At a time when job cuts, pay freezes and economic turmoil have become the topical norm for newspaper headlines, some businesses have refused to allow the challenging environment to hamper growth, and have endeavoured to unearth new ways to develop products, deliver them to the market and persistently generate new interest.

One such business is Lancashire’s accessplanit, the software house working directly with training companies, course providers, and in-house training departments within organisations. The key attributes to accessplanit’s innovation-led software are embedded within cost-cutting and easing administration for companies, both of which have proved to be particularly attractive options during the downturn.

Over the course of 2011, regular visitors to the accessplanit website will have noticed the weekly news items covering the latest new client wins, and these have ranged from large retail groups like Musgrove Group, all the way to Canadian-based training company Tamlo, and the Open University.

As a result of these increases, the software developer is not only recruiting staff in four different areas, but also, in order to cope with the expansion, is moving into larger office space within the city of Lancaster.

Dave Evans, commercial director at accessplanit, explained: “We’ve had an incredible year, client wins have risen and risen, and new software that is meeting key challenges for our target market has been the reason for the success. We are now launching a recruitment drive and moving into larger offices, at a time when many are cutting jobs and downsizing.”

The four key areas that accessplanit has a plan to develop in terms of manpower, are: Support, implementation and training, development, and sales.

During 2011 accessplanit has also worked hard at growing profile in the training industry, and commercial director, Dave Evans, has been published on industry websites like TrainingZone.co.uk and Changeboard.com on a regular basis. The training software company has provided the industry with a number of top tip and advice-led articles, on topics ranging from the different areas of training that can be automated, to the secret benefits of a learning management system (LMS), with a view to sharing more knowledge among its ever-growing community.

The business has a plan to continue this thought-leadership into 2012 and beyond. Latest articles, blogs and news stories will be posted up on the accessplanit homepage, which you can reach at http://www.accessplanit.com/. 

You can get in touch with accessplanit to discuss its suite of training and course booking products, just email enquiries@accessplanit.com or call the team on 0845 543 0229.

While we’re very good at keeping you well up to date with new clients each time they sign up to work with us here at accessplanit, we’re not so good at reporting on progress. Needless to say, our cutting edge software delivers every time for our clients, though once in a while we realise it would be good to share development with everyone else. So, with this in mind we have caught up with the University of Arts London (you may remember reading our case study on them, click here if not), and got a better idea of the kind of impact Course Manager has had…

One of the key areas that the university has developed with Course Manager is around booking time. Paresh Vasanjee, special projects and system development executive, explains: “Course manager has significantly reduced the amount of time it takes in processing a single candidate booking. The current real time online booking process and auto email functionality can cut out a day’s work of inputting the booking manually by 50%.”

And that’s not all, the way that Course Manager is able to bring functions together to create seamless processes, has also been noticed by Paresh and his colleagues at the university. He adds: “On the online front, what was a separate function of raising invoices and then later processing a payment, has now been merged into one complete process which has also helped with weekend bookings in that staff doesn’t have to come in on a Monday and have to process all the weekend bookings.”
 
From a survey carried out last year, members of staff have also found it easier to make bookings through course manager when compared to the old system.
 
Here at accessplanit we are constantly talking about the different ways that incorporating technology like the Course Manager software can save money, and one of the key ways is through streamlining processes and reducing staff. The University of Arts London is a classic example of this in action, as Paresh explains: “The CCW (Chelsea, Camberwell, Wimbledon colleges) have reduced their processing team from two to one, saving an annual cost of almost £20,000.”
 
If you want to find out how Course Manager can bring you the kind of savings that the University of Arts London has managed to make, get in touch with accessplanit today. Email enquiries@accessplanit.com or call the team on 0845 5430229.