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From Other Cost Modeling Tools FullCost is the most advanced, comprehensive, practical, and affordable package for business and budget planning, product/service costing, and rate-setting.
Independent research report: IT as a "Business Within a Business": Vision, Financial Processes, and Systems
SHOPPING AROUND? Here's what to look for.... Here's what makes FullCost unique: Integrates rates and budget: FullCost calculates rates -- unit costs for the service offerings in your catalog. But it can do more: It can also be used to develop an investment-based budget that forecasts the costs of the products and services you propose to "sell" (whether or not your charge back) to each business unit. Both rates and the budget should come from the same cost model. It wouldn't be good to promise one number in your budget, then charge a rate during the year that adds up to a different number! And it doesn't make sense to endure two separate processes for budgeting and rates. With FullCost, these are just two views of the same cost model. FAQ: Why budgeting and rate setting should be an integrated process.... Integrates business planning and budget: How can you plan a budget if you don't know what's expected of you in the coming year!? FullCost is designed to support then entire operating plan process, from demand forecasting through costing and budget negotiations. FAQ: Why planning and budgeting should be an integrated process.... True budget planning, not just budget forecasting: An investment-based budget is not just a forecast based on projection of trends; it describes the costs of each product and service you propose to sell to each business unit. This builds an understanding of the value you deliver, and allows you to engage business clients in a dialog about their needs. It changes the dialog during budget discussion from minimizing your costs to the value of your services. It induces clients to help you defend your budget. It gives decision-makers the facts they need to base your budget on the needs of the business and strategic investment opportunities, not just last year's spending plus/minus a percentage. And it clearly defines what services your budget does (and does not) pay for, helping you manage expectations.
Why budgeting is more than projecting spending trends....
More on investment-based budgeting.... White paper: Why real zero-based budgeting requires investment-based budgeting.... Forward-looking rates, not historic data: Rates are calculated for the year ahead based on planning data, not backward-looking based on historic data alone. Historic accounting data is an input to management judgment, not a replacement for it. This allows you to publish "standard" rates at the beginning of the year (not have rates changing every month based on when you pay invoices). Service-based costing, not antiquated activity-based costing: FullCost is the only true second-generation cost modeling engine, where internal support services are treated as sales from one manager to another. This eliminates the distortions of ABC, offers far greater transparency on indirect costs, and treats every manager as an entrepreneur. Also, in many ways, it's easier to implement. The difference between ABC and second-generation cost models.... The ultimate in transparency: FullCost allows you to drill into any rate or budget deliverable and see exactly what costs and services go into producing it. From there, you can drill all the way down into the source data. You can view the budget by client (business unit), run/grow/transform, enterprise strategy, service portfolio, and more. This is cost transparency at its best. Why investment-based budgeting is more powerful than show-backs for cost transparency.... Individual management accountabilities, not just an organizationwide plan: Each manager owns a piece of the catalog, a P&L (profit-and-loss statement, where the intent is generally to break even), and accountability for competitive rates. Numerous management benchmarks emerge from the data. This helps your executive hold managers accountable for development of the plan, and for living up to the plan. Tool designed for interactive planning, not just financial analysis of accounting data: FullCost is designed from the ground up as a tool to be used by the management team in developing their operating plans and budgets. While it may be used just by financial analysts, it's design allows you to make each manager accountable for developing his/her own business plan hands-on in the tool, building real ownership of the data. The difference between planning and tracking systems.... Differences in tool design based on primary intent.... Functionality for every step of the planning process, not just cost modeling: FullCost supports management engagement, and project-team support and oversight, at every step of an integrated business- and budget-planning process. It's far more than just a cost-modeling tool. The difference between planning systems and cost-modeling tools.... Overview of FullCost functionality.... Benchmarks at the same time: FullCost automatically produces a number of benchmarks for the organization and for individual managers. Beyond that, it's easy to incorporate "towers" in your data for comparison to Gartner, ISG, Educause, or Apptio benchmarks. Organizing your data is typically the most expensive and difficult component of benchmarking; with FullCost, only a small incremental effort produces comparable results. More than a tool, FullCost is a fully documented planning process: FullCost comes with extensive documentation of the planning process and business guidelines to help you at every step. While it's flexibility allows you to configure it to any situation, the proven process helps you implement your cost model quickly and effectively.
More on the planning processs.... More on the FullCost documentation.... What comes with the FullCost package.... Built on solid principles as well as practical experience: The design of the FullCost tool and process was founded on the business-within-a-business paradigm, treating each manager as an entrepreneur who "sells" products and services to customers within the organization and clients outside it. This paradigm also provides a basis for the business guidelines that come with the process (like how to define a service catalog). The specific features, functions, and user experience evolved over years of use by many different organizations. More on its theoretical underpinnings....
How FullCost evolved out of practical experiences....
Very affordable: As a planning tool (not a production system), FullCost is very affordable. Overview of FullCost functionality.... → Seven key decisions you might consider to determine your path forward....
FullCost is not in competition with enterprise budget systems, general-ledger systems, invoicing and financial analysis systems, or project-management systems. In fact, it feeds those enterprise systems. Where FullCost fits in your financial systems architecture.... FullCost may replace internally developed (home-grown) budget spreadsheets. Why replace home-grown spreadsheets with FullCost....
Case Study: We've Already Got Budget Spreadsheets, Don't We?
FullCost is characteristically different from other financial management systems whose primary design intent is analyzing and portraying historic cost data. Here's how FullCost compares to other financial management systems (such as Apptio, ServiceNow, ComSci, and Nicus):
We encourage you to compare FullCost to any competitors.
And to judge consultants' capabilities, we can suggest a tough set of questions to ask....
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