By “great” we mean Great Plains, Microsoft’s answer to the conundrum of business accounting. This article looks at the best features of Great Plains accounting software to help you understand how it can improve business.
Microsoft’s Great Plains (GP) accounting software is an expansive financial platform that also includes enterprise resource planning (ERP) tools. This is a commercial tool that helps businesses manage all crucial functions in one place, from e-commerce to accounting, supply chain to customer service. The specific functions that fall under GP include:
The goal of GP is to give organizations 360-oversight over every function that matters in a business setting. This will positively affect cash flow in the short and long-term. Some of the benefits of using this software include:
The whole point of GP is to provide organizations with insight while taking a patchwork of slapped together systems and turning it into one integrated whole. The biggest benefit in one you may not even recognize until you rollout GP; it will reduce redundancies in basic functions like data entry. That’s because GP uses a shared database structure that extrapolates information across every department.
Some of the best features we’ve found in GP have to do with being able to grab an on-the-go visual snapshot of every functioning department in an organization. Access the Power BI reports dashboard from the homepage to get a clear view of all of the pieces of your business. From here you can run budget exception reports that show accounts that haven’t made it into the general ledger. Or, manage lists and run reports. What’s even better is that the dashboard functionality of GP is customizable with a drag and drop interface. With a SQL database backbone, this opens up a whole new world of reporting for an organization.
Speaking of reporting, we think the reporting mechanisms are actually one of the best features in Great Plains accounting software. That’s because of the volume of canned reports available that make it easy to get up and running quickly, but also the ability to create unique reports and couple them with predictive modeling tools. Remember that GP is more than accounting software – users can take control of BI reporting for forecasting. Imagine the possibilities if your organization could start to work proactively and not reactively.
The latest version of Microsoft Great Plains also has some additional features that we would be remiss not to mention:
We could go on – but we should also mention that GP already integrates well with the Microsoft products you’re already using, like Office 365 tools, Dynamics CRM, and of course, Azure cloud services. Microsoft has created an interconnected series of office productivity tools designed to improve oversight, transparency, and business communications. Together, these tools enable businesses to do more in an increasingly efficient manner. In today’s competitive business world, this is an imperative for gaining and achieving market share no matter what type of service or product you provide.
Implementation of any tool as complicated and feature-rich as GP requires a planning and rollout process to ensure that the software is optimized. We suggest a process that includes:
Microsoft now offers GP as a fully hosted service in the cloud. This makes for a less-costly alternative to on-premise hardware and software installations. It’s a secure, compliant, and stable platform that offers cloud scalability, and real-time accounting features. It’s the on-the-go option for today’s flexible work arrangements.
Third-party integrations are not a problem for GP, which makes this cloud-hosted application a great option for industries like manufacturing or distribution, which typically have in-house customized solutions to handle their unique business.
Increasingly, mid-market and enterprise organizations are joining small businesses in the cloud. That’s because software-as-a-service, and platform-as-a-service cloud computing models have proven to be a stable alternative to on-premise legacy applications. Cloud-driven software provides multiple benefits for any company:
While GP is available for on-premise applications, we would encourage your organization to consider cloud computing as a viable option in 2018. IES is standing by to discuss whether the public, private or a hybrid cloud model could work best for your organization. Contact us today to take a test drive of Microsoft Great Plains accounting software and get ready to improve your business.