Answerthink Takes Business Process Intelligence Approach

Answerthink is gearing up for a new Business Process Intelligence approach to enterprise technology solutions buoyed by research from the consulting firm's think tank, The Hackett Group.

Allan Frank, president of Miami-based Answerthink, said the new strategy, slated to be unveiled next week, is the result of corporate soul-searching the company did during the IT meltdown that left the bulk of once-high-flying IT consultants and integrators out of business.

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>>%A0Consulting firm readies Business Process Intelligence strategy, aims to leverage think tank's intellectual knowledge.
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The new model gives Answerthink a competitive edge by leveraging the intellectual knowledge of The Hackett Group's best practices and integrating those best practices into solution sets designed to help customers improve performance and maximize ROI, Frank said.

"We're so serious about this strategy that we've taken 125 of our top directors and pulled them out of the field to be trained on this approach," he said. "We've also built an entire learning exchange and internal 24x7 Webcasting."

The Hackett Group has compiled benchmarks on more than 2,000 companies, including all of the companies that comprise the Dow Jones Industrials.

Enterprisewide technology solutions to be offered as part of the new business structure include business applications, portals, data warehouses and knowledge management systems.

In support of the Business Process Intelligence strategy, Answerthink developed a repository of application-specific integration tools such as questionnaires, process flows and fit/gap requirement matrices. The tools have been customized to address business application packages from vendors including Lawson Software, Oracle, PeopleSoft, Savvion, Lombardi Software and SAP.

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	%A0ANSWERTHINK GETS SMART>>%A0New enterprisewide technology solutions include business apps, portals, data warehouses and knowledge management systems. >>%A0Answerthink has developed a repository of application-specific integration tools such as questionnaires and process flows. >>%A0New tools have been customized to address business application packages from Lawson, Oracle, PeopleSoft and others.
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Answerthink also recently acquired the SAP software reseller business of Condor Technology Solutions to strengthen its existing SAP business with SMB clients in key Northeast markets.

In addition, Answerthink is shedding itself of practices that haven't been successful,such as its interactive marketing business acquired from Think New Ideas in 1999,to focus on its new approach.

Terry Flaherty, vice president of marketing at Lombardi Software, Austin, Texas, said he believes there is good synergy in his company's burgeoning partnership with Answerthink. Joint business opportunities focus mainly on TeamWorks, Lombardi's business process management platform.

"The combination of TeamWorks plus Answerthink's benchmarking approach is a great fit for us," said Flaherty. "We haven't seen anyone else doing that, and it's important for clients to first be able to identify inefficiencies before implementing a technology solution."

Flaherty said that over the past several months, the two companies have engaged in joint sales efforts and client sharing. With both companies focused on helping clients improve business process and IT ROI,one high-interest area in a tight market,Flaherty said he expects the relationship to work well and eventually expand.

"We are both trying to accomplish business process improvement, so there is a solid cultural fit," Flaherty said. "We just offer different pieces of the puzzle."