VVR uses dashboarding from VanMeijel and Peacock to translate data into management information

Spending a lot of time on reports and data collection? No detailed insight into your projects? Looking for trends across multiple administrations and applications? Many companies in the GWW sector will recognize these kinds of challenges. Fortunately, VanMeijel Automatisering together with Peacock offers a solution: dashboarding.

Whereas VanMeijel has a deep understanding of what the construction industry needs and contributes industry-specific knowledge, Peacock's expertise lies in creating reports, focusing on preparing data for visualization. Together, they offer tremendous added value for companies with dashboarding. With Peacock, VanMeijel developed an accelerator (Power BI) that uses information from the Metacom Data Warehouse (DWH) to create an analytical model. "We developed this specifically for VanMeijel customers working with Metacom," said Arnold Ruisch, account manager at VanMeijel. "VanMeijel provides the data warehouse (DWH) and Peacock provides the integration, rollout and implementation of Power BI dashboarding."

"This may sound complicated," Arnold continues, "but the bottom line is that we build a database (DWH) between various sources such as Metacom and other applications, in which all the complicated to fathom data is collected. From this, Peacock extracts specific data that is then displayed in an understandable and visual way in the dashboard." The accelerator includes standard dashboards developed in collaboration with Metacom consultants from VanMeijel and BI consultants from Peacock. These dashboards contain financial data and data on project results, but can be adapted to specific requirements during implementation. As an example, Arnold cites sustainability within the industry. "With Power BI, you can convert CRSD information from the data warehouse into a report. In this way, possibly combined with information from other systems, you can provide the necessary data on emissions on a project, for example."

Clearly, dashboarding provides insight into data needed to make informed decisions. "Normally this is done manually, which is labor-intensive and error-prone. With dashboarding, you can pull out the desired information at the push of a button, which helps you with business operations, supports decision-making and allows you to make processes more efficient." According to Wilbert van Leeuwen, co-founder of Peacock Intelligent Automation, dashboarding ensures that there is always one version of the truth that is up-to-date. "The KPI is the same for everyone, which makes the picture of the situation more factual," he emphasizes. "In addition, you can click through from the dashboard and see ERP-independent how a number is constructed."

One VanMeijel customer where dashboarding is being implemented is Van Velsen Reflection Lines (VVR). "We have been working with Metacom for years and have expanded our products to Metacom Online," says Jasper van Wilsem, controller at VVR. "We have more and more information at our disposal, and to make these figures transparent to our employees, we chose dashboarding. Figures only capture the imagination when they are displayed visually." Jasper explains that Peacock created a link that makes data warehouse information available in different dimensions for a dashboard. "Since VVR is a bit of an oddity within the gww, an addition to the standard layout was needed. For example, a first step was taken in the developments of the income statement and balance sheet. It also aligns with certain KPIs we want to see." The benefits of this for VVR are clear, according to Jasper: "The continuity in this, securing data and knowledge, requesting and providing complete and reliable information and sharing this with our employees provides insight and firmness." Jasper is pleased with the collaboration with VanMeijel and Peacock. "We are really taken care of in this process."

VVR looks forward to future configurations and the ability to link multiple VanMeijel products. "For example, we want to combine multiple reports from Metacom into one management report. Creating such a report normally takes a lot of time. It would be nice if we could give the management and shareholders the most accurate information at any time." Arnold explains that VanMeijel is working on this. "Because that information is not always for internal users, we are optimizing its accessibility. It needs to be set up so that it can be broken down and rights attached to it. VanMeijel will continue to develop dashboarding, just like our other products, so that our customers can continue to work smarter, more fun and more efficiently," he concludes.