Do you see everything as a nail?

Photo by DevVrat Jadon on Unsplash

“To the man who only has a hammer, everything he encounters begins to look like a nail.”

― Abraham Maslow

The Merriam- Webster definition of a tool is “a hand-held device that aids in accomplishing a task”.

Our story is incomplete without the story of Business in the Community (BITC). The Prince’s Responsible Business Network is a business-led membership organisation made up of progressive businesses of all sizes who understand that the prosperity of business and society is mutually dependent.

We started working with them around 2007 and now it is more than 11 years that we have been their technology partners for Complex Surveys and Benchmarking. We are really proud to be associated with them and provide them with our web platform. It is said that the life span of most of the software is about 5 years. However, due to our long-standing clientele, we have completed this cycle twice. We have steadily made our software more robust and efficient, similar to a well- oiled machine.

This has boosted our confidence and made us agile enough to hand over a customised platform to you in a matter of a couple of weeks. 

Apart from all the strategies and tactics that BITC use, they also have tools in place. These tools help them to leverage more on technology and free them to do their best job. The most obvious one here is the use of Probench for Data Collection. Thus making it easy to collect data from London and the rest of the world.

They make use of Survey Progress reports to have better overall visibility and control on the current benchmarking cycle. This is important when multiple teams are working on different areas and keep a check on the progress made. Since there are continuous data collection and analytic work going on, data becomes the most important part of the process, hence, an automatic nightly backup simply ensures you sleep well, night after night!

With long-running projects, seldom do the teams keep moving, however in the event that there is a re-shuffle, a dedicated knowledge bank comes to a great help; it has the secrets of the team locked in. Thus, it helps the team to make a smooth transition with the benchmarking cycle. 

One of the tools which come in handy is a representation of benchmarks, especially across sectors and/or regions. A chart becomes a good friend here. You can see how many unique chart types are used across all our clients. 

An advanced client always comes up with something new that the industry may not have seen before. A concept that we developed called Interactive Feedback shows the concepts behind every tool that can be useful. 

In successive articles, I will talk about the following tools that make your benchmarking journey easier. 

1. Collaborative Innovation

2. Data Cleanup

3. Excel Formula

4. Bullet Graph

5. Beautiful Automatic Charts

6. Example of Reports

7. Icons for Infographics

8. User Testing

9. Broken Link

10. Need for Speed

11. Icon Matrix

12. User Stats

The most important characteristic of a tool is that it automates a repeatable task and produces the same outcome each time. You can rely on them for quality and accuracy.

We wish you look for more of such tools and buy better tools so that you can achieve new benchmarks. Tools can bring freedom, is what I tell all my clients.

#Sustainability #Data