringing a better understanding and control to the financial process within their organization.

The class was organized by Pat Quimby, TMC’s Client Account Manager, and was a huge success with over 48 people attending. The free class was held at the Microsoft Office in Downtown Los Angeles. The class was presented by Julie London, TMC’s Senior Implementation Specialist. Julie has been with TMC for over 12 years and has been involved in countless Dynamics GP implementations. The class was split over two sessions: beginners and advanced.

Dennis Jones, CFO of Hof’s Hut who attended the class said “The Controller and I attended an FRx reporting class conducted by TMC in an effort to learn how to optimize our use of FRx. The training session was very professional and definitely exceeded our expectations. We already had a good working knowledge of FRx and considered ourselves intermediate/advanced, but we cam e away with several new concepts, shortcuts and time-saving tricks that will allow us to take our Financial Reporting to a whole new level. I would recommend this class to any user of FRx, even if they think that they are at an advanced level”.

The morning session covered FRx basics, which involved creating both a Balance Sheet and Income Statement. The class was fully interactive with all attendees given access to a PC with a virtual image to create a balance sheet and income statement for themselves during the class. This enabled all attendees to practice what they were learning enabling them to take back what they learned to their organization.

The afternoon session focused on the advanced topics and covered some tips and tricks when using Microsoft FRx. Some tips and tricks that were covered were:

Adding variance columns and print control in reports. Specifically, when including Budget to Actual columns and being able to get your variances coming out in the correct direction for both revenue and expenses;

Being able to create one report using multiple column layouts. By using the ‘Effective Dates’ a user is able to control the number of columns printed based on the report date;

Creating dynamic actual to budget reports. This allows the user to have one report that will, based on the reporting date, report the actuals for your date, then prefill the remainder of the report with Budget information;

Using conditional if, then, else statements. A good example of this is when showing the intercompany account as an asset when the balance is a debit or as a liability when the balance is a credit.

The afternoon session finished with Dynamics GP’s new financial reporting tool, Management Reporter. Management Reporter is a powerful corporate performance management solution, which provides real-time financial reporting for midsize businesses. Going forward, Management Reporter will replace Microsoft FRx. It is a comprehensive financial reporting and analysis application available to Microsoft Dynamics ERP customers. The afternoon session explained the main differences between these two reporting solutions.

“The participants left the training course with very satisfactory comments and an extremely positive view towards Management Reporter,” said Jennifer Harris, Director at TMC.

As a part of TMC’s continuing commitment to providing high-quality training classes, they are proud to offer board approved classes for CPA’s. TMC’s FRx training course and webinars allow attendees to earn CPE (continuing professional education) credits. Each of the attendees who completed the FRx Class earned six credits for the day.

TMC continues to offer webinars on various topics, each earning CPA’s one credit per webinar. The next webinar is on Smartlist Builder, scheduled for April 20th, 2011 at 10am. Future webinar topics are on SalesPad, Formatting Excel & Word Templates and GP Light Users. Please check the webinars page on TMC’s website for future class times and topics.

For more information on TMC’s training classes and webinars please contact Pat Quimby pquimby@tmc-la.com.

Technology Management Concepts (TMC), the leading Microsoft Gold Certified Partner in Southern California, has been selected by Goodwill of Orange County as their new consulting partner. Goodwill of Orange County has recently selected Dynamics GP (formally Great Plains) as their new ERP solution. TMC is extremely excited by the partnership and looks forward to a successful implementation.

Goodwill of Orange County provides people with disabilities and other barriers the opportunity to achieve their highest levels of personal and economic independence. In order to continue to provide these levels of services to their program participants, they have decided to streamline their systems. To that end, Goodwill of Orange County has an initiative for 2011 to reduce costs and increase efficiencies by replacing as many of their disparate systems with one integrated system as possible.

The organization turned to the comprehensive functionality of Microsoft Dynamics GP to integrate its point-of-sale systems and leverage their world-class business intelligence and reporting functionality.  They have selected TMC to provide implementation services.

Some immediate goals include: (more…)

E-mail overview

By using the e-mail functionality in Microsoft Dynamics GP, you can embed document into the body of an e-mail or send documents as attachment. You can send a single document, batches of documents, or multiple documents from sales and purchasing transaction lists. When setting up the e-mail functionality, you can select which documents to send and which customers and vendors should receive their documents in e–mail. If you are using Word templates for Microsoft Dynamics GP, you can send predefined or customized forms. For more information, see Word templates in Dynamics GP 2010 help.

You can send the following documents in e-mail.

(more…)

In October 2010 Microsoft made a major change to its partner program and the criteria by which partners are ranked.  The new Microsoft Partner Network (MPN) accreditations were introduced as well as new partner logos.

The two main changes that took place with this switch were:

(more…)

Effective thru the end of the year (December 23, 2010), Microsoft has created a promotional offer, “Move Now”, for companies using Microsoft’s Small Business Financials.  This offer applies to US-based companies only, and there are some other restrictions.  With this offer, your company can upgrade from Small Business Financials to Dynamics ERP!

The “Move Now” promotion offers a 100% discount on the first 5 system users of Dynamics GP, Dynamics NAV and Dynamics SL, and up to a 50% discount on system users 6 – 10.  In addition, there is a 100% discount avail on the following ‘a la carte’ modules:

                US Payroll (up to 500 employees)

                Payroll Direct Deposit

                Federal Magnetic Media

                Bill of Materials

                Integration Suite

(more…)

TMC (Technology Management Concepts) is very pleased to announce the availability of a new product offering:  Microsoft Dynamics NAV.  TMC has long supported Dynamics GP (formerly Great Plains), and has now expanded their Dynamics Business Solutions sales and services to include Dynamics NAV.  TMC is recognized by Microsoft for their commitment and experience, and has awarded TMC a GOLD Competency in Enterprise Resource Planning, a recognition that is made to less than 2% of Microsoft partners worldwide.

Dynamics NAV is a fully-featured Enterprise Resource Planning system, emphasizing an easy to use interface, full end-to-end integration, strong analytical tools and business intelligence capabilities, and robust integration and development tools.  Dynamics NAV leverages Microsoft SQL Server as the database engine, and extends SQL server’s reporting tools.

With Dynamics NAV 2009, you will benefit from a role-tailored experience designed to promote those features and capabilities that are suited to an employee’s job requirements, and then either minimize or hide those features that are irrelevant or sensitive.  Dynamics NAV provides important tasks and reminders direct to the Home Page, providing rapid access to those critical situations.  Dynamics NAV includes 21 pre-defined Role Centers, and variations on these are easy to do.

TMC will also bring their highly experienced team of project managers and consultants to deliver the consistent results we have always provided to our Dynamics GP clients.  TMC has also supplemented the staff, bringing on certified Dynamics NAV team members.  Count on TMC to offer our best in all implementations.

Contact Pat Quimby for more information.

310.559.3982 x 784 or

pquimby@tmc-la.com

With the release of Dynamics GP 2010, Microsoft continues to enhance its flagship business application and its ability to support a wide variety of government agencies, NGO’s, and not for profits.  Enhanced reporting and analysis tools, support for international financial reporting standards (IFRS and XBRL), and general ledger reporting ledgers all make GP 2010 a great choice for government agencies and institutions. (more…)

TMC, a Microsoft Gold Partner based in Marina Del Rey, California, announced on Monday that they have earned the Business Intelligence Competency in the Microsoft Partner Program.

The Business Intelligence Competency recognizes TMC’s proven skills to help the mid-tier enterprise mature their BI capabilities. This solution combines strategy, process and organizational change and utilizes the Microsoft suite of BI tools to help leaders align strategy with execution and move from reactive management to empowerment and measurement.

(more…)

For many people, the distribution industry is viewed as simply “buy stuff, store stuff, and sell stuff”.  How much does it take to really manage a distribution business?  The answer, not surprisingly, is “how successful do you want your distribution business to be”?  When should I buy new items?  Is it time to off-load that stale-dated inventory?  Who was responsible for buying that stale stuff in the first place?  Who are my best customers?  Who are my worst customers?

With Microsoft Dynamics GP, transparency is brought to all 3 sides of the distribution business:  Purchasing, Inventory Control, and Sales.  Dynamics GP provides key, timely insights to the movement of goods throughout your system.  When this information is delivered directly to the key decision makers, your company will realize significant benefits.

(more…)