Johnson Controls, a $6 billion a year manufacturing company, discovered 4th Dimension by accident. Years ago, Steven Bomba, Vice President of Technology, called a computer store inquiring about a product and, while on the phone, the salesman quickly pulled up Bomba's billing record. Bomba, impressed with the speed of the clerk's response and the quality of information he had available, asked the clerk what database he was using. Recalls Bomba,"He said, 'there's only one to use, and it's 4D.' Since then, a number of departments at Johnson Controls, including Marketing and Analytical Services, have used 4th Dimension and 4D Server to streamline and automate tasks.
Johnson Controls embarked on a comprehensive 4D Server project to reengineer its Research Department with a database called Personal Research Information Management Environment, or PRIME. The main purpose of PRIME is to free department employees from time-consuming administrative duties and increase productivity by expediting processes, including inventory, budgeting, financial reporting and human resources tracking. .
Johnson Controls is a 57,000 employee conglomerate with 170 factories that produce batteries, plastics, building controls and automobile components. Because the company makes such diverse products, the Research Department continually studies new manufacturing methods to improve existing technologies. All 50 employees in the department, including scientists, purchasing clerks and managers, use PRIME to automate everyday tasks, giving them more time to do their jobs. PRIME puts a wide range of information for managing projects, finances, inventory, human resources and purchase orders in the hands of its users. Because data is stored electronically in one location, the department eliminates the need for paper printouts and files and as a result, completes tasks faster and with a minimum of effort.
Before using PRIME, Johnson Controls managed the Research Department with a paper-based system that required employees to spend much of their time manually filling out purchase orders, getting signatures and tracking inventory. For example, research scientists were often distracted by"busywork," such as checking inventory, getting a check request authorized or locating a purchase order for equipment. Says Joe Prokop, Manager of Business Systems and Operations,"We want the researchers to practice their trade to as great an extent as possible. The greatest percentage of their day should be spent being physics and chemistry experts, not order placers or shipment trackers. Those things should be incidental aspects of their day."
Kathie Brzezinski, Purchasing Clerk, remembers the days before PRIME, when she tracked purchase orders manually. She recalls,"When I first started, everything was hand written and then typed in. There was no flow of information, and a lot of duplication because you couldn't keep track of certain things. It just didn't run smoothly."
Without automation, simple tasks took too much time to complete. Notes Steve Linstead, Research Scientist and developer of PRIME,"Now with the database, we can create forms that look just like paper purchase orders, for example, and keep them in the database. It becomes an electronic record, so it moves at the speed of light."
Every employee in the Research Department is connected to the 4D Server database so they can perform their jobs quickly and with almost no duplication of effort. For example, to submit a purchase order, a department employee enters the item description into the purchase order screen. All new orders are automatically sent to purchasing clerks, who decide upon a vendor. PRIME provides a choice list of over 700 vendors, and the database completes orders by filling in appropriate vendor information."We automate entry to make data entry consistent and reliable," notes Linstead. Adds Brzezinski,"That takes away a lot of errors and has made data entry a lot smoother and easier."
To obtain authorized signatures on all purchase orders, PRIME provides Apple Open Collaborative Environment (AOCE) capability to allow for digital signatures, no paper is ever printed. Purchasers complete the order and send it to an authorized employee who can approve the item electronically. If multiple signatures are necessary, the database informs each signer by automatically sending a message to their e-mail. No other users can modify the purchase order once the digital signature has been assigned. The approved order is then sent to the purchasing clerk, who simply clicks a button to fax it directly to the appropriate vendor. To help track orders, purchasers can record communication with vendors in the database."One good thing about 4D is the comment section, because we don't have to keep everything on paper," elaborates Lynn Kamrath, Purchasing Clerk."We can call up the record and find who we spoke to last and that helps a lot."
Vendors are required to place bar code labels relating to the original purchase order number on each item they send to Johnson Controls. Once the item arrives at Johnson Controls, receiving clerks run a bar code reader across the label and PRIME accesses the original purchase order and marks it as being received. To facilitate accounting, the item is subtracted from the department total if written against an appropriation request."Because of the relations, 4D brings the capital budget, the project budget and the department budget up to date, giving us a real time accounting system," states Linstead.
4D Server performs many other duties in the purchase order loop to save employees time and allow for quality analysis. For example, PRIME applies a system date to each order submitted and automatically assigns new dates as the order moves through the processing, signing, ordering and receiving steps of the procurement process. The time differences between the dates provide metrics on the various steps of the process."With automatic dates, we can measure the productivity of the department and how fast the vendors are," explains Linstead."This all ties back to the vendor file, allowing us to perform quality measurements."
For further analysis, users can print any type of report from 4D Server, including expense reports, resource lists and asset depreciation reports. States Kamrath,"I can do reports a lot easier with the database." Before PRIME, Kamrath used Excel to track purchases, but was unable to print such detailed reports with the spreadsheet."There was no way to calculate this before," she says."We would actually have to pull the files out of the cabinet and do the paperwork on it. Excel was a much slower process." Prokop adds,"We're taking advantage of 4th Dimension's reporting capabilities. People create their own custom reports, which is a valuable and usable feature because people want data displayed in a different way. Customizing reports can be done with little trouble."
Researchers create many text-intensive reports, which other researchers use as reference material for their new activities. Using AppleSearch, the researchers can search through text to find a phrase, a context or other information quickly."AppleSearch is a very good application. It complements 4D when there is a large content of text needing to be searched in a free-form manner," notes Linstead.
Because 4D Server integrates seamlessly with bar code readers, the Corporate Technology Department tracks company assets with PRIME. By placing bar code labels on equipment, the department can see when each item was bought, view accrued charges and evaluate the depreciation of the item's value. The database stores scanned Images of equipment for reference.
In addition to facilitating purchasing, PRIME also serves as a complete human resources database. Personnel records for the department are stored in 4D Server, allowing authorized managers to see at a glance an employee's entire job history at Johnson Controls. With this data, managers can evaluate an employee's performance based on previous reviews and salaries. Employee photographs can even be displayed in the records.
4D Server imports and exports data from the corporate mainframe, ensuring that all human resource data is consistent and current. To help staff a project or department, employees can search through the database to locate employees or contractors possessing certain skills."Through this database, this is now a truly analytical human resources module," says Linstead.
The PRIME team is prepared to capitalize on the benefits of multi-platform, scaleable software, and plans on using 4D SQL Server to provide a Macintosh interface to Sybase databases."It's important to me that the work we do be able to survive in a heterogeneous computer environment," states Bomba."I'm happy that the folks at 4D have decided to make 4D available across platforms. Having the SQL interface to Sybase really saved my hide because I can't imagine myself ever giving up the 4D client side, which is beautiful."
PRIME has such an easy interface that Linstead and Programmer Bob Harrison train new users for only 20 minutes before they can operate the database."It's really easy to use and doesn't take long to learn," states Ann Currie, Department Secretary. Kamrath agrees."I think anyone could come in and just by looking at the database, figure out how to use it," she elaborates.
The database includes a diverse range of data, from financials to laboratory
operational support to project statistics, and the interface provides uniformity
throughout the entire application."The user interface boils it down
to one common look and feel so if you learn one screen, it's intuitive across
the broad range of information and you don't have to relearn new methods
to get information," says Linstead."We are a client-centered project
and we developed this in conjunction with our users. With color coding,
hierarchical pop-ups, choice lists, voice annotations and QuickTime clips,
the user interface is extremely intuitive."
Adds Prokop,"To the research scientists, a computer is just a tool
that helps them practice their particular area of expertise. They don't
have the patience or time to go through a lot of gyrations to get a piece
of information on the desktop. They want it to be transparent, simple and
easy to use."
Developing the database was also intuitive, especially since both Linstead and Harrison had no previous database programming experience and were able to get PRIME up and running in just a few months. The developers found that the 4th Dimension language provided nearly all the commands they needed to create the comprehensive system in a modular manner. And if 4th Dimension didn't provide a capability, they were easily able to write externals that they integrated into the system."The 4D language is neat," says Programmer Bob Harrison."I had never had any experience doing database programming, but this was easy to learn."
PRIME helps employees interact throughout the department so they can perform their jobs effectively and easily."We need to use computer systems to let people be productive, not busy," states Bomba. According to both Linstead and Prokop, productivity within the department has increased significantly since the introduction of PRIME because the database simply helps employees spend more time doing their jobs. Brzezinski confirms their opinions,"I do purchasing for about 200 people, and I don't think I could have done it before 4D. 4D has helped a lot."
As a test site for new computer technologies, the Research Department has successfully implemented a new business system with the PRIME database that will soon be adopted by other departments. When Bomba asked the sales clerk at the computer store why he liked 4th Dimension, the clerk answered that 4th Dimension could be developed in a modular fashion and that programmers could easily add new features, externals or functionality to an existing database with virtually no problems. Although PRIME was first used to automate purchasing, departments can request new ways to automate their work environments by inventing new ways to make decisions faster, communicate between employees and share valuable information.
Bomba may have selected 4th Dimension on a whim, but ever since then, he has been studying the progress of both 4th Dimension and its competitors to evaluate if the software he originally chose is still the best for the company's needs."The reports have been glowing. 4D has been a good choice, he reports."4D has been without a doubt the best database I've ever been acquainted with."
»Debbie Brewer
4D, Inc. Marketing
408.557.4606
dbrewer@4D.com
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