Overview

Silver-Owl Progress Reporting is one of nine modules that comprise the Silver-Owl Business Management suite of software. It can be purchased as a standalone module or as part of the suite - each module is compatible with each other and interacts as necessary, for example, if you use our Project Planning module you can automatically obtain the latest predicted completion dates for each main stage of your project from the latest plan.

Why is a structured Progress Reporting tool useful?

If you are responsible for ensuring jobs are completed on time, you need to be kept informed of progress. Whenthis responsibility covers many "projects", whilst you could rely on hand-written notes, email or even spreadsheets, using a structured tool:

• ensures everyone supplies information in the same way
• guides people to give the information you want
• automatically highlights projects requiring ettention based upon rules that you supply ("red/amber/green" traffic lights).

Why is this relevant to schools?

Head teachers and senior administrators will already have enough to do! Chasing staff or employees to find out what is happening is something they can do without - it's far better than the correct information is provided in an easy to understand format, making it easy to identify areas needing special attention.

What makes Silver-Owl different?

• It is very easy to use, by staff or students at all levels - in fact our aim is that it takes less time to complete the progress report than argue about why you didn't do it - maximising the likelihood of the report being ready when it's needed.
• It uses terms that everyone can relate to, so that everyone provides the right information
• Reports all have the same structure
• "Executive" level reports are generated automatically from the key points of each individual "project" report
• You set up rules to determine when a project warrants special attention - the "red/amber/green" traffic light system, and they are applied automatically and consistently.
• Part of the report can automatically pull in key dates from our Project Planning module and Risks are automatically incorporated if you use Silver-Owl Risk Management.

What does it cost?

As a guide, the list price for a Standard Silver-Owl licence for Progress Reporting alone is only £45 per user, up to £220 per user for a full Standard licence covering all nine Silver-Owl modules. Depending on your requirements, we may be able to offer a special discounted rate.

The licences are a one-off cost.

There are no additional costs for hardware, databases etc assuming you have disk space to install the software and the data you record.

What are the other Silver-Owl modules?

The full Silver-Owl suite comprises nine integrated modules that can be offered separately if required. The full list of modules is:

• Project Planning
• Progress Reporting
• Minutes Of Meetings
• Action Tracking
• Workflow (including Change, Faults and Processes)
• Timesheets and Time & Cost Analysis
• Risk Management
• C.R.M.
• Information Database

Where can it be used?

It can be run on your server (or simply integrated into your network) or can be hosted at a third-party site.

It can be operated from your site or over the internet - much attention has been paid to optimising data download requirements to make response times over the internet almost as fast on your internal network.

Other key features

• Choice of simple navigation routes
• Everything is integrated, but you only use what you need
• You control who can see what data, AND who can update it
• Prevents concurrent data updates
• Optional help screens and tips throughout
• Separate, detailed User Guide
• "Retro" look means big buttons and no hidden drop-down lists. Everything you need to use is immediately available to you
• Doesn't try to "second-guess" what you mean - it does what YOU tell it!
• You don't feel like you need a degree in it just to understand it.