Client Successes
S1000D Business Rules - Decision Point™
Online Analysis, Collaboration & Review System
Situation.
Customers in Defense and Aerospace are beginning to utilize S1000D to create, manage,
store, and exchange technical data. In order to implement S1000D, customers must
develop a set of S1000D Business Rules. Due to the large number of Business Rule
decision points in the S1000D specification, this process requires analysis and
collaboration between S1000D experts and the project team. Historically, this process
has taken many months (even years in some cases) and involved many people in frequent
face-to-face meetings.
Reasons.
Crowell Solutions faced a challenge on a joint project with a customer: Our customer
needed to rapidly develop custom S1000D Business Rules. S1000D Business Rules determine
how content is created, stored, and published. In order to meet the goal of providing
quality S1000D Business Rules in an aggressive time frame, we determined that we
needed a way to review, collaborate and track our interactions with the customer
for each decision. Additionally, in order to minimize the project’s impact on our
customer’s time, we wanted to accomplish this collaboration without having to meet
in person.
Crowell Solutions wanted to accomplish three main goals:
- Empower Crowell Solutions analysts and our customer’s content experts to collaborate while making decisions.
- Track Business Rule recommendations made by Crowell Solutions as well as feedback from our customers for each decision point.
- Provide credential-based access to the system without geographical restrictions.
Vision.
We envisioned a data-driven system that would allow analysts to enter decision points,
provide recommendations, gather customer feedback, and track the decision through
each stage of the workflow process. The information entered had to be easy to control,
navigate, and update. The workflow for a decision point starts by entering the issue
into the system and setting its status as “Open”. Once Crowell Solutions makes a
recommendation it is designated as “Ready for Review”. After our client reviews
the recommendation they mark it either as “Accepted” or “Rejected.” The client has
a comments area to explain their thought process.
Solution Provided.
Crowell Solutions developed an application, Decision Point™, which allows analysts
to enter business rule decisions, and allows customers review, collaborate, and
exchange issues that require decisions. Decision Point™ is deployed via the Internet
which removes geographical restrictions. Decision Point™ may be accessed by any device
with Internet access from anywhere in the world. Users are required to have valid
credentials to access Decision Point™.
Decision Point™ allows analysts and customers to collaborate on making complex decisions without the need of elaborate and lengthy meetings. Work is tracked online. Business Rule decision points are easily filtered by chapter or status. Here are some of the highlights:
- Decision workflow is tracked throughout the process
- Analysts and customers are able to save a tremendous amount of time and communicate more frequently and more effectively since they no longer have to meet face-to-face to work together in making decisions
- The system is so intuitive and user friendly that according to our customer, “It is so simple even a child could use it.”
CitiMortgage, Inc.
Escrow Management System
Situation.
Headquartered in St. Louis, Missouri, CitiMortgage prides itself in making the dream
of homeownership come true for a wide range of customers and partners across the
country every day. As a member of Citigroup, they are focused on providing the highest
quality mortgage products as part of an expansive portfolio of financial services
that includes banking, insurance, asset management, credit cards, and much more.
CitiMortgage wanted to accomplish three main goals:
- Improve the efficiency, productivity, suspense tracking, and performance of their escrow management processes
- Allow for offshore staffing
- Track the quantity and quality of work performed by each employee and department
Reasons.
The information was managed in a mainframe system that was missing functionality.
Any requested upgrades to the system were either not possible or required long delays
before implementation.
Vision.
Darin Lenger, Assistant Vice President of Escrow Management Services for CitiMortgage
told us they wanted a workflow tool for all functions in escrow management setup
and audit.
Solution Provided.
Crowell Solutions provided CitiMortgage with a web-based database application written
to their specifications. The application is deployed via their corporate intranet.
As new loans are booked they are loaded into the application and then routed to
the appropriate work queues for setup, audit, tax audit, and suspense. The application
is scalable and supports more than 100 concurrent users. Users are assigned roles
that allow them to perform specific functions. Analytical reports were developed
that monitor work queues, inventory levels, and the performance of each employee.
Result.
The web user interface allows for offshore staffing which is critical to CitiMortgage's
plans. In addition to outsourcing data entry tasks to India, CitiMortgage has also
used the web interface to outsource work to Assurant Insurance, a vendor in the
USA.
- More than 1,000,000 accounts valued at $68 billion have been setup and audited to date as of Dec. 2006
- CitiMortgage saves $100,000 a year by using the system for outsourcing
- Mr. Lenger says, "Where CitiMortgage really saves is on real estate, equipment, phones, etc. Without question CitiMortgage’s quality and efficiency has improved which reduces the cost of tax penalties, cancelled insurance, etc. CitiMortgage has better control of each process which keeps all the outside auditors and regulators happy. All of this is worth something but there is no way to determine how much."
INMOR Capital Investments Corporation
Web Site & Database Development Project
Situation.
INMOR Capital Investments Corporation’s main business is to strategically invest
in short-term real estate development projects. They specialize in highly profitable
residential housing projects, multifamily units, commercial buildings, and condo
conversions.
Critical Issues.
INMOR wanted to accomplish three main goals:
- Support their corporate image with a web site
- Educate clients about their offerings
- Gather survey information from prospects and clients
Reasons.
INMOR was dissatisfied with the appearance of their existing web site. It was difficult
to navigate, did not serve as an information gathering tool, and their previous
web development company was slow in responding to INMOR's requests.
Vision.
Tim Chatman of INMOR told us he needed a way to retrieve survey information gathered
from the web site, enter and delete investment opportunity information and change
product images.
Solution Provided.
Crowell Solutions provided INMOR with an attractive and functional Internet presence.
We developed a database that is integrated with their web site that captures information
from the survey section and displays information about investment opportunities.
We created an administration section of the web site that:
- Requires a valid user ID and password to access
- Provides reports of survey information
- Has a data entry screen used to enter and delete investment opportunity data
- Has an image manager that allows project images to be changed
Result.
INMOR accomplished its main goals:
- Supporting their corporate image with a web site
- Educating clients about their offerings
- Gathering survey information from prospects and clients
Kahn Mechanical Contractors, Inc.
Sales Tax Reporting Add-On
Situation.
Kahn Mechanical Contractors has been serving Dallas/Fort Worth Metroplex businesses
since 1974, designing, installing, and servicing mechanical systems for their commercial
and industrial clients. Their primary goal is to provide solutions to each customer’s
indoor air comfort needs.
Critical Issues.
Kahn Mechanical Contractors wanted to be able to report on the sales tax they had
collected within a specific time period.
Reasons.
Their billing system provided reporting of the sales tax that was billed, but not
of sales tax that was received. In order to calculate the sales tax they received,
they had to review each account and manually calculate the total.
Vision.
Josh Kahn, Vice President of Service for Kahn Mechanical Contractors, told me that
for state government purposes, they needed to be able to report on the sales tax
they had collected in a specific date frame.
Solution Provided.
Crowell Solutions analyzed their billing system and discovered the way the system
stored tax information. Then we developed a Sales Tax Received reporting tool. The
reporting tool has a Windows user interface and allows Kahn Mechanical Contractors
staff to input date range criteria that narrows the results that are returned. Sales
tax received is subtotaled for each customer with a grand to total at the end of
the report.
Result.
Kahn Mechanical Contractors saves time and avoids frustration by using the sales
tax reporting add-on.
