TALLAHASSEE, Fla. -
"A lot of the time in business we look to the outside to solve our problems," explained Envision's CFO Dan McGowan. "At Envision, we're revisiting everything we do with a fresh set of eyes toward leveraging current tools for maximum performance."
The result is not mere vanity. In one of seven substantial advances across the CU this year, the accounting department is saving three hours per day because it no longer manually enters data into the general ledger platform. All it took was a few programming tweaks to Microsoft Excel and a new interface to the core system using an existing terminal emulator.
"Just as it's said that we only use about 10% of our brains, corporate America probably doesn't even get that much from it's investment in the Microsoft Office Suite," McGowan said. "We've had Excel as long as it has been offered, and the terminal emulator has been here for years and years."
This year, the $194-million CU added a few input cells to Excel, enhanced with a little Visual Basic code, and used an Excel macro to automate those cells. Now, accounting can transfer data into the general ledger in one minute, saving about 43 keystrokes per data entry line and saving itself from manual errors.
"It's not rocket science, and it's not a big time commitment to develop," McGowan added. "It's just being curious enough to do something better."
Envision was also curious enough to figure out how to produce account analysis tables and graphs using Excel and a newly purchased budgeting and forecasting tool. The CU loads trial balance data into the budgeting tool, which exports the data to Excel for use by macros and control functionality. There, analysts can produce six-year histories, year-over-year comparisons and two-year trend lines for individual accounts or account groupings.
Envision had no precedent for such an analysis, said McGowan.
The first step toward maximizing performance is to closely review processes and procedures at the department level, McGowan said.
"IT managers never look down at the department level," he said. "That's where people are groping to do whatever they can do, often with very cumbersome, error-prone processes."
Some would criticize Envision for sweating the small stuff, but McGowan doesn't see it that way.
"The cumulative value effect of even small improvements over time shouldn't be dismissed as inconsequential," said McGowan. "It all eventually pays off. And we're open to adding new things to our capital budget as needed."
In fact, employees get excited about process improvement in general, he said. "After improving the data entry method, my accounting staff got the shot in the arm they needed to explore other processes, too."
Envision this year also bolstered teller activity reporting, late charge calculations, and charge off and recovery reports, all using primarily existing software and "intellectual capital," he said.
And Envision eliminated an 85-step manual, monthly process to validate the general ledger against the fixed assets ledger in favor of a four-step process using Excel, the budgeting and forecasting tool and some existing Microsoft development software.
"I would encourage credit unions to recruit technically savvy persons and encourage them to rethink systems and processes," said McGowan.
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