At Advanced, one of our main priorities is ensuring customers get the maximum value from our solutions. In order to achieve this, we regularly run one-to-one training days to provide guidance and insight on elements of the system they may not be aware of or fully utilising.
One example of this is a recent training day we ran with a longstanding financial management customer, Boston College. Although the college have been a customer for many years, throughout the pandemic they found that they were using the system in different ways, as they had new requirements for reporting which they didn’t have previously. To help the team get a better understanding of the breadth and depth of the reporting functionality within the system, we set up a dedicated ‘reporting day’ with one of our trainers. The focus of the day for Boston College was centred around how they could automate a lot of the reports that they were manually configuring.
The Head of Finance at Boston College, Charlotte Robinson, told us:
“Before the training day we were configuring all the reports manually on a monthly basis, which was really time consuming. Automating the reports we use will make our lives (and our budget holder’s lives) much easier. We’re really looking forward to giving our teams across the business a better awareness of performance, financial health, and spend, with less manual work involved for the finance team.”
“We’ve also learnt how to design the reports in a way which is more comprehensible for key stakeholders, which will mean everyone is more informed and engaged with the reports.”
Charlotte was also impressed with how tailored the training day was:
“The day was completely tailored to go through elements of the system we really needed to focus on, so we got a huge amount from it. There wasn’t a single moment when we thought ‘this isn’t relevant for us’, it was all really useful learning.”
One of the other key drivers for embarking on the training was to help new starters in the team, who perhaps never received training when the system was implemented.
Charlotte told us: “It has been really helpful (and well timed) being able to get our new starter up to speed with the system. As she is someone we are progressing in the business, ensuring she has a full understanding of the software is critical. She now understands that it does more than just cash banking and purchase ledger!”
Charlotte and the team are already looking ahead and scheduling in more training days to ensure they get maximum value from their finance software:
“We definitely see huge value in having training days with Advanced. I think it’s important that businesses do it to ensure they are getting the biggest return from their software, and that it is as efficient as it can be.”