Applications Division has been acquired by Access Group

I am delighted to share the news that the Business Applications Systems Solutions (Bass) part of Atlas Group has been acquired by Access Group, the UK author of Access Dimensions. As a result of these changes the whole of our Atlas applications team are also joining Access.

Access Group decided on this strategic move because of the strength of our service quality, expertise and reputation in providing our customers with successful business systems. In joining Access we now have available for you an even greater depth and breadth of products and services expertise to support and develop great solutions and services for an ever-growing spectrum of clients across many sectors and critical business functions.

The whole board of Atlas universally endorsed this teaming up with Access after twenty years in a very successful business partnership together, because we are certain that the combination of business software applications capability of the expanded Group really will deliver substantial benefits to our customers' organisations in terms of added choice, value and operational performance gains they will want to make over the next several years.

Our valued customers can be immediately assured, as well, that their current relationships and contacts will continue with the existing people of the Atlas team, regardless of whether their need is for applications or 'technicals' assistance for whichever products and services we provide to them. In addition, our applications consultants will have access to the whole wider pool of several hundred Access specialists for both support and projects.

Therefore, the main point of contact for our customers will remain the current staff they already know well:

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  For clients who prefer email to raise support queries your existing addresses continue to work and you can also now use support.atlas@theaccessgroup.com when you believe that it is an 'applications' rather than IT infrastructure or networking issue.
  
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  For those who usually make initial contact to our office by phone for business function/applications related matters, then in the interim period please continue to call 0333 666 3330 where there will be an option to contact the Access team. Over the course of the next few weeks the team will be moving to a new office, the telephone number for which will be communicated to you beforehand. (For the many of you who also depend on us for technical IT infrastructure and networking support, you should continue using the 0333 666 3330 number you are used to - so no change there.)
  

I have especially enjoyed working with all of our clients over the years (the many years with many of them!) and we look forward to continuing our relationship with everyone as part of Access Group.

John Butler

Managing Director

Atlas Business Group

Atlas has all of their ducks in a row

Recently an expectant duck decided that the garden at Atlas’ Head Office in Nantwich would be the ideal place to build a nest. The pleasant garden surroundings attracts different types of wildlife all year round, but we rarely receive a visit from ducks. With the high walls protecting her from wind, traffic and most predators, and the pond conveniently available for a quick dip; the Atlas team adopted her and she became affectionately known as 'Jemima'.


Jemima made her nest in a quiet corner just outside the techies office and not too long later she was incubating some eggs. One colleague reported that they heard the duck quack “have you tried turning it off and on again” as a consequence of sitting within earshot of the technical helpdesk team. The Atlas team spoilt her with bread several times throughout the day. On Monday afternoon we were delighted to spot that all eight of Jemima's eggs had successfully hatched. Jemima was particularly protective over the ducklings in the first few hours but now she is frequently seen going for a waddle with her babies all following not far behind in a nice neat row.

Payroll Event calms RTI nerves

Atlas ran 3 successful payroll workshops at the end of March and beginning of April. Despite the challenging weather conditions over 30 customers joined us to hear all about the Real Time Information (RTI) and Auto Enrolment pensions legislation changes as well as the year end process. The sessions were interactive with a lot of delegates raising their concerns regarding specific challenges that they face. Director Diane Lonsdale did a very good job at answering questions and calming people’s nerves. The workshop received almost exclusively 9s and 10s out of 10 customer feedback scores, and payroll managers returned to their office feeling significantly more confident on the subject matters.

Feedback included:

"Great course, Diane made it interesting as well." - Steve from Amberline.

and

“Thanks for a brilliant training session" - Ruth from Horizon Community College.

Attached are some photographs from the first Leeds event where 20 people squeezed into the Saluté suite.

There is sNOw Payroll Workshop Today

Unfortunately due to the adverse weather conditions we have had to postpone our customer Payroll Workshop event.  We have listened to our customers who had telephoned to raise their concerns regarding the snowy road services, and in particular whether they would be able to make it back home again!!

The re-arranged 1/2 day workshop will take place on Tuesday 26th March at our Nantwich Head Office.  We ran the same event in Leeds on Monday and it has received excellent feedback.  If you use Access Payroll and would like to learn more about RTI, Auto Enrolment and the Year End procedure then it is not too late to book your place.

Click here or call 0333 666 3330 to reserve your seat.

Customer visit results in pink hats for John & Joe

On a recent visit to a customer in the North West, Director John Bilyj and Sales Manager Joe Jardine were required to suit up and boot up in accordance with the factory hygiene regulations of our customer. They didn’t mind the boots they had to wear, or the overcoats, or the washing of their hands three times, or the alcohol antiseptic gel that was required, but the pink hats ruined their day.

Seriously, though, this is an indication of our experience and understanding of the requirements and customs in the food industry. Our BarRed product is used by companies all over the country to provide traceability and the logging of parametric tests against batches of product, and allows our customers, with a minimum of effort, to view what batches of ingredients went into which production batches, and where they were shipped to.

This is very relevant to all food manufacturers and processors in these times where the content of foods has to be verified and provable. Give Joe or John a call to discuss this exciting product. Tel: 0333 666 3330.

Are Women Better Managers Than Men?

Craig Cameron, IoD member and Atlas Group Director, considers the latest gender-based research.

A few weeks ago Kelvin Redmile and Craig Cameron from Atlas attended an IoD event entitled “out of the cave” in the fabulous surroundings of Booths Hall, Knutsford.

The speaker was top business coach Nick Robinson whose niche is coaching men in the leadership skills normally attributable to the very top women managers. Nick started with two startling statistics. One, women are responsible for 85% of all purchasing decisions. Two, according to research by Harvard Business Review out of 16 key leadership criteria, women are ahead of men in 15 of them.

If that is enough to make you want to tear in half this month’s copy of Muscle & Fitness magazine then think again and if you read to the end of this article you will find where to get help.

Have a guess what was the management competence where men excelled? It was the ability to develop a strategic perspective. Personally I would have thought it was Drive but apparently top women managers are 12% more driven than their male counterparts.

On closer inspection of the Harvard Business Review article, and I must stress this is a personal opinion, the true message of the research is more subtle, albeit it is an excellent headline that makes you want to read more. Taking the direct comparisons the gap between men and women for the sixteen competences measured is not that large; typically men upper 40% to low 50% and women low to middle 50%. Nowhere is anyone getting 70%, 80% or 90% so is a true reflection not that women are marginally less useless at management than their male counterparts? With scores of 49% to 56% women are not perfect managers either.

Also is there a definite gender bias or something else in the statistics? Again a personal opinion (research funding welcome if you want me to gather the facts) but my understanding is there are relatively few top-level women managers and any person that reaches these levels has to be a truly remarkable individual.

This could create the statistical anomaly where the average women surveyed is more senior, and therefore, more capable than the average man surveyed. What might be getting measured is that on average because the women are more senior they are getting better results. The fundamentals behind the results might not be to do with gender but with ability.

If you want to draw your own conclusions the Harvard Business Review article can be found at

http://blogs.hbr.org/cs/2012/03/a_study_in_leadership_women_do.html

Whatever the root cause there are things to be learned from how successful leaders operate and that is where Nick Robinson can help you to help yourself. If you are looking for a speaker for one of your company events I can recommend this man, especially if you want to create lively discussion.

On a more personal level, starting in February, Nick is running an online Personal Development Course that is one event per month for six months. Having spoken to Nick, and signed-up myself, the course material takes the best possible leadership advice currently available, from both sexes, and shows you how to apply it to your 21st Century workspace.

If you want to book the course details are to be found at

http://nickrobinson.org/courses/development-for-leading-men-1/

New Features for AFS Pro Users

Atlas are delighted to announce a new set of features for users of our popular Advanced Financials product, AFS Pro.

The latest .Net 4 version 6.04 of the product is now available for new and existing users. This version includes the ability to have customised layouts for your P&L account including subgroups of Sales, Cost of Sales or Overheads and to show Budget and Last Year variances.

The variance report format P&L Account is now a standard report within the system. You can also define a custom vertical layout based on an excel template so you can include % calculations and subtotals where you would like them.

If you are interested in this new version of AFS Pro or would like to discuss the product in more detail, please e-mail newsletter@atlasbiz.com or call Atlas' friendly sales team on 0333 666 3330.

We've Not Been Quarantined!

Contrary to recent reports (from staff), Atlas have not been quarantined, we are not the source of a new zombie outbreak, we don't think we are contagious, although it may look like all of those things and more are true...

Globe is merely undergoing a bit of a facelift, for which it has had to cover up. Please watch your step if visiting the premises.

Blown Away by Bentley

Sales manager Joe Jardine blogs about his trip to Bentley Motor Cars.

This month I attended a South Cheshire Chamber business networking event at Bentley Motor Cars. I got to meet plenty of business owners and influential people but the reason for this blog article is to tell you about the inspirational Bentley factory tour.

The event included a fascinating half hour presentation about the history of the luxury automotive manufacturer and how it continues to evolve, adapting to the latest challenges whilst still delivering their vision of developing and crafting the World’s most desirable high performance cars. This was followed by a two hour tour of their Crewe site. Unlike many other car manufacturers, Bentley design, build and sell cars from the single site, in a huge all in one operation.

Despite living less than 10 miles from the factory and having driven past it hundreds of times, I’d never set foot through the big fancy glass doors. The first thing that struck me was how spotlessly clean the entire site was. I was in a group of ten and at the beginning of the tour we were invited to stop any worker along our route and have a chat. Each individual we spoke to was extremely passionate and had a story or two to tell. These ranged from how their role has changed over the years to keep up with the latest technology and the extensive training they’ve been on, to the lavish customisation requests that they have received from rich extrovert celebrities. Personalised ‘his and hers’ crystal champagne flutes in the arm rest anyone? Or what about a £5k child seat?

Bentley are part of the Volkswagen Group. In 2011 they sold over 7,000 vehicles with the new Continental GT accounting for approximately one third of them. This is a huge vamp up in production compared to a decade ago when they were making a little over 1,000 cars. During the past ten years to keep up with demand they have introduced lots of new lean practices and machine automation to ensure everything runs efficiently. They have a number of quarter million pound machines that are programmed with certain shapes that are required for the interior trim. It was fantastic to watch the machine review a piece of material, recognise the pre-marked blemishes and then make the cuts to maximise the utilisation. That said, they still employ around 4,000 people with many more jobs at key suppliers dependent on Bentley.

Some interesting facts:-

• Subject to the amount of leather, it takes a highly skilled person between 5 and 8 hours to handstich each steering wheel.
• Bentley are expecting big things for their next car as they are entering the SUV market. Their concept car received the most amount of press interest at the recent Geneva show.
• Bentley is the jewel in the VW Group crown. The VW Group also includes Audi, Bugatti, Lamborghini, Porsche, Seat, Skoda and Volkswagen.
• Rolls Royce who previously owned Bentley, chose to build the factory in Crewe because of the good railway links, the skilled workforce and for the cloud cover to help protect them from bombing raids! At that stage they were building aeroplane engines to help with the war efforts.
• Bentley have won the Le Mons 24 hour race six times, 1924, 1927, 1928, 1929, 1930 and more recently in 2003.
• Bentley source their veneers from Atlas customer, Nantwich Veneers! Visit them and see the work they do at www.nantwichveneers.com

  

Bentley run organised tours for members of the public. If you’re interested in cars, luxury or manufacturing in general then I certainly recommend you take a trip. Click here for further details.

Right I’m off to sell lots of systems to earn sufficient commission so that I can afford the Bentley Continental GT.

All Tied Up

Liam Meadows wore a tie. We realise that a man wearing a tie perhaps doesn’t seem news worthy to most people, but when Liam walked into the office with his tie on it certainly caused a few dropped jaws. Rumours quickly spread about a court case but the real special occasion and reason for the tie was because we had allowed Liam out of the developer’s dark cupboard to join the sales team in a customer facing meeting.

This got us thinking... why do we wear ties?

After all...

• They seem to be a magnet for any spilt breakfast / lunch.
• They regularly take a dip in our brews.
• They are the frequent cause of “are you colour blind? / did you get dressed in the dark?” comments/insults from our colleagues on the very rare occasion that the colours/patterns clash with our shirt.

Would you be offended if we attended a meeting and didn’t wear a tie? We’d love to hear your comments.