The 5 Essential Reports

Synergist provides a complete range of standard reports. See the screenshot below. But how many are truly essential? Is it possible to run a busy project-based business by focusing on just a handful of these reports? If so, which ones?

When we talk with Synergist users, five reports keep being mentioned more than any others. They are the essential five you should concentrate on. Between them, they give you amazing real-time intelligence, control and visibility of the fundamentals of your business.

Essential report options

1. Profitability Report

What does the report do?

It shows financial performance by client, project and job over a chosen period, detailing gross revenue or net profit as needed.

Primary benefits

ANALYSING TYPES OF CLIENTS

See at a glance which of your clients are profitable for you, and which are not. At times of contract renegotiation it is hugely helpful to know exactly how profitable a client has been for you.

POST-ANALYSIS REPORTING

What went right? What went wrong? Sometimes busy jobs don't turn out as profitable as you expected.

LATE COSTS

Unexpectedly-late cost increases from external suppliers will show up in the reports.
You need to know surprises like that, otherwise you're not getting the true picture.

Impact on your business

  • Increases control and visibility
  • Gives early warnings and alerts

2. Staff utilisation report

What does the report do?

STAFF UTILISATION is the analysis of the time that staff members spend on billable work. It is one of the two key drivers of profitability.

The Staff Utilisation Report shows the hours that staff members were available for the period selected, compared with the hours worked on chargeable and non-chargeable jobs, and gives analysis against targets.

Primary benefits

KNOW WHERE THE PROBLEMS ARE LOCATED

Merely suspecting you've a utilisation problem isn't enough. You need to know the extent and the cause.

INVALUABLE DATA FOR DECISION-MAKING

Hire more freelancers? Or manage non-charged time better? Without the right information you're working in the dark. Targets only make sense if they're rational. What's realistic? What's needed for profitability? Good, real-time data enables you to confidently set rational targets.

OVERLOADING

Being in the dark about staff utilisation goes both ways. Which of your team are working way too many hours? Burnout and staff resentment issues are real.

MINIMISE THE NON-CHARGEABLES

It has been said that the key to increasing the chargeable hours is to fix the unchargeable hours problem. Nail that and the rest follows.

Impact on your business

  • Reduces leaks
  • Increases control

3. Project health reporting and alerts

What does the report do?

It reports on the status of your projects and jobs, comparing time and costs incurred vs the budget.

Primary benefits

TIMELY ALERTS

Proactive alerts of jobs running over budget give clarity to those still working on the job.

It focuses their minds on meeting the budget while there's still time to retrieve a situation that might have otherwise drifted

TRIGGER POINTS

Alerts can be set at a specified percentage to give you the advance notice needed to manage the job well. For example, a milestone set at 70% of budget spend can be an invaluable wake-up call for team members.

PROFIT LEVER NUMBER 2

This report is one of two crucial levers at your disposal. If you're looking for the key levers in your business that drive profitability, when it comes to reporting there are two. This is the second of them. It keeps jobs on track. It's as fundamental as that.

Everything else flows from this.

Impact on your business

  • Reduces leaks of chargeable time
  • Gives early warnings and alerts
  • Increases control and visibility

4. Work in progress report

What does the report do?

WORK IN PROGRESS is work that has not yet been completed but has incurred costs such as staff time, purchases and materials.

The report shows the state of Work In Progress (WIP) at a certain cut-off date selected by the user. It selects the requested range of job phases and can be further filtered by client, account handler and many other options.

Primary benefits

BILLING EARLIER

Many jobs end well before month-end. Sending out accurate invoices, with minimal effort, is a major time-saver and a significant contributor to improved cash flow.

CAPTURING LEAKS

It's all about chargeable time. If you know exactly where all the unbilled hours are sitting, you have a great grasp of the issues and the time to fix what needs fixing.

A MAJOR PERIOD-END TASK BECOMES AN AUTOMATED EMAIL

Pulling it all together manually is a major chore, as the accounting team would have to analyse each project in detail.

WHAT IT DELIVERS: THE BACKSTOP

Above all else, this is the report that ensures nothing gets missed. In that regard, in the hectic pace of a busy and complex environment, it delivers peace of mind.

Impact on your business

  • Saves time
  • Reduces leaks of chargeable time
  • Increases control and visibility
  • Improves cash flow

5. Forecasting report

What does the report do?

The following are forecastable:

• Resource planned work, by person, role or team.

• Summarised capacity by role.

• Open opportunities and/or revenue forecasts shown against a timeline, typically by client and account handler.

• Estimated gross and net profit can be shown, and opportunity weightings.

Primary benefits

UNEVEN BUSINESS LEVELS

Information like this helps the business to smooth inevitable peaks and troughs of business by pre-warning while there's time to act.

STAGE BILLING

The process of stage billing is greatly simplified with the system, based on planned values.

AUTOMATION IN BILLING

Billing, a time-consuming and error-prone process when handled manually, can be semi-automated to give a speedy, accurate result.

AUTOMATION

Many parts of your forecast can be maintained automatically, based on other information held about your jobs in the system. Estimates and dates can be produced automatically if you want. It's your option.

Impact on your business

  • Saves time
  • Gives early warnings and alerts
  • Increases control and visibility
  • Improves cash flow