Company:
EchoStar Communications
Denver, Colorado

Business:
Satellite Communications

Staff:
34-person in-house communications department

System:
Clients & Profits Pro
Macintosh

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fter 20-odd years as a professional photographer, Roger Reynolds paused at a career crossroads. Photography, like separations and film output, has gone digital. Although he was Denver's first digital photographer and had a well established roster of clients (including EchoStar), he felt a tug in another direction. About that time, Arnold Gonzales, EchoStar's director of Creative Communications, offered him an on-staff position: they needed to put Clients & Profits to work.

Wanted a complete package

EchoStar, the industry leader in satellite communications, decided to purchase Clients & Profits Pro for their 6-person Corporate Communications department in 1997. Even though the software would be used for their in-house department, they chose Clients & Profits Pro. "We wanted the complete package," Roger explains. Looking toward the future, the company is planning to set up Corporate Communications as a stand-alone division with accounting functions.

Once completed, the division will be able to provide financial statements for corporate consolidation--and maintain division budget controls on a more immediate basis. "Getting Clients & Profits Pro instead of Job Tracker puts us one step ahead when we're ready to go in that direction," Roger says.

Since 1997, Corporate Communications has grown to 34 staffers and broken into four departments: creative services, video, internet, and live broadcast. "Our next step," Roger says, "is to set up the departments as profit centers in Clients & Profits" for cost and profitability analyses.

Going live

After limping along for nearly four years using only the job tickets in Clients & Profits, EchoStar hired Roger to maximize the use of Clients & Profits in the communications department.

"When I got here, all they were using was the job ticket," Roger says. "They would enter basic information into the job ticket window, print it out, and put it on an envelope." After the jobs were entered into the database, they were virtually ignored. "They were using C&P for a job log," he says, "but didn't use scheduling, traffic, change orders, or time cards. It was a mess."

While their early system was working (sort of), there was lots of room for improvement. Under the direction of Dianne Powers (the creative services marketing manager for EchoStar), Roger adapted Clients & Profits to their existing workflow. The improvement was fantastic. "Creative Services is light years ahead of where it was," he says, "but we still have light years to go."

Quick turn jobs

Roger started by closing the 6,000 or so open job tickets. He then rebuilt the database, setting up 14 job type/spec sheets to streamline the data entry. "We have one for logos, one for banners, and so on. Using job types really makes for a quick turn on jobs," he says. He also implemented existing job trafficking and scheduling procedures. "The most helpful thing is C&P email," Roger says. "Since we're now set up with status codes and milestones, notices go straight through to the person in charge of the job." And the new scheduling process has helped the four departments understand what a realistic schedule is.

Detailed reports and schedules

Now Corporate Communications has detailed reports and schedules -- which gives teeth to an emphatic "no" when someone walks in and wants a job done in an afternoon.

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