Although each business is unique, common patterns of activities and challenges appear in almost every business.

Small and midsize businesses focus first on increasing sales and profitability. Getting orders from customers and fulfilling them at a profit is always job one, and software can be a tool to increase efficiency and productivity. But at some point, especially if growth has been rapid, most businesses find that the process of increasing sales is being slowed down because information is not flowing smoothly from one part of the business to the other. This can happen for many different reasons.

The information gap refers to the lack of timely business information needed to run the business efficiently. For example, if a large order comes in that is time sensitive, the key question is: when can we fulfill this order? In the face of an information gap, the right information must be assembled from a variety of sources, if it has of an information gap, the right information must be assembled from a variety of sources, if it has been properly captured in the first place. In the face of persistent information gap, business decisions are made without sufficient information, resulting in mistakes, rework, or missed opportunities.

A process gap exists when manual business tasks are not automated, or automation stops in one application and must be manually transferred to another. Process gaps are resolved by duplicate reentry of information from one application into another or by constructing brittle, special-purpose software to do the transfer. Process gaps slow a company down, retard change, and reduce the possibilities for automation. Effective and complete integration in which information flows from one step to the next bridges the process gap.

 

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