While non-profits are a mainstay of IMC’s client roster, we have delivered a range of important, money-saving and business-transforming services for our clients in the for-profit sector as well.
How IMC negotiates savings, diagnoses problems, creates solutions and brings clients to the next level is applicable to any business or organization. Read our case studies for some specific examples.
Case Study:
Negotiating Savings
The IMC team was called in for routine maintenance for this community-based organization when the team discovered inadvertently that the client was paying $3,500 per month for less-than optimal Internet and telephone services, with only 1.5 MB Internet bandwidth in overall capacity. IMC recognized that the “deal” was not really a deal at all. When IMC alerted the client, the Chief Financial Officer was interested in seeing if better terms could be arranged and gave permission for IMC to negotiate with the service provider on the client’s behalf.
Quickly, IMC assessed that about $600 of the original $3,500 monthly fee paid for firewalls and building connectivity each month. IMC recommended a one-time purchase of hardware that would install the firewalls, connectivity and Wi-Fi services, which would free up dollars for more bandwidth.
With the service provider, IMC negotiated a new contract that gave the client considerable more value for their dollar. For the same monthly cost, the new contract increased Internet bandwidth by 50 times the speed and increased phone capacity by 30% for both sites. Additionally, IMC negotiated three free months of service in order to purchase the hardware to install firewalls at each location. These firewalls allow the sites to be connected and security to be controlled by the client. Furthermore, the new firewalls with the Wi-Fi access points provide building-wide Wi-Fi services in both locations for personnel and guests.
Case Study:
Creating a Database
A non-profit theater company had for a year and half been trying to create a fundraising database from several Excel spreadsheets. Because the client had already given a developer a significant sum of money to start work on the project, the client was reluctant to switch to a new consultant. However, it soon became clear that a change was needed and the company sought out IMC for rescue.
In the initial meeting, the IMC team immediately was able to recommend some software for consideration and within a month of officially taking on the project, a tailored database built on a well-chosen CRM package was up and running with all the important add-ons, including contact information, cross-referencing by variables such as age, and the ability to create customized reports. The system was very user-friendly and required minimal training.
Case Study:
Diagnosing an Unusual Problem
Employees at a $40,000,000 Westchester-based company came to work one day to discover that their QuickBooks was giving them incorrect financial information. The Chief Financial Officer was sure that they needed to switch to what she considered was a “real” financial software package that would cost the company $20,000. The President wasn’t quite ready to spend that kind of money without additional information. IMC was called in as Pro Advisors to diagnose the situation.
IMC determined that the company’s software errors were due to inadequate hardware and recommended upgrading all of their hardware systems. The client seemed extremely skeptical that hardware alone could cause these kinds of software errors, especially in only one application. They agreed, nevertheless, to move forward with the upgrade since even if it didn’t solve the QuickBooks problem, they figured hardware improvements were probably needed anyhow. When IMC completed the suggested upgrades, QuickBooks started functioning correctly.
Case Study:
Translating Mainframe to PC
The New York State Comptroller’s offices were moving and they realized that transporting all of their mainframe equipment would cost a fortune. They needed a software solution so that the old mainframe system could be translated to the PC environment in advance of the move, as well as make them Y2K compliant. (Software that was built way in advance of the year 2000 stored year numbers as two digits and would have considered the year 2000 as the year 1900. When companies were approaching the year 2000—abbreviated to Y2K—a lot of resources were put into transforming old systems to become Y2K compliant.) Along with the easy portability, the PC database solution had to be quickly created and be robust enough to handle the State’s
considerable data.
IMC examined the State’s needs and mainframe database, and assessed what additional information they might want to include in their database systems. Based on their findings, IMC researched and selected an appropriate PC platform database that simultaneously housed all of the State’s data, was Y2K compliant, and incorporated new features that were impossible to access with the old mainframe.