What Are the Core Features of Asana and Monday?

Asana and Monday.com both offer the same core features, but they present them in slightly different ways. Let’s take a look at how these systems stack up on three main features: task management, workflow management, and progress visualization.

Task management

Using Asana, you can create tasks and assign them to team members, set deadlines, and make them dependent on other tasks. Clicking on a task expands it to show more detail, where you can comment using @ mentions and attach documents for collaboration. After logging in, Asana displays tasks that are due soon in the Home section, and you can see a complete list of all tasks assigned to you by navigating to My Tasks.

Monday.com works much the same way, except Monday calls tasks “Pulses.” Pulses are unique from tasks in Asana because they aren’t necessarily represented by cards, though you can view them that way. You can give every Pulse a name, assign it to a team member, set its status, make it dependent on other Pulses, see a quick overview of time to completion with a progress bar, and more.

Workflow management

Workflows in Asana are categorized by “views.” These are different ways of visualizing progress on your projects, and you can see them as lists, Kanban boards, Gantt charts, and calendars. Task dependencies make sure you don’t get ahead of yourself when working on bigger projects, and drag-and-drop functionality makes it easy to move tasks along.

Monday.com works much the same way, but it lets you see different visualizations for Pulses without having to switch between pages or browser tabs frequently. Monday’s user interface (UI) always shows a list view of your Pulses with a mini progress bar for each one, but it also shows the visualization of your choice in the section above the fold. This lets you see everything in one place, which is nice for project managers with a lot on their plates.

You can change Pulse statuses in Monday.com using a drop-down menu in the list section, but you can also stretch and shrink Pulses in the timeline view (Gantt chart) or drag-and-drop cards in the boards view (Kanban board). Monday also lets you visualize projects as maps and pie charts.

Portfolio management

A lot of PM systems for small businesses don’t include project portfolio management features, so it’s impressive that Asana and Monday.com do.

Asana offers a portfolio feature that essentially works like the regular project management tool but for projects instead of individual tasks. This feature lets you zoom out from your day-to-day workspace to see the bigger picture and to make sure that you don’t drop any of the projects you’re juggling.

Monday.com offers a comparable feature called Groups. Whenever you create a new Pulse in Monday, you can choose which Group you want to add it to. Groups are not necessarily tasks, nor are they projects. Instead, the open-ended framing of Pulses frees you up to make them whatever you want.

If you want to manage your project portfolio, create a Group where every Pulse represents a project. Managing your portfolio this way doesn’t offer as much detail or insight as the portfolio feature in Asana, but it is helpful for lowering the risk of tunnel vision.

Asana vs. Monday: Integrations, Pricing, and Security

Some of the other considerations you’ll want to make when comparing Asana vs. Monday have nothing to do with features. You want a PM system that’s friendly to your existing tech stack, within budget, and secure.

Integrations

Compared to most other project management systems, Asana takes the cake in terms of the number of integrations it offers. In fact, Asana offers over 200 integrations, running the gamut from Dropbox to Slack to GitHub to Mailchimp. Asana also integrates with Zapier in addition to offering its own API.

Also read: How to Use an API: Just the Basics

Monday.com offers 40 integrations as well as its own API. The integrations Monday offers are definitely useful, as they include Slack, Jira, Google Drive, Shopify, Zapier, and Mailchimp. These may be all you need if you’re a smaller organization, but for medium to large organizations, you may need to set up a data share over the API.

Pricing

Asana and Monday.com offer pricing tiers that operate on a sliding scale, depending on the number of user licenses you need. Asana is a bit pricier than Monday, but both options offer a free plan.

The free version of Asana lets you collaborate with up to 15 other people, and you can track tasks and view them as a list or in a Kanban board. There are some features you may miss, such as advanced security features and access to priority support. But for small teams, freelancers, and solopreneurs, Asana’s free tier offers all the basics you need to manage simple projects.

You can do a free individual plan on Monday.com, but you’ll have to upgrade to see some of the more advanced features like dashboards. Monday.com’s free version includes unlimited boards, over 200 templates, and 20 column types. You can collaborate with up to two team members, which makes it a good option for smaller teams.

Both Monday and Asana offer an enterprise pricing tier with premium support, security and governance, and more. Contact their sales teams for more information.

Security

More and more companies are taking digital security seriously, so it’s important to take a look at how these PM systems protect you and your customers’ data. Both systems hit the high points such as GDPR, EU-US Privacy Shield, and SOC 1 and 2 compliance, but if you work in a highly-regulated field like healthcare or finance, you may need additional security features like SOC 3 and HIPAA.

In this category, Asana has a slight edge. Both options offer two-factor authentication (2FA) for all plans. For an extra layer of security, Monday.com also offers SSO with popular apps like Okta and OneLogin, while Asana offers SSO through Google in addition to Okta and OneLogin. Coupled with 2FA, this ensures maximum security for your account.

Table Comparison of Key Differences

	Asana	Monday.com
TechnologyAdvice rating	4/5	4.5/5
Works best for	Small Business, Midsize Business	Midsize Business
Project Management Features
Task management	Yes	Yes
Scheduling	Yes	Yes
Resource management	Yes	Yes
Gantt charts	Yes	Yes
Team collaboration	Yes	Yes
Agile support	Yes	Yes
Mobile app	Yes	Yes
Time tracking	Yes	Yes
Document management	Yes	Yes
Notable Integrations
Google Drive	Yes	Yes
Box	Yes	No
Dropbox	Yes	Yes
Evernote	Yes	No
Harvest	Yes	Yes
Slack	Yes	Yes
Zapier	Yes	Yes
GitHub	Yes	Yes
Jira	Yes	Yes
Security/Privacy Features
GDPR	Yes	Yes
ISO 27001	yes	Yes
ISO 27018	Yes	Yes
EU-US Privacy Shield	Yes	Yes
SOC 1	Yes	Yes
SOC 2	Yes	Yes
SOC 3	Yes	Yes
HIPAA	Yes	Yes

Trending Project Management Software

The post Asana vs. Monday in 2023 appeared first on TechnologyAdvice.

There are many options out there when it comes to practice management software, so finding the tool best suited for your small practice can be challenging. That’s why we sifted through over 150 different practice management solutions to pick out the five systems that we believe work best for small practices.

Here are the top five small practice management software solutions, in no particular order.

drchrono

Trusted by over 70,000 doctors, drchrono offers all the features you’d expect from a quality practice management system without breaking the bank. This is a HIPAA-compliant tool for managing all aspects of a small practice, from appointment scheduling and billing, to messaging patients, managing health records, and staff management features.

Key Features:

For more information, read our complete review of DrChrono.

ALSO READ: Your EHR Isn’t Just For Storing Health Records. Here Are 4 Ways It Can Also Help Boost Patient Retention.

Kareo

Built specifically with independent practices in mind, Kareo offers a suite of cloud-based medical software solutions that can be used together to completely manage your practice. From managing electronic health records to monitoring collections and accepting payment, Kareo offers all the tools you need to run your small practice. Plus, Kareo offers integrations with a host of other tools and is available for technical support at no extra cost.

Features:

EHR/EMR

Practice management

Financial services (RCM)

Scheduling & billing

Interoperability

Labs, imaging, and e-prescribing

Patient engagement

Technical support

Telemedicine

Practice Fusion

Practice Fusion is a full-service practice management system that provides EHR management, billing, e-prescribing, labs and imaging, and more. Offering accessibility across your devices thanks to cloud computing, Practice Fusion lets you manage your practice even when you’re on the go, and Practice Fusion’s self-service patient portal allows you to instantly share test results with patients for secure viewing.

Features:

EHR/EMR

Practice management

Scheduling & billing

Interoperability

Labs, imaging, and e-prescribing

Patient engagement

Technical support

NextGen Healthcare

Perhaps the most well-established name on this list, NextGen Healthcare is an industry-leading practice management solution that has been supporting healthcare providers for over 40 years. While it may be a bit pricier than some of the other options out there, NextGen offers a comprehensive list of medical software services, including a service specifically built for independent and small practices.

Features:

EHR/EMR

Practice management

Financial services (RCM)

Scheduling & billing

Interoperability

Labs, imaging, and e-prescribing

Patient engagement

Technical support

athenahealth

Offering a complete network of medical software services, athenahealth is an intuitive, easy-to-learn practice management system built for modern physicians. A cloud-based system lets you care for your patients from anywhere, and athenahealth‘s mobile medical information app, Epocrates, allows you to quickly look up important details about medication, treatments, and diagnoses.

Features:

EHR/EMR

Practice management

Scheduling & billing

Interoperability

Labs, imaging, and e-prescribing

Patient engagement

Technical support

These medical practice management systems represent best-in-class solutions, but just because a solution is on this list doesn’t necessarily mean it’s the right one for your practice. For more information on practice management software and to view more solutions, visit our Medical Practice Management Product Selection Tool.

For a free shortlist of the practice management software options that are best for you, give us a call at 855.718.1369 or email us at info@technologyadvice.com to speak with one of our unbiased Technology Advisors.

Top Electronic Health Record Software Recommendations

The post The Top 5 Medical Practice Management Software Solutions For Your Independent Practice appeared first on TechnologyAdvice.

• Nowadays, most manufacturing resource planning (MRP) software systems are built into bigger enterprise resource planning (ERP) systems.
• This article examines seven of the best MRP solutions on the market.

Manufacturing resource planning (MRP) software is just one tool that manufacturing business owners and supply chain managers need to stay competitive in today’s demanding world. But since these tools often come as features within enterprise resource planning (ERP) software solutions, it’s easy to overlook or forget about them entirely, meaning you may be missing out on better inventory control, smoother production processes, and lower manufacturing costs.

This article examines seven of the most popular MRP II software systems, most of which come as part of some big names in ERP systems. If you’re still doing preliminary research, read on. Otherwise, feel free to contact us for a free, five-minute, no-hassle software consultation. Our Technology Advisors are standing by, ready to send you a short list of the best software based on your biggest needs.

Leading MRP solutions

Product profiles in depth

1. Netsuite
2. Fishbowl
3. IQMS
4. JobBOSS
5. SAP Cloud ERP
6. InforVISUAL
7. Odoo

NetSuite

Featuring real-time demand planning, visibility across product life cycles, and strong integration with accounting software, NetSuite offers a powerful MRP software tool in the form of its Demand Planning abilities. While NetSuite itself is an ERP solution, it offers a lot of functionality and built-in tools, including many built specifically for the manufacturing industry.

MRP software-specific functionality includes the ability to check inventory control and safety stock levels, review customer demand, and conduct supply planning before generating sales orders. The system is also cloud-based, making it highly scalable and great for advanced planning throughout the entire manufacturing process.

Fishbowl

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Fishbowl is an inventory and supply chain management platform that offers MRP software, among other tools. Many users see Fishbowl as an affordable (albeit lighter-weight) alternative to NetSuite’s MRP process. Standout functionalities include QuickBooks integration, personalized customer support, and good reporting features, such as inventory records file reporting for better MRP planning and reporting.

Since Fishbowl was built as an inventory management platform first, it does a very good job of keeping up-to-date and accurate inventory counts. This makes its MRP software offering especially powerful, as you always know your inventory levels, leading to better inventory control, shop floor scheduling, capacity planning, and overall better supply chain management.  

IQMS

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IQMS is an ERP solution that can be deployed on-premise or in a public or private cloud. Like many other solutions listed here, IQMS is an enterprise resource planning system first, but it offers a competitive MRP software system along with other useful manufacturing and demand forecasting tools.

This MRP software syncs with manufacturer bills of material (BOMs), using data entered by shop floor workers to update raw material requirements and production scheduling. This is a comprehensive MRP system built for larger manufacturing companies, so many users recommend designating an MRP software admin within the manufacturing operation to oversee its processes and to be available for questions or troubleshooting.

Also read: The Difference Between MRP and ERP

JobBOSS

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JobBOSS is a manufacturing ERP software that’s great for smaller businesses. It requires a good deal of customization to run properly, but it works well once it gets to know your business. Users love the ability to favorite workflow shortcuts, and the Shop Alerts feature sends automated messages to the right people to keep the manufacturing process running smoothly. These alerts can be customized for a variety of messages and can be sent as emails, text messages, and internal messages within the system.

What’s more, JobBOSS recently announced a partnership with manufacturing software E2 Shop to create JobBOSS2, an entirely separate solution from JobBOSS that offers more robust features and capabilities and an app that offers real-time production and scheduling tracking on the shop floor. Other functionalities include automatically tying purchasing needs to purchase orders, analyzing the profitability of every job in real-time to streamline the manufacturing process, and seeing every process by machine, employee, or time period to stay on course with the master production schedule.

SAP Cloud ERP

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As the name implies, SAP Cloud ERP is a cloud-based system, and it includes an MRP. Software developers push updates to the system every three months, and the company is constantly adding to its already-extensive online help library. These help documents are thorough enough to teach a newcomer how to use the software, which makes SAP a popular choice among SMBs.

This software is quite expensive when purchased for enterprise-sized companies, but the freedom for customization it offers is very valuable. SAP’s ERP software tool also offers dependent demand tables, so users can see the dependent demand for component parts, raw materials, or sub-assemblies. This is great from a materials requirement planning standpoint and offers insight into material requirements, allowing users to have the appropriate inventory on hand to keep the master production schedule operating at maximum efficiency. 

Infor VISUAL

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Infor VISUAL is an order-driven ERP software built for process manufacturing. The system includes an MRP software feature that offers inventory management, safety reports, quality management, and material planning, among other capabilities. Info VISUAL can be difficult to implement, but you can work around this by hiring a software implementation consultant. This system does not offer as much room for customization as a system like SAP Cloud ERP, but it is very easy to learn how to use out of the box.

This manufacturing software aids the production process by enforcing predefined standards throughout manufacturing and the supply chain. Companies are able to determine delivery dates, create “what-if” demand schedules, and secure shop floor capacities in anticipation of customer purchase orders.

Also Read: Ask The Experts: When Should We Hire An Implementation Consultant?

Odoo

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Odoo does everything from CRM to sales to HR, but it also offers a market-leading MRP solution. This MRP system lets you organize workflows with Gantt charts and Kanban boards, and predictive demand helps you stay ahead of production needs with intelligent forecasts. While some users have noted problems with learning community documents not being comprehensive or centralized, Odoo is making strides to improve this. For companies with an adequate IT staff or dev ops team, Odoo also offers an open source edition of its software as a free download on its website.

Odoo offers features for inventory requirement and management, traceability reporting, material requirements, and maintenance requests. The demand-driven manufacturing software offers a master production schedule tool to plan your production based on the demand forecast. Process manufacturers are able to see an overview of the production plan and all available resources. 

Finding the right MRP software for your business doesn’t have to be so hard.

We know that ERP systems can be behemoths, so we’re standing by to look into specific MRP software for you. Fill out the form on our manufacturing resource planning software page or contact us to get a free, no-hassle short list of the software with the best MRP tools for your business. Getting started is easy and only takes five minutes.

The post The 7 Best Manufacturing Resource Planning (MRP) Software For Balancing Supply And Demand appeared first on TechnologyAdvice.

But if you’re looking to get out of spreadsheets entirely, we can help. Use the Business Intelligence Product Selection Tool on our business intelligence software page to match with five different business intelligence vendors that we think you’ll love. For more tips on getting the most out of Tableau for your project management needs, read on.

Table of contents

• Building Gantt charts in Tableau
• Gaining deeper insight with donut charts
• Connecting your project management tool with Tableau
• Get more out of your project management data with the right business intelligence (BI) tool

Building Gantt charts in Tableau

If you currently use spreadsheets for project management, the ability to build Gantt charts might be one of the more exciting prospects of using Tableau. Gantt charts have been a staple of project management since World War I, showing not only a list of tasks but also their estimated time to complete, progress, and interdependence on other tasks. Using Tableau, you can import data from spreadsheets to build helpful Gantt charts.

Also read: 16 Tableau Alternatives For Visualizing And Analyzing Data

Start by making an Excel sheet. You’ll want to make columns for team members, tasks, beginning and end dates, and date of completion. Next, import your spreadsheet to Tableau and start customizing it. You can either build the Gantt chart out manually by dragging and dropping dimensions to the appropriate rows and columns, or you can apply the Gantt Bar mark type to visualize your project.

From here, you can publish your visualization to Tableau Online, Desktop, or Public. You can also embed the Gantt chart wherever you want to so others can view and interact with it.

Also Read: Power BI vs. Tableau: A Data Analytics Duel

Gaining deeper insight with donut charts

Donut charts are a favorite visualization among Tableau users, and it’s easy to see why. This slight improvement on the pie chart makes a great addition to almost any dashboard you’re working on, showing you quick snapshots of revenue goals, marketing signup sources, and more.

You can also use them to track project management stats. Here are some ideas of the different ways you can use donut charts for project management:

• Display late versus on-time tasks
• See how close individual team members are to completing their tasks
• Identify unassigned versus assigned tasks
• View individual team members’ bandwidth based on the number of tasks they’ve been assigned
• Get a snapshot of your project portfolio’s health by seeing how many projects are running on-time or on-budget

Once you start using Tableau for more project management-related uses, you’ll probably start to identify other areas where donut charts can be helpful. Also take into consideration who will be able to see these donut charts. Will only project managers be able to see which team members are making better progress than others? Could this visualization be used to encourage some friendly competition among team members?

Connecting your project management tool to Tableau

But what if you don’t use spreadsheets for project management? Many companies use project management software applications like Wrike, Microsoft Project, or Monday.com, but for this example, we’ll take a look at Tableau’s integration for Asana.

Asana is one of the most popular project management tools on the market. And while it does offer some of its own reporting features, you may want to import your Asana data into Tableau. Doing so allows you to create more customized views or to more easily share a project’s status with stakeholders who don’t have an Asana seat. To import your data in Asana to Tableau, Asana Business and Enterprise customers can easily add Asana as a web data connector by copying and pasting Asana’s web data connector URL into Tableau.

From there, you can create multiple visualizations using your Asana data. This is especially useful if you use custom fields in Asana or if you want to foster more collaboration between departments. (Note: Not all Asana data — like task dependencies — is available for use in Tableau.)

Asana isn’t the only project management tool that integrates with Tableau. If you use project management software, check your tool’s documentation to see if it supplies a web connector URL. In many cases, project management tools will also let you export data as a CSV or JSON file, which you can then import to Tableau for reporting and visualizing.

Get more out of your project management data with the right business intelligence (BI) tool

Tableau is a market leader when it comes to reporting and data visualization, but it isn’t the only one that can help you dig deeper into your project management data. Use the BI Product Selection Tool on our business intelligence software page to get free recommendations on which applications will work the best for you. In less than five minutes, we’ll ask you some questions to discover what specifications are most important to you, then we’ll send you a free shortlist of BI vendors that match your needs the best.

Top Business Intelligence Software Recommendations

The post How To Use Tableau For Project Management appeared first on TechnologyAdvice.

These are big, costly systems, so there’s little room for forgiveness when it comes to choosing the one your organization will use. Contracts frequently run into the millions — even billions — of dollars, and implementing the software itself can take anywhere from six months to over a year, not to mention the time it takes staff to learn the new system.

Table of contents

1. Top EHR systems
2. Is Epic or Cerner Better?
3. Is Epic or Cerner Easier to Use?
4. Interoperability in Cerner vs. Epic
5. How Cerner and Epic have responded to EHR innovations
6. How to request software recommendations from TechnologyAdvice

Top EHR systems

While Cerner and Epic are two of the most recognizable names in the EHR software space, they aren’t the only options. To help you find the right tools for your practice, here’s a quick list of the top EHR systems.

Is Epic or Cerner Better?

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Cerner and Epic are both makers of health information technology and electronic health record (EHR) software, but they serve organizations of different sizes and offer vastly different workflow experiences. The size and nature of your organization should therefore be a major factor in deciding which solution to go with.

Both vendors offer cloud-based software solutions for acute and ambulatory care, though Cerner is the far more popular choice for ambulatory care and clinicals. When it comes to larger healthcare organizations, most healthcare providers go with Epic. Neither vendor discloses pricing information publicly, but news about contract deal sizes seems to indicate that Epic is slightly more expensive than Cerner, though this also depends on how well you plan implementation.

For example, Becker’s Hospital Review reports that after University of Illinois Health sent out an RFP for a new health records system, it received a bid of $60.5 million from Cerner and a proposal of $62 million from Epic. For a different RFP, Cerner won a $10 billion contract with the Department of Veterans Affairs. However, this grew into a $16 billion contract in March 2018 after more considerations about implementation, maintenance, management, and rollout were made.

In terms of software solutions offered, you’ll find both systems to be fairly similar. They both offer interoperability, revenue cycle management, population health management, mobile access, telehealth, and artificial intelligence.

	CRM	Consulting	Dental	Real-time Data
Cerner	No	Yes	No	Yes
Epic	Yes	No	Yes	No

Cerner and Epic also offer services for implementation, training, IT, and support, to name a few.

This article is designed to help you choose with confidence between these two solutions, but we can help take even more pressure off this decision. Use our Medical Product Selection Tool to request a free, personalized shortlist of the best EHR-EMR software for you. We’ll ask a few questions to determine your needs and then send you five systems that meet them the best.

Is Epic or Cerner Easier to Use?

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Cerner (pictured above) offers a well-designed graphical user interface (GUI), but this doesn’t necessarily translate to good ease of use. Many users report long, repetitive workflows for even simple tasks with many users saying the system is not intuitive to use. While you could certainly do worse when looking for a usable EHR, Cerner will still require a decent amount of training before staff feel comfortable working in it.

Epic (pictured above) may not be as aesthetically pleasing as Cerner, but many users report good ease of use. This EHR is intuitive, so staff are usually able to figure out how to perform tasks without having to go through extensive training. Built-in shortcuts speed up work even more, though the number of on-screen functions at any given time can feel a bit overwhelming at first.

Also read: What Doctors Want From Medical Technology

Interoperability in Cerner vs. Epic

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Interoperability, the ability for the system to share information with other software, should be a key consideration when choosing between Cerner and Epic. Here’s how both systems stack up when it comes to sharing patient data.

Cerner

Cerner enables interoperability in several different ways. The first and perhaps most well-known is through CommonWell Health Alliance, a not-for-profit industry trade association that Cerner co-founded along with six other competitors. CommonWell Health Alliance provides a set of standards and policies that make it easier for members to share and access patient data.

Additionally, Cerner provides Cerner Ignite APIs to let healthcare organizations integrate third-party apps with the EHR. Reference Lab Network lets providers connect to multiple acute and reference labs without having to make connections with every single lab. Later this year, Cerner plans to unveil Seamless Exchange, a new innovation to interoperability in the platform.

Also read: 5 Cerner EHR Competitors for Hospitals and Small Practices

Epic

Epic allows for interoperability in three different ways. First, you can connect to the Carequality network, a public-private network that connects healthcare providers from all over the United States. Another way is the EpicCare Link, which lets non-Epic users view information about patients from an Epic user. Think of it like the shareable collaboration links Google Drive and Dropbox utilize. Share Everywhere is a third interoperability feature that lets patients share their own health information with outside providers. This allows providers to see patient information without connecting to Epic through an EHR.

How Cerner and Epic have responded to EHR innovations

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The COVID-19 pandemic introduced some major innovative needs for both the healthcare industry as a whole and EHR systems. Take a look at how Cerner and Epic have responded to these challenges.

Telehealth

With limits placed on how many people could gather indoors, practices had to limit what they could see patients for in-office. However, people didn’t stop needing to see doctors, so clinics had to find creative ways to help their patients. Telemedicine allowed doctors to safely examine their patients while offering a more accessible (and possibly cheaper) option for people to take advantage of post-COVID.

Cerner collaborated with Amwell, a telehealth company, to help their clients schedule, conduct, and chart telehealth appointments. Additionally, they’re beginning to offer digital care plans to mitigate the workloads their practices are facing. These plans help patients self-monitor their symptoms and automatically identify patients that need a physician to intervene.

Epic embedded a new telemedicine platform into its system, allowing physicians to connect with patients right from the EHR. By adding the service to their system, Epic has made it easier for doctors to view patient history and search symptoms while video-chatting with their patients.

User-friendly patient portals

Limits on in-person groups also made it more difficult for patients to schedule appointments and get information over the phone. Because of this, doctors’ offices and hospitals needed patient portals that were easier for their clients to use. Moving forward, these new patient portals make it easier for patients to request prescription renewals, schedule appointments, and ask their doctor follow-up questions.

Cerner’s patient portal includes a secure, HIPAA-compliant messaging application where patients can safely chat with their doctors to ask questions and ensure they’re following the right steps in their care plan. The system also enables online prescription refills and allows patients to schedule virtual appointments.

Epic’s patient portal not only allows patients to schedule appointments and view their medical records securely, but they can also get information on what certain procedures might cost them. The patient portal supports virtual consultation scheduling as well.

Work balance

As clinics and hospitals become busier, doctors are spending more time in front of their computers and less time with patients. Many practices look to their EHR systems to help them rebalance their time and reduce burnout.

Cerner’s system improves the efficiency of the communication between clinical and billing teams to optimize billing and claims processes. The platform also includes AI-enabled workflows to optimize charting and other behind-the-scenes processes and allow doctors to spend more time with their patients.

Epic used to include alerts for everything, but they’ve since worked on streamlining their platform to keep from overloading doctors with alerts and pop-ups. The system helps doctors optimize their workflows to improve their work-life balance.

How to request software recommendations from TechnologyAdvice

Typically, Cerner is more attractive for smaller clinics and hospitals due to the services they offer in IT and implementation management. Larger hospitals tend to prefer Epic because it usually takes less training to get started with. Even so, each practice is unique and both have features that would be appealing to clinics of any size.

If you’re still not convinced whether Cerner or Epic is right for you, we can save you hours on researching other vendors. Use the Medical Software Product Selection Tool on our website to request a free, personalized shortlist of the best EMR-EHR software for you. We’ll ask a few questions to identify your biggest needs and then match you with the vendors that will work best.

The post Cerner vs. Epic: Comparing The Biggest EHR Vendors appeared first on TechnologyAdvice.

Recommended Applicant Tracking Systems

Get the Best Recruiting Tool for Your Hiring Process

Recruiting is complex and ever-changing, but with the right tool, you can get ahead of the game and find great candidates for your roles. If you’re wanting to streamline your hiring process and provide a positive experience for candidates, use our Product Selection Tool to get a shortlist of recruiting software systems.

The post Best Applicant Tracking Systems appeared first on TechnologyAdvice.

If you don’t use Zoom, you’ve probably heard about it in the news thanks to recent discoveries of its security issues. Zoom is taking swift actions to fix these, but if it’s looking like video calls will be part of your daily workflow for any extended period of time — and it does — it might be worth exploring other options, like Skype from Microsoft.

Keep reading for our detailed comparison of Zoom vs. Skype, or save yourself some time by using our Web Conferencing Software Buyers Guide to get a free list of video conferencing software recommendations based on your needs.

Overview of Zoom vs. Skype

Zoom is a relative newcomer to the video conferencing market, but in the short time that it’s been around, it has soared in popularity. According to CNN, Zoom was the most downloaded app on the Apple AppStore in March 2020, with tens of thousands of people turning to the app to stay connected with friends, family, and colleagues during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Proponents of the software praise its stable, high-quality video calling, ease of use, and integrations with popular apps like Google Calendar, Microsoft Outlook, and Apple iCal. Eric Yuan — former VP of engineering at rival Webex — founded Zoom in 2011 and took the profitable unicorn public on the Nasdaq in 2019.

Also read: Webex vs. GoToMeeting: A Virtual Conferencing Software Comparison

By contrast, you may have thought of Skype as little more than a precursor to Apple’s FaceTime. But Skype can do so much more than video calling, and it’s not strictly limited to Apple devices. Originally released in 2003, Skype started out as a way to send instant messages and make video and audio calls over the internet, mostly for personal use.

However, many businesses around the world use Skype today for their video conferencing needs, citing pros that include quality, simplicity, advanced features, and native integration with Microsoft apps.

Major features

In terms of core features, Zoom and Skype offer very similar products. Both apps include these basic capabilities:

• Video conferencing
• Digital audio calling
• Instant messaging
• Screen sharing
• Call recordings and transcripts
• Virtual/blurred backgrounds

Most of the important distinctions lie in call length and participant limits, special features, and security.

Call length and participant limits

Depending on which plan you go with, Zoom imposes limits on video call length and number of participants. For free users, you can host group meetings for up to 40 minutes with up to 100 participants. It’s important to note that the 40 minute limit only applies to calls with three participants or more — Zoom offers unlimited one-on-one calls for its Basic plan users.

For its free users, Skype offers unlimited calls for up to 50 people. This includes calls with three or more people, making Skype a perfectly suitable option for business meetings involving multiple stakeholders. Just like Zoom, the free version of Skype also includes screen sharing, file sharing, and call recordings.

Special features

Both Zoom and Skype come packed with additional features that make them much more than video calling tools. Many of these features are only available in Zoom if you pay extra, but the free plan also comes with some noteworthy features, like whiteboarding and instant meetings. It’s true that Skype also supports instant meetings, but at the time of publishing, this is a very recent feature that seems to be a response to the massive demand increase for video conferencing software.

Additional special features in Zoom include:

• Advanced user management and admin control tools
• Option to boot users from calls (Pro plan and above)
• Disable video call encryption
• Chat
• Notifications

You can also pay for add-ons, like extra cloud storage for call recordings, a Call Me feature for starting meetings automatically at their scheduled times, and toll-free meeting numbers so people can audio call into meetings from a landline or cell phone.

You’ll find most of the special features in Skype in Microsoft Teams, formerly known as Skype for Business. But even the free version of Skype comes with cool features like free cloud storage for recorded video calls and live video transcription. The live transcription feature in Skype will even translate calls in real time, essentially adding subtitles to Skype calls as they’re happening. The translation feature supports 10 languages for video conferencing and up to 60 languages for chat.

You can also buy credits or start a subscription to make Skype audio calls to landline or mobile phones, and you can purchase local telephone numbers and assign them to your Skype account.

Security

Security is a hot topic for Zoom right now, but the company deserves some credit for how quickly it’s responded to the public scrutiny of its security issues. Zoom recently:

• Added password protection to all meetings
• Gave users the option to create waiting rooms in an attempt to prevent Zoombombing
• Hired a former Facebook chief of security as an outside security counsel
• Formed a council for recommending security best-practices

Controversy over the company’s encryption claims persists after The Intercept reported on March 31 that Zoom doesn’t actually support end-to-end encryption as advertised, only transport encryption.

By contrast, Skype does support end-to-end encryption, unless you call into a Skype call from a phone. As long as you’re communicating from Skype to Skype, your video calls, audio calls, and chat messages are encrypted using 256-bit Advanced Encryption Standard (AES) encryption. Like Zoom, you can also create instant meetings in Skype by generating a meeting link, but at the time of publication, Skype does not let you password protect meeting links.

Supported platforms

Zoom definitely has a leg up on Skype when it comes to integrations. These include popular social collaboration tools like Slack, HipChat, and, yes, Microsoft Teams. You can download desktop applications for Mac, Windows, and Linux, and you can download a Zoom browser extension for Firefox, Google Chrome, and Safari. Zoom also integrates with Outlook, Google Calendar, and iCal for easy access to meeting links.

Skype also offers applications for Mac, Windows, and Linux with additional apps for Xbox One and Amazon Echo. For instant meetings, its web client currently only works on Chrome and Microsoft Edge. This is only a problem if the person you’re meeting with doesn’t have the Skype app, Chrome, or Microsoft Edge, but it does exclude Firefox and Safari users.

Which video conferencing tool is right for you?

Choosing between Zoom and Skype isn’t as straightforward as it may seem, but these aren’t your only options. Use our Product Selection Tool to get a free list of the best video conferencing software for your business. We’ll ask a few questions to learn more about your needs and then match you with five vendors we think you’ll love. Getting your recommendations is free and takes five minutes or less.

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When shopping for a business intelligence solution, some people try to compare Alteryx vs. Tableau. This is understandable — both products fall under the umbrella of business intelligence software. But Tableau primarily functions as a data visualization system with few tools for data cleansing while Alteryx works great for data cleansing but lacks good data viz capabilities.

Instead of trying to decide whether you should go with one of these business intelligence solutions over the other, use them both. They complement one another, which helps you get the best insights from your data.

If you’re still looking around for the best business intelligence systems for your needs, we can send you a free list of recommendations. Use our BI Product Selection Tool to request your shortlist of the top five BI solutions for your organization. Getting started is easy and takes less than five minutes.

Topics

1. Alteryx: what it does best
2. Tableau: what it does best
3. Using Alteryx and Tableau together

Alteryx: what it does best

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Alteryx is an ETL system, which means it’s designed to extract, transform, and load massive amounts of data from a variety of different data sources. This system is designed for use by BI analysts, but it works just as well regardless of whether or not you use SQL.

Alteryx uses workflows to engage with data throughout the ETL process, and the system allows you to make these repeatable so you don’t waste time on manual processes. A scalable and intuitive user interface (UI) makes working in the software fast and easy to learn, and flexible and diverse data discovery and management tools let you access dozens of data connectors and make edits to the incoming data.

One major shortcoming with Alteryx is data visualization. You can use Alteryx to generate reports, but these aren’t accessible to employees who don’t work in data or business intelligence. Instead, Alteryx offers Analytic Templates for loading data into third-party visualization platforms.

Also read: Qlik vs. Tableau: Comparison Of Key Differences

If you use Qlik or Tableau for data visualization, Alteryx also supports direct data integration. Using this feature, you can load your data directly into Qlik, Tableau, or Microsoft Power BI once you’ve cleansed and prepared it in Alteryx.

Tableau: what it does best

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Tableau is a data visualization platform that uses drag-and-drop functionality to create a variety of interactive graphs and charts. People know Tableau for offering some of the best data visualization tools on the market, and they use this system to reveal hidden insights and to tell stories with data.

Using Tableau, you can create forecasts, spot trends and outliers, generate maps, and more. Similar to Alteryx, Tableau uses drag-and-drop functionality, but in Tableau, you apply visuals to data segments to see data in different ways instead of imposing various transformations on data to clean it. This means people with any amount of coding know-how can use Tableau, but the system also supports natural language in addition to custom SQL queries.

Also read: The TechnologyAdvice 2019 Best Business Intelligence Software Awards

Tableau’s biggest blind spot is data cleansing and preparation. It does an excellent job of visualizing the data you load into the system, but it doesn’t come with tools for data blending and cleansing. For this, Tableau offers an Alteryx Starter Kit for Tableau, which makes it easier for you to prepare your data in Alteryx and then load it directly into Tableau for visualization.

Using Alteryx and Tableau together

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For data scientists and business intelligence analysts alike, the combination of Alteryx and Tableau is a lifesaver. If you spend a lot of time writing code to prepare, cleanse, and analyze data, Alteryx will save you hours of writing SQL and R code. If you have no idea how to code, Alteryx empowers you to work in data using drag-and-drop features. Once you load your clean data into Tableau, you can uncover hidden insights and make your organization’s data more accessible to everyone using high quality visualizations.

Generating Tableau Data Extracts

Perhaps the biggest value-add Alteryx offers is the ability to convert datasets to Tableau Data Extract (.tde) files. Making a Tableau Data Extract compresses data to reduce storage requirements and to optimize it for visualization in Tableau.

These extracts are columnar stores, which means they aggregate data into columns instead of rows. This improves performance in Tableau and speeds up load times, not to mention that it also eases file sharing and collaboration.

Cleansing data for more insightful visualizations

Using Alteryx with Tableau together goes beyond simply making data visualization easier. Clean data is valuable data. By corollary, data with missing values, structural errors, and other impurities is not. Even worse — impure data costs you money, both via opportunity cost and bad decisions.

This reminds me of a famous quote from Bill Gates: “The first rule of any technology used in a business is that automation applied to an efficient operation will magnify the efficiency. The second is that automation applied to an inefficient operation will magnify the inefficiency.”

By tweaking some of the wording, we can also apply this lesson to business intelligence software:

“The first rule of any business intelligence software is that visualization applied to clean data reveals good insights. The second is that visualization applied to messy data reveals poor insights.”

Tableau does a great job at visualizing data, but if your data still needs some TLC, you’re wasting your time. Cleansing your data in Alteryx before loading it into Tableau will save you time and make you more money.

Not convinced Alteryx and Tableau are right for you? We can help.

At TechnologyAdvice, we work with BI analysts every day. We know your pain points, and we want to help connect you with the right software. To get a free, personalized list of recommended business intelligence products, use our Product Selection Tool for Business Intelligence.

We’ll send you a shortlist of the five best tools for your specific needs so you don’t have to waste any more time searching for the right solution. Getting started is easy and takes less than five minutes.

Top Business Intelligence Software Recommendations

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What is HRIS software?

Vital employee information for use across a business’s many human resources functions lives within a human resources information systems (HRIS) software. HR enters personal information related to payroll, benefits, time tracking, and performance for every employee into the system, which makes that information available for analysis and reporting. An HRIS also ensures that a company complies with regional and federal regulations regarding employment documentation, benefits, pay, time off, and the secure storage of employee contact information.

An employee accesses their contact information, address, and government ID numbers in the HRIS via a self-service portal. HR staff can update records across the software and integrated apps, and employees can use the self-service portal to keep their records up to date. The system then uses that employee data for key HR functions, which reduces the amount of manual data entry each HR team member must perform, thus reducing time and money lost to human error.

Human resources staff controls employee data and organizational tasks in the HRIS. Today’s best tools help companies save money by combining features found in standalone software systems

• Payroll software
• Time tracking software
• Employee scheduling software
• Employee benefits management tools
• Self-service portals

Large and growing businesses can find additional recruiting software and applicant tracking software features in their HRIS. Other software options manage accounting software tasks by integrating with payroll features. Many HRIS vendors also improve employee engagement metrics with valuable features from performance management software, learning management software, or gamification software.

HRIS software systems come in all sizes, but they are best suited to medium and large businesses. The software can be complicated and expensive to implement, so smaller companies may build similar capabilities from interconnected standalone options.

For some companies, an HRIS isn’t the best option. Large, multinational, and enterprise businesses integrate key financial and supply chain data with HR data within an enterprise resource planning (ERP) software. These combined data points provide context that can then be used for forecasting and hiring trends.

Because HRIS software contains personal identifying information for all of the company’s employees and contractors, these systems are key targets for hackers looking for unsecured data. Companies purchasing an HRIS should consider how the vendor will protect their data. Research encryption standards, the security of cloud or on-premise database options, and the vendor’s track record of visibility into any previous breaches.

These HRIS platforms may be some of the most highly-rated solutions by popular agreement, but they won’t be right for everyone. Use our Product Selection Tool or click the banner below to get a shortlist of the best HR software for your business.

Key features of HRIS platforms

While there are many HRIS systems on the market, most of them incorporate these key features.

Applicant tracking system

An applicant tracking system (ATS) makes hiring easier by consolidating information about applicants, job postings, and interviews into a single location. ATS can also make the candidate experience better by streamlining the application process and improving recruiters’ workflows, so they can contact good candidates faster. An ATS features a searchable database that lets you look for previous candidates who might now be a good fit for your company and reach out to them, saving you money on job board postings.

Onboarding

Onboarding new hires is a time-consuming process, but an HRIS can streamline it and make it easier. The software can automatically send new hire paperwork, prompt your new employees to create logins for the necessary sites or applications, and collect tax and payroll information. Many HRIS platforms also include learning management features to make training easier and more effective. By automating these processes, an HRIS reduces the workload for your HR staff and improves the new hire experience.

Time and attendance tracking

HRIS software should include time and attendance tracking to simplify payroll and leave requests. Many platforms include an employee self-service portal where employees can request time off, track the amount of paid time off (PTO) they have left, and see their hours for the week. By making this information available for employees, you can reduce the amount of time HR staff has to spend answering questions about it.

Payroll

Payroll features in an HRIS work with the time and attendance tracking to make payday easier. It automatically pulls and consolidates timesheets to pay your hourly employees accurately. It also automatically calculates taxes and benefits to withhold the correct amount. Many payroll systems include an employee self-serve portal where employees can upload receipts or mileage for reimbursement and look at their pay stub.

Choosing the best HRIS for your business

The best HRIS for your business will depend on your company size and the features and functions you want to prioritize. If your company is rapidly growing, an HRIS with a robust ATS will probably be the most beneficial for your HR department. If your organization is an enterprise business with a lot of employees, streamlining payroll and time and attendance tracking may be your priority.

Still not sure which HRIS is right for you? Use our Product Selection Tool to get a short, unbiased list of software tailored to your company’s needs.

The post Best HRIS Systems & Platforms appeared first on TechnologyAdvice.

But don’t stop there. Use our ERP Product Selection Tool to get your free shortlist of ERP software recommendations. We’ll match you with five different vendors based on your specific needs, potentially saving you hours of research. Getting recommendations is easy and takes less than five minutes.

Table of contents

1. What is NetSuite?
2. What is Acumatica?
3. NetSuite vs. Acumatica comparison table
4. Features
5. Pricing
6. Deployment options
7. Netsuite vs. Acumatica: which is right for you?

What is NetSuite?

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TechnologyAdvice rating: 4/5

Oracle NetSuite is a provider of enterprise resource planning (ERP), accounting, CRM, marketing automation, and various other kinds of business software. Best-known for its ERP solution, NetSuite caters to businesses of any size, from small businesses to multinational corporations. Evan Goldberg started NetSuite in 1998 and remained the chairman and CTO until Oracle acquired the company for $9.3 billion in 2016. Today, NetSuite serves thousands of customers around the world through its software-as-a-service (SaaS) model.

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What is Acumatica?

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TechnologyAdvice rating: 4.5/5

Acumatica makes ERP software for small and medium-sized businesses. Founded in 2008 by Serguei Beloussov, Mike Chtchelkonogov, and John Howell, Acumatica offers financial management, customer management, project accounting, and ERP products with specialized editions for at least five different functions. The software is used in multiple industries, and customers can choose from two deployment options: on-premise or cloud-based. EQT Partners acquired Acumatica in 2019 to form an ERP coalition with one of the lending investment firm’s other major holdings, IFS.

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NetSuite vs. Acumatica comparison table

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	NetSuite	Acumatica
TechnologyAdvice rating	4/5	4.5/5
Works best for	Any sized business	Small to medium-sized businesses
ERP features
Financial management	Yes	Yes
Financial planning	Yes	Yes
Order management	Yes	Yes
Procurement	Yes	Yes
Production management	Yes	Yes
Supply chain management	Yes	Yes
Warehouse & fulfillment	Yes	Yes
Reporting	Yes	Yes
CRM	Yes	Yes
Dashboards	Yes	Yes
Pricing
Per user	Yes	No
By transaction volume	No	Yes
By required data storage	No	Yes
Deployment
Cloud	Yes	Yes
On-premise	No	Yes
Prive cloud	No	Yes
iOS	Yes	Yes
Android	Yes	Yes

Features

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ERP solutions are vast software systems with many different features. Comparing every single feature two systems have to offer could take you hours, so focus on the most important ones to your business instead. If you sell any kind of physical goods, these might be the two most important features to consider when comparing NetSuite vs. Acumatica.

Inventory management

NetSuite offers an advanced inventory management module to give companies greater insight and control into their fixed assets. Users have access to several different depreciation and costing methods, including Last-In First-Out (LIFO), average cost, group average cost, standard costing, and First-In First-Out (FIFO). NetSuite’s inventory management module also comes with bill of materials (BOM), forecasting and demand planning, bar coding, and asset images.

That isn’t to say Acumatica’s inventory management module fails to delight. Far from it — PCMag awarded Acumatica as an editor’s choice for its inventory management features. Just like Oracle NetSuite, you’ll find tools for various depreciation and costing methods, but Acumatica doesn’t support the LIFO method. The systems supports barcoding assets with a scanner or a smartphone, and BOM with kitting are available.

Materials resource planning (MRP) modules are available by request for both NetSuite and Acumatica.

Financial management

While accounting software like Intuit QuickBooks is extremely popular among small and medium-sized businesses, it doesn’t always offer the advanced reporting and security features that enterprises need. NetSuite and Acumatica meet these higher standards and offer features like:

• Payroll management
• Vendor lists
• CRM
• General ledger
• Financial statements and reports
• Customizable dashboards

Both systems offer dashboard navigation, which shows you overview information for any category you visit. You can customize dashboards to your preferences, and you can drill down into more detail by interacting with the dashboards. NetSuite’s financial management module is slightly more intuitive than Acumatica’s, but both systems let you customize workflows to how you prefer to work.

Pricing

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Pricing might be the biggest point of difference between NetSuite and Acumatica. While NetSuite follows a fairly standard approach of selling its software directly and through licensed third parties, Acumatica offers a “pay only for what you use” pricing model.

A major pro of this model is flexibility. Instead of paying for a certain number of seats and hiring an implementation consultant to handle your setup and customization, Acumatica lets you pick and choose your applications, deployment preference, and projected level of consumption — that is, how many transactions you’ll handle and how much data storage you need. This is good if flexibility is a top concern, but it can be confusing if you don’t know exactly what you need.

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NetSuite’s pricing is more straightforward. You can either buy the software through NetSuite’s in-house sales team, through approved third-party consulting organizations, or through NetSuite BPO partners if you only want to use the accounting module. Once you’ve worked with NetSuite or one of their partners to create your instance, pricing varies on how many users will need to access the software.

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Deployment

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NetSuite is known as a pioneer in the software-as-a-service (SaaS) space, and it remains one of the best SaaS products out there. Cloud-based is your only option when it comes to deploying NetSuite, so you might think twice about this ERP if you’re looking for an on-premise solution. That being said, NetSuite runs on the Oracle Cloud, a highly-secure, heavy-duty cloud platform that powers large organizations like Western Digital and CERN.

Acumatica can be deployed as a SaaS solution, but you can also choose from on-premise and private cloud. With the SaaS subscription, you pay an annual fee, and a cloud computing provider handles all of your IT maintenance. If you need more control over your deployment and you have the IT resources to pull it off, deploying the software on a private cloud or on your own servers. Acumatica charges a one-time licensing fee and a recurring annual maintenance fee for on-premise deployment.

NetSuite vs. Acumatica: which is right for you?

Ultimately, it’s up to you to decide which ERP is best, but based off what we covered in this comparison, we can give you some pointers. If you’re a larger organization and you don’t need an on-premise ERP solution, NetSuite might be your best bet. Conversely, if you’re a small manufacturer or distributor with a greater need for flexibility and customization, Acumatica might be the ERP for you.

Whether you’re looking for your first ERP system or wanting to switch to a new one, our Technology Advisors have the expertise to help you make the best decision. Get started in less than five minutes by using our ERP Product Software Selection Tool to request a free shortlist of ERP software recommendations. We’ll examine your needs and match you with five vendors we think you’ll love in under five minutes.

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