Message from the PresidentTom Malone talks about a company-wide commitment to creating raving fans out of customers and how Accero is making it happen. Read more…Market Trends: Disaster Recovery and Business ContinuityCan your organization survive a natural or man-made disaster? The survival rate for companies without a disaster plan is less than ten percent, according to a recent study. Accero has introduced a Disaster Recovery and Business Continuity Service that can help ensure your business survival with high availability access to a mirrored version of your production system, hosted at a secure tier 3 or 4, SAS 70 compliant data center. Read more…Product Roundup: Accero Workforce IntelligenceYour HCM database is a treasure trove of answers to critical productivity questions. But traditional reporting takes time, can be cumbersome, and may not produce the details you need at the moment you need them. Introducing Accero Workforce Intelligence, a new workforce data analytics product that enables you to spot crucial workforce trends and gain strategic insights — instantly. Read more… |
Conversations: Mike Smitheman Talks about Accero Workforce IntelligenceProduct Manager Mike Smitheman digs deeper into the power of Workforce Intelligence, an application that uncovers the wealth of information that you input into your core Payroll & HR solution on a daily basis, and explains why he believes Workforce Intelligence is a ground-breaking solution. Read to learn more…Spotlight on Success: Shriners Hospitals for ChildrenShriners Hospitals for Children is an international health care system dedicated to improving the lives of children by providing specialty pediatric care, innovative research and outstanding teaching programs. With a relatively small HR and payroll staff, the organization needed an effective way to minimize manual processes and to empower its employees to update their own information. Read more…
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Message from the President
But we're not stopping there. We plan to keep our raving fan machine rolling along. This quarter, for example, we're offering a new Disaster Recovery and Business Continuity Service that can ensure you have secure and high availability access to a mirrored version of your production system.We know that this is a major initiative for many of you and there is a growing need to be prepared in case of disaster. Our data center is staffed with Accero Cyborg experts, meaning they're ready at a moment's notice to step in and continue your payroll and HR processing in time of need—giving you true peace of mind and protecting your business when it's most at risk. We're also bringing business analytics and metrics to HCM decision making, with our latest application, Accero Workforce Intelligence. Workforce Intelligence provides users "out of the box" access to over 200 key metrics, charts, graphs and dashboards to instantly boost HR's strategic role in the organization. For details, please read our Accero Workforce Intelligence discussion in this issue, as well as our interview with product manager Mike Smitheman. Learn more and be sure to take advantage of some introductory offers we have for early adopters. And we're making it easier than ever for our customers to keep on top of compliance issues with the launch of Compliance Central, our blog that's totally dedicated to important regulatory issues. I encourage you to check it out and make it one of your favorites. We'll be updating the information on a regular basis. Our customer feature story in this issue is Shriners Hospitals, a long-time customer who is running their applications through Accero On-Demand, our hosted, subscription-based service. Accero's team of consulting and operations experts worked closely with the Shriners' team to deliver a nearly perfect open enrollment process, as well as other successes. Lastly, I'd like to mention I'll be a guest on HRchitect's Web Mingle (a live radio blogcast) in March. I invite you all to listen and call in. I would love to answer your questions over the air. Although we're focused on creating raving fans, we prefer to rave about our customers. It's only through your close assistance and advice that we're able to take HCM to the next level. Thanks for helping us make each of our organizations stronger. Working together is how teams win. |
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When Disaster Strikes, Be PreparedAccero Introduces New Disaster Recovery and Business Continuity Service From the horrific tragedy of 9/11 to the 2003 northeast power grid failure to the devastating power of Hurricane Katrina in 2005, the previous decade had more than its share of catastrophic disasters. And not every business survived. In fact, the survival rate for companies without a disaster plan is less than ten percent, according to a recent Touche Ross study. International Data Corp. estimates that companies lose an average of $84,000 for every hour of downtime. That's the bad news. Now for some good news… Accero is pleased to offer our customers a Disaster Recovery and Business Continuity Service that will provide secure and high availability access to a mirrored version of their production system, hosted at a secure SAS 70 compliant data center. Unlike some backup data centers where hosting is all they know or do, our data center staff averages more than 10 years of experience working with Accero Cyborg solutions. Our solution-trained experts are ready to step in and support your payroll production, should a natural or man-made disaster prevent your staff from working. The beauty is… this is a highly customized service! We audit and thoroughly document your processes and learn exactly how you run your systems. We review the processes with you quarterly, updating process documentation as needed. And we test, test, test your mirrored environment regularly. Access to your mirrored system is either through Fast Forward or via VPN for system administrators, much the same as you access it today. Here are a few highlights of what you can expect with our Business Continuity Service:
Register here to see the Introduction to Disaster Recovery Webinar & learn more. Can your organization survive a disaster? Contact your Accero Representative to learn more about protecting your business or send an email request to info@accero.com. When it comes to surviving the unexpected, the Boy Scout motto says it best: Be Prepared. |
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Accero Workforce Intelligence — The Right Information in the Right HandsAt any given moment, do you know what your turnover rates are? Maybe. But how about turnover for a specific department, or over a specific data range, or for a specific class of employees — or all of the above. Accero Workforce Intelligence is all about providing you with instant access to the information you need when you need it — right on your desktop and in any form you want — graphs, bar charts, dashboards, spreadsheets. With Accero Workforce Intelligence, you have access to over 200 predefined metrics, charts, dashboards, scorecards and reports. Instantly view key data on employee demographics or job satisfaction rates? Easily separate your top performers from those who are average. Ensure your organization has the right people in the right position at the right time. All this, and much more, available with just a mouse click. Accero Workforce Intelligence is our new workforce data analytics product that enables you to spot crucial workforce trends and gain strategic insights — instantly. This intuitive product includes easy-to-use and understand metrics, reports, scorecards, and dashboards. With more than 200 predefined workforce metrics at your fingertips, you'll be able to drill down for better— and more timely — decision making and improved performance. Accero Workforce Intelligence is fully integrated with your Accero Solutions suite, including payroll, HR, benefits, and compensation data. Through a centralized database, the product enables you to analyze the metrics that matter most. You can quickly identify trends. Gain valuable insights. Create and distribute relevant reports. And protect sensitive information by ensuring each user views only authorized data. Key Features:
Accero Workforce Intelligence introduces a new dimension to your decision-making process and prowess. To find out easy it is to gain timely workforce insights, and to learn about special introductory pricing offers, contact your Accero Representative or email us at info@accero.com. Download the datasheet or view the 30 minute on-demand webinar "Introducing Accero Workforce Intelligence" to learn more. |
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CONVERSATIONS: Mike Smitheman Talks about Accero Workforce Intelligence
I joined Accero in July 2009 as Product Manager to help make the vision of Accero Workforce Intelligence a reality. Could you tell us something about your business software background? I've spent over 10 years in the Business Intelligence space working in a variety of roles, from design and implementation to consultancy, sales engineering, and product management. Most recently, I helped start and grow a software company that provided Employee Performance Management solutions. As VP of Product Management I was responsible for providing the vision for and managing the delivery of a solution that aimed to improve the efficiencies and effectiveness of the workforce, by bringing business intelligence to the masses. What is Workforce Intelligence? Accero Workforce Intelligence is an application that uncovers the wealth of information that you input into your core Payroll & HR solution on a daily basis, and delivers it to the right people at the right time. Business Analytics and reporting in general have largely been necessary evils for most companies because vendors have essentially delivered toolkits and left the important work of creating reports and analytics to their customers. Accero Workforce Intelligence overcomes this challenge by delivering tons of content (in the form of metrics, reports, scorecards and dashboards) in the application. We have done all the heavy lifting for you! Of course, you can still build your own reports and KPIs. But with Workforce Intelligence, you'll probably find all the information you need right at your fingertips. Why is it important? I think this is important from a couple of perspectives. The most important of these is that it is finally going to give Accero customers real insight into what is happening in their workforce. There is an unbelievable amount of data in the core Accero Cyborg product today, and while we have provided reporting tools in the past, for the reasons I mentioned above it is not easy to get to that data and allow your users to consume it in an effective way. With Accero Workforce Intelligence, we have overcome that hurdle, and our customers are now going to have the information they need to make more informed and timely decisions. Secondly, in my 10 years in the reporting industry, the focus has been on selling toolkits to organizations, which in a lot of cases become shelf ware. I am excited that Accero can lead the charge by delivering a content-rich application to our customers that is quick to install. I believe this could be a ground breaking solution in the wider Business Analytics space. What are the chief benefits of Workforce Intelligence to an HR or Payroll professional? At the corporate level, organizations will now be able to get to the information they need when they need it, and understand the reasons behind results and trends…a promise that the industry has made for years, but never delivered on. At a personal level, Accero Workforce Intelligence will truly make HR a strategic force in the organization. HR will be able to provide insight into information that was previously just too difficult to get and discern. HR professionals will likely see their stock rise as they will now have the information needed to help steer the organization towards greater levels of success. How will Accero customers use it? Workforce Intelligence is a module within the Accero Cyborg product suite. It is fully integrated into Fast Forward, our new web based front end, and makes use of the Accero Cyborg security model to give users access only to the information relevant to them. Can it be customized? I prefer "configured"! Within the application you will be able to give users access to the screens that you want them to see. We have an integrated reporting engine in the application that customers will be able to use to create their own reports if required…we understand that there will always be customer specific views required. How will the tool be supported? Workforce Intelligence is supported the same way as our other products. But remember, we also support the content (metrics, reports, dashboards and scorecards)! We will provide a set of short training courses to get people familiar with the power of the application, but functionality wise it is not difficult to use. With that in mind, the application contains a full "data dictionary" that exposes a lot of helpful information through pop up and help screens. We will also be providing a full set of documentation around not just the functionality within the product, but also what the content is. What enhancements are planned? Many! Firstly we will continue to expand content as we get feedback from customers. If there are views on the data that are useful that aren't included in our library of content, we want to know so that our customers don't have to maintain them themselves. We are looking at providing customers a way of integrating other workforce related data that may not be available with Accero Cyborg. Functionality wise, my focus is now looking at ways of expanding the analysis capabilities (looking for relationships in the data that aren't necessarily obvious but that might be driving a key set of results in your business) and ways of using that information in an effective way. How soon can customers get started using Workforce Intelligence? April 1st (and no… it's not an April fool!). |
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spotlight on successCase Study: Shriners Hospitals for Children The Company: Shriners Hospitals The Industry: Healthcare Industry The Challenge: Shriners Hospitals for Children is an international health care system dedicated to improving the lives of children by providing specialty pediatric care, innovative research and outstanding teaching programs. Children up to the age of 18 with orthopedic conditions, burns, spinal cord injuries and cleft lip and palate are eligible for admission and receive all care in a family-centered environment with no financial obligation to patients or families. An Accero customer since 1998, Shriners Hospitals is responsible for the payroll and benefits needs of 5,151 employees, across multiple locations in the U.S. With a relatively small HR and payroll staff, the organization needed an effective way to minimize manual processes and to empower its employees to update their own information, where appropriate and as needed, through a secure process. The Solution: Accero's consulting experts, project managers and operations teams partnered with Shriners' HR and payroll teams to implement employee self-service, including online annual enrollment capabilities. Applications are delivered through Accero On-Demand, the company's hosted, subscription-based service. The Accero Professional Services team implemented Accero On-Demand's employee self-service module, which dramatically reduced manual processes and created a better annual enrollment experience for all employees. From setting up benefits tables, test environments, security, monitoring services, third party electronic file transfers and other implementation activities, Accero's team of professional benefits and payroll consultants delivered Shriners' first annual enrollment on-time and on budget. The Results: Shriners Hospitals experienced a near-flawless open enrollment process. Additionally, the Accero team successfully completed six large consulting projects for the client during 2009, including the successful implementation of a multitude of new complex interfaces. This effort resulted in marked improvements in communication, project delivery and issue resolution. The Accero On-Demand operations teams have since delivered a second successful annual enrollment program. Accero's services and products continue to decrease the amount of manual transactional activity for Shriners' HR and payroll teams, as well as for employees and managers. Shriners Hospitals will be implementing Fast Forward (our Web-based user interface) next. Client Comments: "Implementing the Accero Self Service modules has made us more efficient. We used to manually handle each employee's benefits package. Now, employees can go online, make their changes, get a confirm statement, print it and take it home to discuss with their family," Suzanne MacArthur, H.R.I.S. Manager, Shriners Hospitals. Are you an Accero Success Story? If so, we'd like to feature you in an upcoming newsletter. Please email us at customersuccess@accero.com and tell us your story. |
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ACCERO WINS 2010 STEVIE AWARD FOR SALES AND CUSTOMER SERVICEAccero was the recent recipient of the 2010 StevieR Award for Customer Service Team of the Year — Recovery Situation at gala ceremonies in Miami Beach on Monday, February 22, 2010 at the 4th Annual Stevie Awards for Sales & Customer Service. Finalists for the awards were selected from over 500 entries from organizations of all sizes representing virtually every industry. The awards are presented by the Stevie Awards, which organizes several of the world's leading business awards shows including the prestigious American Business Awards. Accero (formerly Cyborg Systems) was nominated in the Customer Service Team of the Year — Recovery Situation category based on its 'raving fan' campaign. The year-long campaign, launched following the acquisition of Cyborg assets from Hewitt Associates, focused on turning every customer into a raving fan. Program tactics included personalized visits from Accero executives, a customer portal featuring an online knowledge base and extensive customer tools and a customer support summit where the support team brainstormed and put into effect strategies to bring excellence to every customer interaction. Members of the Awards' Board of Distinguished Judges & Advisors and their staffs selected Stevie Award winners from among the Finalists. Finalists were chosen by business professionals worldwide during preliminary judging. "This award is shared by our entire team, all of whom demonstrated dedication and a concentrated focus on turning our customers, who had been somewhat neglected under prior ownership, into raving fans," said Accero President, Tom Malone. "We are extremely proud to accept this award and the recognition of our commitment to customer success." "This year's honorees demonstrate that even in challenging economic times, it's possible for organizations to continue to shine in sales and customer service, the two most important functions in business: acquiring and keeping customers," said Michael Gallagher, president of the Stevie Awards. Details about the Stevie Awards for Sales & Customer Service and the list of honorees in all categories are available at www.stevieawards.com/sales. |
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