CAPSTONE

Improving
PROJECT Pathways to
Education’s Alumni
Processes

Prepared by CapConsulting

Minh Ngoc Tran

Abdulmunim Ali
James Cao
Akif Chowdhury
Zeshan Jang
Ryan Yau
Table of Contents

Executive Summary 4
Acknowledgements 5
Introduction 5
Company Profile 5
Current Process - Performance Assessment 6
Consent Form/E-Signature Process 6
Survey/Sign Up Process 8
Supporting Technology Assessments 9
Microsoft Dynamics 365 10
HelloSign 11
Typeforms 12
Heat Map 13
Process Design 15
Gap Analysis 17
Key Performance Indicators 19
Change Management 19
Diagnosis 20
Delivery 22
System Requirements 23
Technical requirements 23
Non-Technical Requirements 24
Request for Information 24
Feasibility Assessment 25
Vendor Profiles 25
CatapultERP 26
ITKConsulting Inc. 26
PowerObjects 27
Requirements Assessment 28
Technical Feasibility 29
Cost Benefit Analysis 30
CatapultERP 31
 ITK Consulting Inc. 32
PowerObjects 32
Risk Assessment 33
Poor Implementation 34
User Acceptance 34
Poor Quality 35
Project Schedule 35
Implementation Costs 36
Recommendation 37
Implementation Plan 38
Planning 38
Installation & Conversion 39
Testing & Training 40
Documentation 41
Closing Remarks 41
Works Cited 43
Appendix 45
Appendix A 45
Figure 1-1.2 45
Appendix B 47
Figure 2 47
Appendix C 48
Appendix D 49
CatapultERP 49
ITKConsulting Inc. 50
PowerObjects 51
Appendix E 52
Executive Summary
The Capstone Project is an 8-month term project that provides students in their final year of
Business Technology Management at Ryerson University, an opportunity to engage in a business
consulting environment with real-life working clients. Pathways to Education (P2E) is a national,
charitable non-profit organization working to make Canada a graduation nation. Collaborating with
dedicated organizations in low-income communities, Pathways supports youth to graduate from
high school and achieve their full potential. Pathways to Education offers an award-winning
combination of academic, financial, social, and one-on-one support. It continues to successfully
break the cycle of poverty through the power of education.
The purpose of this project is to analyze Pathways to Education’s current alumni relations
processes and technologies, identify all the pain points and provide a feasible information
technology solution.
The Project Deliverables Include:
● “As-Is” process mapping ● A feasibility Analysis
● “To-be” Process mapping/Gap Analysis ● Recommendations
● Technical & Non-Technical ● Implementation Plan
Requirements of the proposed solution
In our initial discussions with Pathways to Education, some constraints to the project were
identified. The constraints are the following:
● The feasible solution must be an integration with Microsoft Dynamics 365. Pathways to
education currently has a strategic partnership with Microsoft, which provides them with the
software at no cost.
● The solution must be very cost-efficient since Pathways is a non-profit charitable
organization and does not have has a high budget constraint.
Due to a lack of integration between the multiple back-end systems, there is a lot of manual
data entry work being done daily. Pathways to Education also wishes to gather more accurate data
to further service the needs of the students and alumni. After analyzing Pathway’s processes, we
were able to determine that there was room for improvement. We identified their pain points in
their existing processes. Integrating additional Microsoft Dynamics modules was the key part to
alleviating their pain points. Microsoft Dynamics allowed for the automation of manual processes
resulting in higher efficiency, productivity, and better use of time.
Keeping this in mind, after thoroughly reviewing and analyzing their processes, there was a
need for a process improvement project. Pathways to Education should have a deeper
understanding of Microsoft Dynamics 365 and an integration of other web technologies to the
platform to fulfill their business needs. We have analyzed, defined all pain points, assessed the
current process performance, provided a re-engineered process design, performed a feasibility
analysis on the top three vendors for proposed solutions, provided a recommendation and finally,
creating an implementation plan for the recommended solution.
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Acknowledgements
We would like to thank everyone who was involved in helping and supporting us to create
this report. A special thank you goes out to our Professor, Linying Dong and T.A Quest Atkinson who
inspired and guided us through the past year. We would also like give a special thanks to both
Sydney and Jason for providing us with all the detailed information for this report. We would like to
acknowledge, Jeff Bacon from CatapultERP and Randy Kalir from ITKConsulting for providing us the
crucial information to complete our analysis. Finally, a special thank you to Ryerson University for
providing us the opportunity to gain valuable experience in the business and IT industry.

Introduction
Our client is Pathways to Education, a national, charitable non-profit organization aiming to
help youth in economically disadvantaged communities to graduate from high school and
successfully transition into postsecondary education, training, or employment. The purpose of this
report is to carefully analyze two of Pathways to Education’s current processes, their Survey Process,
and E-signature Process. The analysis will leverage business process modeling diagrams, financial
analysis, and feasibility analysis to help our client identify key issues with their process and provide
them with feasible, cost efficient solutions. The report is structured as followed:
1. Analysis of their existing processes
2. Reengineering their process
3. Technical & Non-Technical Requirements for the proposed solution
4. Feasibility Analysis
5. Recommendations
6. Implementation plan

Pathways to education services two types of students. First, high school students, these
students are currently attending high school and is simultaneously enrolled in the pathways
program. Second, Alumni, students who have graduated from the pathways program and continues
to support and participate in pathways initiatives. The processes that this report focuses on, only
relate to the alumni.

Company Profile
Pathways to Education was founded in 2001 by Carolyn Acker and Norman Rowen. Carolyn
noticed an alarming dropout rate of high-school students in the Regent Park Community. In
September 2001, Carolyn and Norman opened their first flagship Pathways to Education business
model in opened in Regent Park. In 2011, 10 years later, there 70 percent decrease in high school
dropouts and a jump from 20 to 80 percent in post-secondary attendance. Their vision is:
“Breaking the cycle of poverty through education”
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Today Pathways to education has 20 programs located across Canada, including 4 programs
in Toronto. Their Headquarters is located right at heart of downtown Toronto, at University and
Dundas. Pathways currently employs 50 staff members and has 13 nation business leaders sitting on
their board of directors.
Each program is strategically placed in low income communities across Canada, each
program is led by an appointment program director. Each Pathways program operates as an
individual business, and each program delivers unique mentoring and tutoring programs. The key
objective for those programs are to support high-school students of these communities to graduate
and then hopefully move on into postsecondary. At which point, the student graduate from their
specific Pathways Program and become apart of the nation Pathways Alumni network. The alumni
network is managed by the Pathways to Education alumni relations team at head office.
The alumni relations team’s main objective is to support alumni in their transition from high-
school to postsecondary, provide alumni specific events which include professional development,
donor appreciation events and social events, and lastly, they coordinate with alumni to create
marketing material.
For the purposes of this project, we focus on two of the alumni processes supporting the
events management responsibilities, Survey and E-signature. The Survey process’ main objective is
to register alumni to events, its secondary objective is updating alumni profiles in the Pathways
alumni database. The E-signature’s main objective is to provide Pathways with media release
consent (consent forms) of the alumni for marketing purposes.

Current Process - Performance Assessment

Pathways to Education’s two process of concern are their Surveying/Sign Up Process and
Consent Form/E-signature Process. We have mapped out the processes (please see Figures 1 – 1.2 in
the Appendix A) and have analyzed performance of the processes below. Both processes are
initiated prior to an event occurs and both have very similar entities. We will begin by analyzing the
consent forms/E-signature process and then Surveying/Sign Up process.

Consent Form/E-Signature Process

When there is an upcoming event, the Alumni Coordinator, Sydney, is responsible for
notifying Alumni of the upcoming event. She proceeds to do so by sending out an email attached
with a link to HelloSign’s media release form (consent form) to the Alumni. HelloSign is web
application with legal binding e-signature functionalities that Pathway uses to identify which Alumni
is eligible for any media purposes. Alumni are not required to sign consent forms to attend events
unless it’s a specific event like a photoshoot, then it will be a requirement.
Once the Alumni receives and opens the email, they must decide if they are interested in
attending the event. If they are not interested, they simply ignore the email and the process ends as
they do not wish to participate in any media coverage. If the Alumni are interested in attending the
event, they open the HelloSign link provided in the email, which then displays the consent form they
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are required to sign. The Alumni then proceed to fill out and sign the consent form. Once finished
signing the form, HelloSign prompts the user to agree to the legal binding terms which then the
Alumni must select agree or disagree. If they agree to the legal terms, the form is then submitted
otherwise the consent form will be closed. The purpose of the consent form is to authorize the use
of any images or video footage from the event of the alumni in any of their media purposes
including promotional presentations and marketing campaigns. If any photographers are on site,
attendees that did not consent to the form are made aware, so no pictures are taken of them. If any
pictures are taken of these attendees, they will not be shared on any platforms.
Once the consent forms are submitted by the Alumni, Sydney will be notified via email that
the Alumni has signed and agreed to the legal binding terms. At this stage of the process, the forms
will be stored on HelloSign’s database. The Alumni Coordinator will then cross reference the
attendance of the Alumni attendees with the submitted forms. This process is completed by
accessing the database on HelloSign and examining the forms associated with attendees and
confirming which Alumni have signed the consent form. Afterwards, Sydney will export the forms
from the database into her computer and sort them into respective folders. Once sorted, Sydney will
select consent forms and use the Alumni Database to search/select the corresponding alumni
profile. She will then upload the consent forms to the profiles on the database and this will notify
the database admin that the file has been uploaded, after which the file will be closed and deleted
from the computer. This process will repeat itself until there are no more forms to be updated onto
the database, then the Alumni Database will be logged out of and closed. The entire process from
cross referencing forms to updating profiles based on submitted forms will take anywhere from 3-5
minutes per attendee. Depending on the event size, number of attendees and number of non-
uploaded forms from previous events, the manual data entry work is very time consuming. Events
ranging from 5-40 alumni, with 2-3 events per month and forms not uploaded from previous events
can create anywhere between 2-11 hours of additional work for Sydney. This takes precious time
away from her as her primary responsibilities are to coordinate with all Alumni attendees,
responding to emails regarding any questions Alumni have and planning for future events.
Performance assessment: Waste identification
Defects: This occurs frequently as there are a lot of manual work. There tends to be human errors in
the process such as data entry errors and typos made by the Alumni when they submit the consent
forms. If there are any errors, the coordinator must contact the individual to fix any errors. Also, the
coordinator may make errors when updating the profiles of each alumni.

Excess Motion: This occurs frequently throughout the process as the coordinator is constantly
updating profiles on the Alumni database based on each consent form and contacting Alumni for
any errors made.

Overproduction: This occurs irregularly as sometimes consent forms are signed and may create
duplicate copies which may be printed by the coordinator, creating wastes in resources and costs.
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Survey/Sign Up Process
During the Survey/Sign up process, the Alumni Coordinator notifies and gather information
from alumni attending events, for survey purposes and incentives (discounts to events such as
baseball games, conferences, the exhibition etc.) being rewarded in exchange for updated
information. The process is extremely time consuming because the Coordinator must wait for
individuals to complete the forms on TypeForms, as well as wait for an event to occur before they
can begin to update the database. That is why the Coordinator usually sends these forms to the
Alumni a month in advance and follows up a week prior to the event by logging into the Typeform
dashboard. If the satisfaction threshold of attendees hasn’t been met, the Coordinator will message
each Alumni individually that haven’t signed up yet during the one-week buffer before the event
occurs to get any last-minute sign ups. However, it’s important to note that regardless of the
number of Alumni attending, the event will always move forward. At any given time, the
Coordinator may also decide to send questionnaire, feedback, incentive, and survey forms to the
Alumni to provide rewards or gather general information and feedback from a previous event.
Another issue is that there are currently no notifications present on the platform, Typeform. When
an Alumni completes and submits a form, the Coordinator must manually check on their own time
to gain any knowledge of any completed forms. Before the event, for any forms that are
completed, the Coordinator will then export all the data that the Alumni has filled out on TypeForms
to a spreadsheet and then save it to their computer’s C: Drive. An event attendance list is then
generated from the spreadsheet and used by the Coordinator to authorise Alumni attendees on the
day of the event.
Depending on how many attendees filled out the forms, the longest duration will have to be
updating the Alumni’s information and checking the accuracy after the event. Currently, there’s no
automated way of updating an Alumni’s profile with new relative information based on any of these
forms filled out. The Coordinator must manually verify and input matches from the gathered forms
into Microsoft Dynamic 365 such as phone numbers, email address and school information. This
creates an issue for inaccurate information being inputted as there’s no way of verifying information
without contacting the individual at hand which adds another time factor if the information
provided is incorrect. The Alumni Coordinator spends a considerate amount of time, on average it
can take anywhere from 3 to 10 minutes dependant on the information provided by the Alumni.
Depending on the size of the event which can range from 5 to 40 Alumni, with up to 3 events
happening each month, this can create an additional 5 to 22 hours of work from exporting the data,
cross referencing and then manually inputting the data into the database. Another key consideration
is that the Alumni Coordinator has a lot of other primary responsibilities to handle before an event
occurs. These responsibilities include coordinating with all Alumni attendees with instructions on
how to proceed after signing up through email, answering any questions that any Alumni may have
and planning for future events. Therefore, these additional hours can interfere with the
Coordinator’s other key responsibilities. When there are cancellations to events from the Alumni
that initially signed up, the Coordinator must then remove the Alumni’s name on the attendance list
created and find replacements by messaging Alumni that haven’t signed up for the event yet. Given
the multiple responsibilities of the coordinator, time is the key constraint for the entire process as it
is extremely limited, sensitive, and valuable.
9|Page

Performance assessment: Waste identifications

Waiting: This involves the delay in process steps to move forward with the task. As reiterating the
fact that the Coordinator must wait for the forms to be filled out to update the database. This can
lead to frustration when errors from manual data input occurs or when other responsibilities are not
being handled in a timely fashion due to the constraint of how much time is spent on this process.
When the Alumni Coordinator requests irrelevant fields to be added, removed, or automatically
calculated (such as birth date). They must contact the director of IT to approve and make the
changes which adds another time factor. Another delay can occur externally in which any downtime
by TypeForms, may affect how events are being moved forward by the Coordinator or any factors
relating to the technical issues such as slow computer speeds/ crashes.
Over-processing: This varies from each alum depending on the information provided by them. It can
be defined in two ways in this process, the need to enter the forms data into the database more
than once. When exporting the data into a spreadsheet, if there are pending forms to be filled out
after the exportation, the Coordinator will be required to continuously export the new form. This is
where setting a deadline becomes quite handy for the Coordinator, however like stated above, if the
demand for the event isn’t there the coordinator will have to continue waiting. The other main
variable is whether the Alumni’s information is up-to-date. If no changes are needed, this process
usually takes 2 minutes, however, if it’s related to school or work it can take additionally 3 to 10
minutes based on having to cross reference, create a record for the school/ work field and gathering
school or work information to input.
Overproduction: This occurs irregularly, however occasionally there will be from of forms signed or
multiple of the same forms printed, this can create other significant wastes to occur such as
inventory, resources, and costs.
Defects (Rejects, Repair & Rework): This frequently occurs in association with the manual work done
in Microsoft Dynamic 365. This can be defined in this process by data entry errors, typos and
accidental profile deletion which aren’t presently known to the Coordinator. Then going back into
the system by the Alumni Coordinator to update the information, contacting the individual, looking
for paperwork etc. to correct the error.
Excess Motion: This occurs throughout the entire process very frequently. Whether it’s constant
follow ups with Alumni to get updated and missing information from them or constantly shuffling
between the spreadsheet and the alumni database screen.

Supporting Technology Assessments

In both processes, there are three key technologies currently supporting them, Microsoft
Dynamics 365, HelloSign Web Application, and TypeForms Web Application. Each supporting
technology plays a key role in accomplishing the goal of each process. We have analyzed the current
supporting technologies below.
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Microsoft Dynamics 365

Overview
Microsoft Dynamics 365 is a combination of Customer Relationship Management (CRM) and
Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) solutions in cloud enabled service. It was released by Microsoft
in November 2016. Microsoft Dynamics is already a household names in many organizations; over
170,00 companies use Microsoft's ERP and CRM platforms. According to encore business, “Dynamics
365 isn’t an ERP or a CRM product, it’s both. Microsoft already has significant plays in ERP (Microsoft
Dynamics GP, Microsoft Dynamics NAV, Microsoft Dynamics AX), and CRM (Microsoft Dynamics
CRM). Dynamics 365 is the next step in the evolution of a combined ERP and CRM product”.
Microsoft Dynamics is a tool that allows to put all their ERP and CRM capabilities through one shared
database.
Why companies use Microsoft Dynamics 365?
Microsoft Dynamics 365 has a common data model that eliminates the layering of different
databases, meaning that for every process the user would need to use a different database; users
would need to set up, maintain, and customize the database for every unique business process.
Integrating these different databases often becomes difficult.

Microsoft Dynamics 365 looks to eliminate this issue by allowing database customization and
standardization, building of applications and customizations is done freely knowing that their
applications will be compatible with Microsoft’s entire customer database. The common database
also allows other applications to be used and integrated into the Database such as Office, Visio, and
other Microsoft applications. This is designed to use for one company so that their database can be
used throughout the whole enterprise fluidly, this lowers the costs and allows organizations to use a
centralized database with the same products.
Cloud computing is a technology that has been increasingly gaining popularity with many
organizations using and upgrading to the technology. Microsoft Dynamics 365 is offered as a cloud
service which allows a standardization along all the products.
Companies use Microsoft Dynamics 365 in all the following fields:

1. Finance & Operations

2. Sales
3. Marketing
4. Customer Service
5. Project Service
6. Field Service
7. Talent
8. Retail

Microsoft Dynamics 365: Pricing

Microsoft Dynamics is offered in two different editions, the enterprise edition, and the
business edition. The enterprise edition has different pricing models, the whole organization can pay
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$139.80 per month, or it can be offered per user cost which is $12.20 per month per user. In the
business edition, it is only offered per user pricing which is either full user or team member user
which is $46 per month per user or $6 per month for team member user. For full licensing, the user
must contact Microsoft for a quote.

How Does Pathways Use Microsoft Dynamics 365?

Pathways uses Microsoft Dynamics as its main alumni database; Pathways has many new
alumni that enter the database every year and are continually being added to Microsoft Dynamics.
Pathways also uses dynamics to track and update their alumni information. HelloSign consent forms
are uploaded to each alumni profile for legal purposes such as media consent for photographer to
take pictures of them. The information from the TypeForms surveys and registration are gathered
and then manually used to update each alumni profile.
HelloSign
What is HelloSign? How is it currently being used?
When conducting business, documents need to be signed and sent from one place to
another, HelloSign makes this process significantly easier. Employees no longer need to print the
document, sign the document, scan the document, and send it to the appropriate recipient. With
HelloSign innovative technology, the trying process of providing or receiving a signature can now be
done all on a computer or tablet. HelloSign is a web-based program that enables users to request
and receive documents with legally-binding electronic signatures. At Pathways to Education,
HelloSign is used to seek authorization from alumni for reasons concerning their involvement in
events. For example, when an alum is interested in attending an event, Pathways uses HelloSign to
have media release forms and other consent forms signed.
What are the functionalities?
HelloSign’s fundamental purpose is to allow a convenient technique to sign documents over
the web. The capabilities range from efficient integration to seamless utilization. HelloSign allows
users to send a one-time signature request, create templates, and download documents onto their
personal computers. HelloSign supports a large variety of file types including doc, pdf, jpg and many
more. With HelloSign, users have the capability to request the signatures of up to as many as 20
associates at one time. Once the documents have been signed by both parties, both parties receive
a copy of the signed document sent to their inbox. HelloSign gives users the freedom to pre-set
specific fields for their associates to complete. HelloSign’s autofill feature prevents users from
receiving the same information twice from their associates. The autofill feature is used to merge
existing information onto the document before it is sent to an associate. Additionally, this interface
is user friendly on browsers and devices. The HelloSign API allows for contract integration into a
website through simple coding and is compatible with several applications including Google Drive.
Through the embedded signing feature, they dissolve the need for webpage redirection allowing
companies to keep customers on their site, signing directly onto the document without a prompt for
a HelloSign account.
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Are there possibilities for integration?

Users have the option of integrating their HelloSign account with several cloud storage
services, these include OneDrive, Dropbox, Google Drive and more. Users will then be able to upload
documents from their choice of cloud storage, because the user’s documents will already be
synchronized to their cloud storage account. This integration option gives users a way to keep their
documents organized with all other work documents. Currently at Pathways, HelloSign is a stand-
alone software in which it is not integrated with any other software or web-based program.
How secure is it?
In the business world, documents frequently contain sensitive information. HelloSign keeps
user documents secure during transfers using SSL encryption, and in storage deploying secure server
infrastructure. One of the most important factors that users choose HelloSign is because its
documents are legally binding and secure. HelloSign follows all major electronic signature laws, one
being ESIGN.
How much does it cost?
HelloSign offers users the option of paying monthly or annually, annual payments are
cheaper making it the popular choice. When annually paid, packages offered include Free, Pro,
Business, Enterprise, these packages cost $0, $13, $40, respectively, Enterprise bundle quotes are
available via telephone. The difference between these packages are the features available, for
example, the free bundle allows 3 documents per month, 1 sender, 0 templates, and more. While a
more expensive bundle such as business, comes with unlimited documents per month, 5 senders, 5
templates, and more.

Typeforms
Typeforms are one of the major tools used by Pathways to conduct their daily business
activities. Pathways mainly uses Typeforms for surveys and sign up sheets, and currently do not use
any other apps to integrate with the forms. For example, when Pathways has an upcoming event, a
sign sheet on Typeform would be set up to see how many people would be attending the event.
Typeform helps Pathways get information in an efficient way as opposed to asking individuals if they
would attend an invite, Typeforms does all the work and saves time. In comparison to traditional
online forms used by other companies, Typeforms is more user friendly and much easier for admins
to use and create. Typeforms plays a big role at Pathways, with its increased efficiency and ease of
use for both users and admins to complete daily event and database management tasks.
What is Typeforms?

Originally based in Barcelona, Spain, Typeforms was founded by David Okuniev and Robert
Muñoz in 2012, making it a relatively seasoned company. The company contains an workforce of
over 150 people and is backed by major investors – Index Ventures, Point Nine Capital, RTAventures,
and Connect Ventures. Typeform is an online based platform used for collecting and sharing
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information. Typeform is a unique program, compared to other generic programs that collect info.
Other generic info collecting sites are usually dull and boring. Typeforms offers a user-friendly
interface enabling users to feel more engaged and comfortable while answering questions. Instead
of the usual black and white, vibrant colors are added to the forms making them more appealing.
Typeforms provides a simple but unique experience for its users making it a top program in its field.
Uses of Typeform

Typeform can be used in a variety of different ways such as, surveys, contact forms, polls,
questionnaires, job application forms, invitations, online order forms, quizzes, tests contests,
registration forms and much more. It can diversely support 26 different languages, which include the
major languages of English, Spanish, French, and Chinese. By touching almost all major languages
Typeform is also available to almost all platforms and browsers, which includes mobile access on IOS
and Android. Even on unsupported devices, Typeform can still be accessed in a simplified “fallback”
version, basically giving access to almost any user with an internet connection.
Cost of Typeform

Typeform is a free service with their basic plan which allows clients to make as many
Typeforms as they want. Paid versions of PRO ($30/monthly) and PRO+ ($59/monthly) are also
available for purchase for clients seeking more power and flexibility, which offer greater features. A
trial version of PRO features can also be taken for free to see if Typeform fits the client's needs.
Integrations with Other Apps

When a user submits an Typeform the client can simply download the information as an
Microsoft Excel file and view the information. The client can also look to use an application called
“Zapier”, which is a web automation app. Zapier enables clients to automate processes within their
work life. For processes which need to be repeated they are known as a “Zap” and Zapier is the
perfect app to integrate with Typeforms. Instead of the client manually selecting each individual
submission and then downloading, the application Zapier can do all that work and save a significant
portion of time and energy devoted for this process.

Heat Map
Heatmap is a visual representation of how the different types of IT (applications and
software) are being used to support the current businesses processes. We are looking at the
complexity of the technologies being used in terms of their functionality, accessibility and easy user-
experience which is shaded in green. While in contrast, how these specific technologies effectively
support the corresponding business processes shaded in red based on reliability and its ability to
meet demands for each process. For the cells that are white, this indicates that the corresponding
technology does not offer any support for the business process.
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Figure 1 - AS-IS Heatmap – Sign Up & Survey Process

Form
Technology Form Exportation of Storage of Updating Data
Delivery to
Used Creation forms forms Profile Verification
Alumni
Microsoft
Dynamic 365
TypeForms
Outlook

Figure 1.1 E-Signature Process

Form
Technology Form Exportation Storage Updating Data Sign
Delivery to
Used Creation of forms of forms Profile Verification Forms
Alumni
HelloSign
Microsoft
Dynamic 365
Outlook

Legend
Level of Technology Level of Support for The
Complexity Process
Very Complex Very effective support
Moderately Complex Moderately effective support
Relatively Complex Adequate support
Complex Inadequate support
Not Complex No support at all

As-Is Processes
The following technological applications and software that are currently being used is
Microsoft Dynamic 365 which acts as a database, HelloSign used for e-signature purposes, Typeform
is used to create forms or generate questions to be answered and outlook (email only) for
communication purposes by the Alumni Coordinator. Microsoft Dynamic 365 and Outlook are two
very complex software that have many functions available that can support an entire enterprise.
However, these two platforms are only currently used as single functions only (database and
communication respectively) to support the corresponding process above. The current level of
support these technologies has to offer for Pathway’s each business process is shown above. For
Microsoft Dynamics 365 it is a platform that is reliable to store forms and to manually update an
existing Alumni profile. However, it lacks true information confirmation of inputted data from
Alumni, as it is only used to cross-reference past existing data in the database with new ones. For
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Outlook, it does an exceptional great job for gathering information manually by confirming and
asking the Alumni. However, there is no way to guarantee that an email was sent to an Alumni,
hence it provides only adequate support for the corresponding process. On the other hand,
Typeform and HelloSign are two other major web-software that are not-complex and very
straightforward to use in terms of their respective functionality and user-experience. These two
web-software however do provide “Very effective support” for the above business processes, but
because they are third party web services, any downtime related to these two websites or even a
lack of internet connection can affect how an event at Pathway’s would proceed.

Process Design
We were instructed by our client to focus on using Microsoft Dynamics because they had
recently begun using the software to a small extent. Our client informed us that they were not
willing to work with any other software other than Microsoft Dynamics. This created a major
constraint for us to work with, we now knew many doors were closed to us and Microsoft Dynamics
was our only available option. Pathways wanted to better adapt to Microsoft Dynamics and utilize
the software to a much higher degree than its current use. With added integrations, Microsoft
Dynamics can easily be a greater part of Pathways daily processes and lead to beneficial results such
as significantly increased efficiency and organization.
Current Process Design
Microsoft dynamics offers integrations of e-signature and sign-up/survey forms, which are
the two main processes done by the alumni coordinator. The Alumni Coordinator responsible for
these two processes is “Sydney”. The current sign-up/survey process is a timely and repetitive
process, requiring Sydney to dedicate a majority of her time. When dealing with the process of
collecting consent forms via HelloSign; the sub process of checking/uploading a consent form to an
alumni profile can consume anywhere between 3 – 5 minutes. Multiplying that by the average
number of alumni attending a given event (small event 5-15 minutes or large event 25 – 40
minutes). Then multiplying that number for a given event by the average number of events that
occur within a month (2-3). Factoring in previous consent forms that have not been uploaded and
forms still sitting on the computer from previous events must also be taken in. These tasks add
further labor hours, amounting to about 2-11 additional hours of required work. It takes more than
full work day of manual labour just to process the consent forms. The E-Signature process, which is
the process of collecting consent forms, is crucial to the organization. Without the necessary
consent forms, Pathways does not have the alumni approval it requires for these events. For
example, media release forms would give Pathways authority to release photos/articles of an event
on social media. These posts on social media can help the organization grow, this is one example of
why consent forms are necessary and why Pathways must work with this legal constraint. The
processing of surveys is a more tedious task since it deals with a large amount of data, resulting in a
great amount of manual labor input. The process begins by exporting the data to a spreadsheet, and
then cross referencing the information, which can take anywhere between 3 – 10 minutes
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depending on if the information is up to date or not. Using the same mindset from the E-signature
process, these manual data entry tasks could take anywhere between 5 – 22 hours of manual entry
data work. In total, both processes have the potential to reach 33 hours of manual data entry. The
task of updating alumni profiles takes place before an event however, Sydney regularly is left with
no choice but to complete this task after the event, due to the amount of time it requires.
In addition to the manual labor time, there are other existing issues associated with these
processes. A major issue is the potential for human errors. With the substantial amount of manual
data processing, human errors are bound to occur. The errors will force Pathways to allocate extra
hours to fix the problems, yet again resulting in a further waste of time. A minor error can seem
harmless at first, but the effects can bring an significant amount of harm to the organization. For
example, a realistic scenario could be the inaccuracy of an alum/alumna’s profile. Say Sydney missed
an update for an alumni profile, such as change in address or contact information. It could lead to a
lost relationship with the alumni, and if this error were to occur several times, this could result in a
weaker alumni network for Pathways. It would also be very challenging for Sydney to notice the
mistake since, there would be no indicator or any sort of notification to alert her of the mistake, due
to the task being a manual process.
A serious issue in relation to human errors, is the processing of media consent forms. Media
consent forms involve legal implications and if not done properly can lead serious consequences for
Pathways. Just like any other company or organization in Canada, Pathways cannot publish or use
any pictures/videos of alumni without documented proof of their consent. Say Sydney, were to
upload a consent form, from alumni “Alejandro” to the wrong profile of alumni “Hernandez”.
Alejandro may have consented to using his image, but Hernandez did not. Thinking Hernandez did
consent, due to the error, Pathways may use his image. Seeing that Hernandez did not consent, and
his image was used, he could easily sue Pathways for wrongful use of his image and would result in a
serious consequence for Pathways. Simple mistakes such as forgetting to save an updated profile,
deleting information by accident, and misplacing information are all common errors that Sydney
encounters when completing these processes. This shows that on top of being time consuming, the
manual work of completing these tasks can result in several errors, leading to serious problematic
scenarios and headaches for Pathways.
Sydney’s responsibilities don't just include these two major processes of handling forms and
surveys/signups. As an Alumni Coordinator and a member of the marketing department, she has
several other responsibilities she must deal with. Working within the marketing department at
Pathways, entails additional responsibilities such as coordinating Alumni with the media, interacting
directly with Alumni and aiding, and creating alumni marketing pieces such as Alumni Stories. The
manual labor of processing consent forms and surveys/sign ups forms amounts to a substantial
amount of time, which causes Sydney to be distracted from her other responsibilities. Sydney wants
to have time to focus on her other responsibilities and Microsoft Dynamics can be the solution to
help her achieve that goal and bring the much-needed efficiency to her work.
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New Process Design

Microsoft Dynamics would eliminate almost all manual process pains that Sydney currently
deals with. It would allow Sydney to better allocate her time to fulfilling her other responsibilities
and indefinitely bring an increased efficiency into her work. With more time on her hands, Sydney
will have the freedom reach out to more alumni, spread more awareness of their events, and
increase the organization’s network. The automation of handling surveys and consent forms by
Microsoft Dynamics, through the integration of HelloSign and Typeforms with Microsoft Dynamics,
will reduce those long manual hours of approximately 33 hours to potentially no time at all. These
timely and repetitive tasks will be completed instantaneously. In addition to the elimination of
manual labor, this integration will result in other positive outcomes. For example, with the handling
of data all being manual tasks (transferring data to spreadsheets, updating profiles etc.) the
probability or human errors occurring is high. With the elimination of these repetitive manual tasks,
the probability of human errors will be eradicated. Ultimately, erasing the possibility of unnoticeable
errors occurring and the need for Sydney to go back and correct errors that are later realized.
Microsoft Dynamics will boost efficiency at Pathways to a large extent and will help them excel into
being a stronger organization for the many future and current Alumni they work with.
We combined the two main processes of, “Sign-up and Survey Form” into one integrated
process. Our process diagram consisted of two pools, one was called the “Alumni” pool which
consisted of one sole swim lane. The second pool was titled “Sign-Up and Survey Form” pool and it
consisted of two swimlanes, which were “Alumni Coordinator” and “Microsoft Dynamics Alumni
Database”. We eliminated the lanes of HelloSign, Typeform web applications, and Computer. The
process starts with an upcoming event and results in the alumni coordinator sending out a mass
email to all alumni notifying them about the event. The alumni then decide whether they are
interested or not, if they are not interested they simply ignore the email and the process is done.
However, if they show interest, they can click the links to fill out their E-signature and survey/sign-
up information. In the sub-process of the E-signature the alumni read over the consent form and
digitally signs it. The sub-process of survey/sign-up includes the alumni giving basic information such
as: name, date of birth, school, etc. Once the forms are completed the information is automatically
sent to Microsoft Dynamics, where the system then verifies the information. It proceeds to sorting
out the information into the appropriate user profiles and then finally saving all the updated data.
An email notification is then sent to the alumni coordinator notifying them the alumni is interested
in attending the event. Using the updated information from the database, the alumni coordinator
proceeds to create an attendance list five day prior to the upcoming event. After the attendance list
is created the process ends.

Gap Analysis
The Gap Analysis method is used to assess the differences in performance in a business’
information systems or software system to determine whether the business requirements are met.
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If not, certain steps are taken to ensure they are met successfully. The Gap Analysis below (Figure 2)
shows the objective’s present state versus the target state and differences.

Objectives As-is process To-be process Differences

Explained
Data Coordinator cross Once forms are completed, they are Cross-referencing
Verification references data with automatically verified with Alumni data by the Alumni
Alumni profile for any profiles. Coordinator will be
discrepancies. removed from the
process.
Updating When consent forms Profiles will be updated Updating profiles
Profiles are signed, the automatically without the by the Alumni
coordinator updates coordinator. Coordinator will be
profiles. removed from the
process.
Export and All forms are After forms completed, verified, and Alumni Coordinator
Download exported onto a updated, they will be automatically will no longer need
Forms spreadsheet and stored on the Alumni Database. to export and
downloaded onto the download forms.
C: Drive by Alumni
Coordinator.
Checking for Alumni Coordinator Set a required amount of forms that Alumni Coordinator
Completed checks if number of needs to be completed. Alumni will no longer go
Forms completed forms coordinator will be notified via email online to check for
reach the required after required amount of forms are ‘X’ amount of
amount needed. completed. If there are not enough completed forms.
attendees, the coordinator will Notification will be
reach out to any potential alumni sent via email once
interested. Event will go as planned forms are
even if the quota isn't met. completed.
Feedback Alumni Coordinator Surveys/Questionnaire for feedback Beneficial for
Survey/ will create will be integrated into Microsoft Alumni Coordinator
Questionnaire survey/questionnaire Dynamics. as it will be more
on typeform after convenient and
event to generate accessible as all
feedback. types of forms will
be on the same
platform.
Eliminating any
costs from
typeform.
Figure 2 - Gap Analysis
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Key Performance Indicators

Key performance indicators will help us measure the difference in performance and the
value-added activities that are introduced. These performance indicators show the difference in
process improvement before and after the implementation of the new process.
A) User Satisfaction
This performance indicator can be measured by the level in which the user is satisfied with
the changes made to the process. This can be measured by taking surveys or questionnaires over the
period before the system or process was changed. These questions will ask how satisfied the user is
with the process and the overall attitude in which she enjoys performing the process.
Once the change in the process is complete and the user is familiar with the process, we will
then ask another series of surveys or questionnaires, asking how the change has benefited the
process and her new attitude towards the process. This will allow us to see how exactly the process
has changed the attitude of the users and how its benefitted in many ways. The surveys will be
taken once the change in process has been completely integrated into the organization.
B) Number of Email Corrections
This is a useful performance indicator and is easily measurable, the old process would have
the problem in which emails would need to be resent for corrections, or due to lack of information.
We can measure the number of email in which were re-sent due to corrections with the old process.
Once the process is changed we can record either the increase or decrease in which these
emails are being sent and compare it to the number of emails that were being sent back on average
and the how much it has changed. An example of when to measure this KPI is when a mass email is
sent out about an event and measure how many of correction emails are sent. So, it would be
measured once a large amount of email is sent.
C) Increase in Organization Activity
Another way measure performance is we can see if there is more activity once the process
has been changed. Once the process is changed we hope to give the alumni coordinator more time
to work on other things. One way we can measure this is if there was an increase in events or
workshops.
We can do this by seeing how many alumni events Pathways was offering with the old
process, and then compare it to the number events they offer once the process is changed. This
performance indicator would be measured every 6 months to see the change in events over a long
period of time.

Change Management
Change management is the process put in place to allow employees to ease into,
understand, accept, and embrace the changes that will take them in the organization. The benefits
of change management include easing the tension while creating a smooth implementation process.
As well with a clear and effectively communications plan from change management, it will save
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Pathways time and resources during the transition. In assessing the changes that will happen at
Pathways to Education, we will use the 3D framework for change management. This framework will
provide a clear image of what changes will occur, how the change will look like and how the change
will be implemented. The stages of the 3D framework are Diagnosis, Design, and Delivery. For the
purposes of this project, we will only focus on the Diagnosis and Delivery stages of the framework.

Diagnosis
In the Diagnosis stage, we identify the changes that would occur at Pathways. We need to
identify the performance and opportunity gaps at Pathways, to do so we will use a secondary
framework from Harold Leavitt who developed the Leavitt’s Diamond Framework. This framework is
used to define the changes that occur in 4 common components of any organization. The 4
components are Technology, Task, People, and Structure. In each component, the changes captured
will include:
● Technology – Changes in how the technologies being used within the organization
● Task – Changes in how things are done and how performance is measured
● People – Changes in skills, efficiency, knowledge, and productivity of the employees of the
organization
● Structure – Changes in job roles and organizational structure
The following table (Figure 3) is presents a summarized analysis of the changes that would happen
to Pathways to Education.
Figure 3 – Changes to Pathways

Degree of Change (E.g. High,

Changes Explanation
Moderate, low)
The degree of change for Technology is low for
the following reasons. As a constraint, Microsoft
Dynamics 365 must be used in the solution
therefore it limits the changes in technology. As
previously stated, Microsoft Dynamics 365 is
currently, only being used a data repository to
contain all alumni profiles. The changes in the
Microsoft Dynamics would mainly be small
Technology customizations to enhance the software’s Low
capabilities to better support the alumni
processes. The customization done to Microsoft
Dynamics 365 will include:
● A central platform for managing forms
● Automatic Alumni Profile Updates
● Surveying/Questionnaire capabilities
● E-Signature Capabilities
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With the customizations to Microsoft Dynamics

365 will allow Sydney to better manage event
registrations, consent Forms and alumni profiles.
In addition, Microsoft Dynamics would be used to
enhance event management, by creating event
attendance list and tracking alumni participation
based on event attendance.
The degree of change would be high for tasks for
the following reasons. The changes in task would
mainly be revolved around how the alumni
coordinator will manage forms and alumni
profiles on Microsoft dynamics. These tasks
would include:
● Viewing completed forms, both sign up
questionnaires and consent forms, will be on
Task one central platform, Microsoft Dynamics High
365.
● Create Attendee list from Microsoft Dynamics
for each event.
● No longer need to manually update each
alumni profile data field
● No longer need to manually upload consent
forms to each alumni profile

The degree of change for people is low for the

following reasons. With the proposed
changes/improvements in the technology, the
change to people would mainly impact attitude
and skill levels. There would be a positive change
People in the alumni coordinator’s attitude. low

The alumni Coordinators skill set would also

increase. She will have a greater understand of
Microsoft Dynamics and as well as learn how to
use the system more efficiently.
There would be no change in the organizational
Structure structure or job roles. N/a
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Delivery
The scope of the change is minor, as the change will only affect one small business unit at
Pathways to Education. The change tactics for this change should come in three simple stages,
Priming, Changing, and finally Solidifying.
1. Priming – In the Priming stage, key stakeholders should be informed and aware of the
changes needed, as well training should be provided. Since, the origin of the change is
coming directly from the key stakeholders, Sydney and Jason, there isn’t a need to inform
them of the changes needed. The only priming component needed is training. Training
should focus on a few elements. These elements include:
1. How to use the new functionalities of Microsoft Dynamics 365
2. Who to contact and what to do for tech support
3. Provide deeper insight on Microsoft. As previously stated, Pathways only has
limited knowledge of what Microsoft dynamics is and how the tool can
benefit an organization

2. Changing – In the changing stage, the actual changes will be implemented. The upgrades and
customizations needed for Microsoft Dynamics 364 will be implemented, and the alumni
coordinator will begin using the new process for event management.
3. Solidifying – In the solidifying stage, the changes implemented need to be kept from
reverting to its previous state. A feedback system should be put in place, the feedback
system will be based off a questionnaire model. Since the alumni coordinator, Sydney, will be
the main user of the process, she will fill out a questionnaire she will be the only person
filling out a feedback questionnaire. The feedback question will come with options, these
options are:
1. User Satisfaction – In this option, Sydney will be asked to express her level of
satisfaction on the change. The questionnaire will use a 1-3-5 scale to
measure her level of satisfaction and then give her the option of writing a
more in-depth explanation of her choice.
2. User Adoption – In this option, Sydney will be asked to express how well she
has adapted to the change. The questionnaire will use a 1-3-5 scale to
measure how well she has adapted to using the new capabilities of Microsoft
Dynamics as well as the new process put in place. She will also be given the
opportunity to write a more in-depth explanation of her choice.
3. Issues – In this option, Sydney will be asked what issues she is currently
facing. This option will allow Sydney to explain her issues with the new
technology capabilities and process.
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All Feedback questionnaires should be addressed to the vendor and the vendor will use the
data how they see fit. With User Satisfaction and Adoption, they could use this data for
testimonials while the Issues questionnaire data, they should try their best to address the
issues identified as quickly as possible.

System Requirements
This section will outline the requirements necessary for the upgrades and customizations
proposed for Microsoft Dynamics CRM 365 application. It will include a detailed description of the
technical, non-technical requirements and a breakdown of how proposals will be ranked. The RFI
will act as the communication tool between our client and potential vendors. Using the RFI, we will
collect bids from potential vendors and narrow it down to the top three vendors where a closer
analysis will be conducted. The proposed solution functionalities will include fully integrated event
management, account management and information analysis modules into Microsoft Dynamics
CRM 365.
Technical requirements
At a high level, the solution added on to Microsoft Dynamics will allow for an end to end
event management process. This includes creation of an event, conducting the event and finally
gathering feedback post-event. The solution will also allow for other functionalities such as manage
alumni accounts as well as gather and leverage useful information to further engage the alumni. The
functionalities have been broken down into three categories: Event management, Account
management and Information Analysis. A Use Case Diagram is used to visually represent how the
users will use the system. (Refer to Appendix C for the use case diagram)
● Event Management – The solution would allow the administrator, in our project the
Alumni Coordinator, to create, modify and delete events in which the administer would
be able to send out event invitations to alumni. The solution will also allow the
administrator to ask alumni to fill out various forms, such as data collection forms, media
release forms and survey forms. The solution would also have a communications tool
used to send notifications to event attendees, prior to an event occurring as well as to
the administrator, when alumni registers for an event. Finally, the solution will allow for
the administrator to perform basic event activities such as, creating an attendees list,
send out event feedback questionnaires to all event attendees and reuse/modify event
registration forms for future events.
● Account Management – The alumni should be able to create an account and then
register to attend events which have been created by the administrator. From an
administrator’s viewpoint, the administrator should be able to verify and then
authenticate these accounts, at which point the account will be pre-populated with the
respective existing data from the alumni database. Any information gathered during the
event management process should be used to update the alumni account such as, signed
media release forms and any updates with their contact information.
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● Information Analysis – The system should capture information on each event, the
information capture should include, the alumni participation rate, number of alumni
attendees per event, number of events per year/month/week and finally attendees
who’ve registered for an event but do not show up when the event occurs. This data will
be leveraged to better engage the alumni in the future. The solution will also generate
reports which will reflect the data collect during each event.

Non-Technical Requirements

Non-technical requirements outline the criteria in terms of how the solution will operate.
These requirements are identified to measure the quality of the solution. The non-technical
requirements have been broken down to six categories, Speed, Privacy/Security, Capacity/Storage,
Scalability, Disaster Recovery and Performance.
● Speed – This requirement is to ensure that the solution will not lag regardless of the
number of users on the solution. The solution should be able to support multiple alumni
registering for an event at the same time.
● Privacy/Security – Due to alumni providing confidential information while registering for
events, the solution should have adequate security and privacy measures to protection
this important information
● Capacity/Storage – Depending on the event, a lot of information will be generated and
gathered. Therefore, the system should have the adequate storage capabilities to support
the gathered data.
● Scalability – There is an increasing number of alumni every year at Pathways. Therefore,
an increasing number of alumni will attend events as time goes on. The solution should
be able to handle the increasing number of alumni using the solution, while also the
increasing amount of data gathered as time goes on.
● Disaster Recovery – With the important information gathered and stored by solution,
there should be adequate capabilities to back the data up to ensure that the data is never
lost or mistakenly deleted.
● Performance – The solution will be used to automatically update the internal alumni
database. This requirement is to ensure that the automatic updates aren’t making any
mistakes such as updating the wrong data fields or updating the incorrect alumni profile.

Request for Information

This section will describe the evaluation criteria we have set for each category of the Request
for Information. (The full RFI can be found in Appendix E) The major categories which we will
analyze are general feasibility, technical feasibility, functional feasibility, cost/benefit and finally risk.
Using these categories, we will perform a feasibility assessment in which we will examine the extent
in how each vendor solution fits the functional and non-functional requirements, generate benefits,
and minimizes risks. The justification of our weight scheme is summarized in the following chart
(Figure 4).
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Figure 4 – Justification for weight scheme

Criteria Weight Description Justification

This category illustrates how
Functional well each solution covers all
40%
Feasibility the functional requirements
identified in the RFI.
The cost/benefit category
assess how beneficial a
Cost/Benefit 30% solution is when compared to
the costs associated with the
solution
The technical feasibility
Technical assesses the non-functional
10%
Feasibility requirements for each
propose solution
The risk section assesses the
Risk 10% riskiness of each proposed
solution
The functional feasibility received the highest weight out of all
criteria. It is important that the software from each vendor can
meet our client’s functional and non-functional requirements.
Pathways is non-profit organization, therefore if Pathways
decides to pay for a solution, the solution must be able to do
what it meant to do.
The cost/benefit category is weighted at the second highest
because once again, Pathways is a non-profit organization and
it is imperative that the solution chosen by pathways needs to
be cost efficient.
Although a vendor’s reputation, and a solution’s technical
feasibility is important, we decided that the most important
categories for the proposals are the functional feasibility and
cost/benefit categories. Therefore, we had to put the heaviest
weight on those two categories. The justifications for their
weights are shown below.
The risk category is weighted low because the vendors which
we reached out to are all approved partners of Microsoft
Dynamics 365. Also, please note - the solution is targeted at a
small unit of Pathways and the impact of the changes would be
relatively small, therefore lowering risk in general.

Feasibility Assessment
The section will analyze and summarize all the information we have researched and gathered
on each vendor and their proposed solutions. We will analyze the strengths and weaknesses of each
vendor based on the criterion set in the previous section. The structure of the feasibility assessment
section will be as followed: Vendor profile, Requirements assessment, Technical feasibility, Cost &
Benefit Analysis and finally, a Risk assessment.

Vendor Profiles
In this section, we will provide an introduction for each vendor chosen. The profiles will
illustrate who the vendors are, what they do and the solution they have chosen. The vendors chosen
are CatapultERP, ITKConsulting Inc. and finally, PowerObjects.
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CatapultERP
Catapult ERP Services Inc. is a young company, with it only being established in January of
2012. Despite the actual company’s name of “Catapult” being new, its original beginnings are quite
old stemming back to 1996. Catapult was established through a strategic spin-off from the ERP
consulting practice of the Habanero Consulting Group, a Gold-Certified Microsoft partner based in
Vancouver. Their head office is located in Vancouver and the company employs 23 full time
employees, including remote employees in Edmonton and Toronto. Their workforce consists of
highly experienced senior level consultants that have worked in complex business environments and
countless CRM implementation projects in the past.
Catapult is a company that has been implementing CRM projects for various organizations.
Catapult has had a great retention rate of 98% within the last five years, mainly due to the close
relationship it has with it’s clients. Catapult has worked with our client Pathways just recently in
2017, where they successfully delivered a major re-implementation and optimization of the
Pathways PASS solution developed on the D365/CRM 2016 platform. The scope of the project was
to automate the interaction between the Pathways and its facility educators and students. The
design, development and deployment of programs, applications, status reporting and payments
through Dynamics CRM and 3rd party applications Dynamics CRM was the objective. The project
was a success and delivered exactly what Pathways desired.
Catapult’s solution to Pathways problems is leveraging Pathways existing solution and
building upon it, which is Clickdimensions. Clickdimensions is Catapults main focal point of
supporting the solution. Clickdimensions is a top rated, Microsoft-certified email marketing and
marketing automation solution for Microsoft Dynamics customer relationship management (CRM)
arm. Some of the features of Clickdimensions include providing email marketing, web tracking, lead
scoring, nurture marketing, social discovery, campaign tracking, web forms and surveys, event
management and more. A key problem Pathways faced was the manual recordings of registrations
and attendances for events. Clickdimensions can solve that due to its integration with Eventbrite
through a connector as part of the Clickdimensions solution. This integration has a “set it and forget
it” design. Once Clickdimensions is connected to the Eventbrite account, all the event information
including the sessions, registrations, attendance information, and more is automatically
synchronized into Microsoft Dynamics CRM. Clickdimensions has the ability to solve Pathways
process concerns and further improve existing operations.

ITKConsulting Inc.
ITK Consulting Inc. works in both the public/private sectors and for about a decade has
offered strategic IT consulting services in the marketplace. With their head office based in
Vancouver, British Columbia, ITK is a company that offers full-service IT consulting and solutions
delivery to customer-based work teams. ITK delivers quality service through a substantial team of
consultants with professional skills supported by a management team with over 75 years of
accumulated experience in the IT industry. ITK’s core knowledge engages the use of platforms,
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Microsoft Dynamics 365 as well as Office 365 and it is through these platforms, strategies and value-
added solutions are conveyed. ITK works to help customer-based work teams and organizations who
are looking to enhance their performance. Values such as integration, speed of
deployment/usability, best of breed functionality, and customization are among ITK’s most prized
beliefs.
Integration, total cost of ownership and speed of deployment are among the core principles
ITK implements when aiding their customers in getting the best from their Microsoft technologies.
ITK attempts to scale down the requirement for exporting, reconciliation and rekeying when
developing a solution by targeting the integration of the technologies across each of the client’s
processes and activities. This integration is unlike other firms as the existing software being used is
not a barrier prior to integration. Through valuing total cost of ownership, ITK ensures that clients
get the bang for their buck. In other words, that their investment is promising, that all investments
will not outweigh the final product or result, and that all custom preferences meet the directed
needs of the client. ITK understands that time is crucial to any client, which is why the most efficient
deployment methods are utilized. Breaking down the implementation into subprojects using Agile
approaches and the addition of advanced functions once the core system has been deployed, clients
are functioning quicker and with further ease.
ITKConsulting also proposes to leverage pathway’s existing solution and customizing it to
their needs for Event Management.
PowerObjects
PowerObjects, awarded by Microsoft for being “The 2017 Partner of the Year” in providing
excellent products, innovations, services, and solutions explicitly for Microsoft Dynamics CRM users.
Founded in 1993, their vision and business strategy shifted from being a sole business application
developer for companies to concentrating in provisioning their entire business strategy to meet the
needs of the business application, Microsoft Dynamics CRM. With strong emphasis in the following
categorical areas of service, support, education, and add-ons for Microsoft Dynamics CRM. On
October 29 of 2015, HCL Technologies, a leader in Global IT services, acquired PowerObjects on an
acquisition merger worth $46 million. Under this new acquisition, PowerObjects leadership team will
continue to be intact and in full charge of its business operations. Before the acquisition,
PowerObjects had employed just over 300 individuals, where their head office currently resides in
Minnesota, United States. There are additional offices, one located in Downtown Toronto, Ontario
and another office located in the United Kingdom. Their mission today revolves around being the
leader in providing complete, responsive, and flawless CRM solutions, products, and integrations to
serve a wide-variety of users, markets, and industries. With the help of the additional expertise
gained from HCL Technologies’ team, fulfilling their mission and vision is extremely possible.
PowerObjects offers a variety of services and products that can accommodate and be utilized
by a small business, to supporting a full scale large enterprise. PowerObjects product is in the form
of PowerPack tools called “add-ons” that are explicitly intended for Microsoft Dynamic 365 users.
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These unique customizable add-ons can support a wide range of different industry consumers
ranging from warehouses, sales, marketing automation, finance etc. All the current add-ons
supported by PowerObjects are intended to decrease manual workload, increase productivity, and
streamline business process efficiency. To name a few, just to get a glimpse of some popular
PowerPack add-ons provided by PowerObjects, Power MailChimp, is commonly used by small and
large businesses for managing and sending emails in bulks. PowerChat, a built in live chat integrated
into a website, that allows owners of a website to track and chat with visitors within Microsoft
Dynamic 365. There are many more popular add-ons offered, but the last one that we will briefly
speak on is PowerWebTraffic. This add-on allows website owners to learn about what potential
clients are viewing on their website and can track and analyze data using Dynamics 365.
PowerObjects offers an event management ‘PowerPack add-on’ solution that efficiently
benefits event creators and users registering for an event called, PowerZapEvent. PowerZapEvent is
a fully integrated event registration solution and management solution that is integrated into
Microsoft Dynamic 365. The key functionalities that this solution can offer Pathways to Education is
its consistency in managing data in a centralized and safe location. High personalization of workflow
and analytics that can be managed on different platforms such as a web browser or a mobile device.
Users can gain a greater insight into registrants, vendors, sponsors, and volunteers through the
analytical aspect that this add-on provides. Lastly, PowerZapEvent can offer unified processes
through automation and synchronization of data using one centralized system.

Requirements Assessment
In this section, you will assess how well each vendor’s proposed solution meets the criteria
set out in the RFI. As previously stated, the requirements assessment will focus mainly on the
functional requirements rather than the non-functional requirements. A Total Raw and Weighted
Score closest to 100% indicates the solution provided sufficiently fulfills a high number or all the of
requirements needed. Whereas a score closest to 0% indicates that the solution fails to meet none
or most of the requirements. A summary of the requirements assessments is shown below in Figure
5. and following the chart, we will go into detail with how we scored we vendor’s proposed solution.

Requirements Assessment
CatapultERP ITKConsulting PowerObjects
Weight
of Raw Raw Weighted Raw
Requirement Weighted Score Weighted Score
Require Score (Raw score x
Score Score (Raw Score
(Raw score x
ments (Out of Weight)
(Out of score x (Out of
Weight)
100) 100) Weight) 100)
Event 60% 100 60 100 60 88.89 53.33
management
Account
20% 100 20 100 20 100 20
Management
29 | P a g e

Information
20% 100 20 100 20 100 20
Analysis

Total Weighted
Score (out of 100% 100 100 93.33
100)
Figure 5 - Summary of the requirements assessment for all vendors
Each proposed solution is in the form of an add-on feature for handling events. We have
categorized the criteria under three major areas, Event Management, Account Management, and
Information Analysis. Below is a summary regarding how effective each add-on supports the key
criteria required in the RFI to optimize Pathways’ business processes.
1. Event Management: Each solution covers all the requirements identified in the RFI except for
PowerZapEvent. PowerZapEvent meets all the criteria required under Event Management,
except for 1 low priority “After an event has occurred, the system should send a feedback
survey to all event participants.” 8 of the 9 total criteria in this requirement are supported by
PowerZapEvent, which is 88.89% of the criteria fulfilled for this requirement. The low priority
feedback requirement is not mandatory, therefore, PowerZapEvents is still a viable solution.
2. Account Management: All Solutions meet all the criteria required under Account
Management. There is a total of 4 criteria in this requirement, which all (100%) are fulfilled
by each proposed solution.
3. Information Analysis: Once again, each proposed solution meets all the criteria required
under Information Analysis. There is a total of 12 criteria in this requirement, which
PowerZapEvent fulfills all of them (100%) with their “basic features.”

Technical Feasibility
This section will discuss the non-functional requirements of each solution. Each potential
vendor has stated that the solution will be an on-premise solution, meaning all non-functional
requirements will depend solely on Pathway’s server capabilities. Therefore, there is no need assess
each vendor’s technical feasibility and each will receive a perfect score. The performance of any
services within the Dynamics CRM 365 environment will be impacted by the internal network of the
pathways deployment and available bandwidth to/from their data centre. Therefore, the non-
functional requirements for both Clickdimensions and PowerZapEvents are completely covered. The
chart (Figure 6) below summarizes all the non-functional requirements.

Technical Feasibility Summary

Non-Functional Requirement Description
Speed The performance of these services within the D365/CRM 2016
environment will be impacted by the internal network of the
pathways deployment and available bandwidth to/from their
30 | P a g e

data centre
Privacy/Security Personal information is stored within the Pathways Microsoft
Dynamics CRM 365 behind the security system
Capacity/Storage Data is stored on premise within the Pathways SQL server
environment. Pathways IT administrator can provision additional
Scalability
storage
Disaster Recovery Backups can be set according to needs or part of the regular
maintenance routines of the Microsoft Dynamics CRM 365
environment
Performance Microsoft Dynamics CRM 365 has several functions available to
assist in data hygiene. Data duplication rules, Data Deletion and
Archiving, as well as system functions such as mandatory fields,
business rules and option sets
Figure 6 – Technical feasibly summary

Cost Benefit Analysis

In this section we will conduct a cost benefits analysis (CBA). The purpose of the cost-
benefits analysis is to ensure that the vendor chosen, best suits our clients needs in terms of cost
efficiency and if it is worth implementing in the short and long-term. Both the costs and benefits
from Year 0 to Year 5 has been quantified for each vendor’s solution. This analysis will determine
which solution is the most favorable for our client. We will use three techniques in conducting our
cost benefit analysis, the first technique is a break-even analysis. The break-even analysis is one of
the most popular business tools used by companies. It determines the “break-even” point which is
when the revenue equals total costs plus variable costs. As our client is a non-profit organization it is
important to minimize costs and get a return on their investment as soon as possible. This analysis
helps our client provide an estimate of time required to achieve the minimum output before getting
a return on their investment. The second technique used is a payback period analysis. A payback
analysis determines the payback period which is the amount of time to recover the cost of the
investment. Finally, the third technique is a net present value (NPV) analysis. A NPV is the difference
between the present value of cash inflows and the present value of the outflows. This technique will
be used to analyze how profitable each proposed solution will be. Please note, for each proposed
solution there is cost associated with paid events as you will see in the analysis. This cost is
irrelevant because all the events offered through pathways to education are free for attendees. The
following chart (Figure 7) summarizes the Cost Benefit Analysis.
31 | P a g e

CBA CatapultERP PowerObjects ITK

Cost (Year 0) breakdown
Software $0 $0 $0
Implementation $40,000 $4,000 $592
On-going Cost $0 $0 $2 per User/Month
Benefits (Yearly) $8,185.32 $8,185.32 $8,185.32
Payback period (Months) 59 6 1
Net Present Value (5 Years) -$4,561.85 $31,438.15 $34,822.15
(Figure 7) – Summary of CBA

CatapultERP
The estimated costs for Year 0 includes consulting fees, training costs, and software costs for
Eventbrite. Clickdimensions and D365/CRM software fees are not included as Pathways is currently
using these applications. Costs from Years 1-5 have not been listed, as additional storage,
maintenance and activity costs must be assessed based from the volume and use before being able
to determine associated costs. The benefits achieved in Year 0 will include the number of hours
saved by the Event Coordinator in the remaining 7 months. Benefits from Year 1-5 will measure the
number of labour hours saved by the Event Coordinator for 12 months. The benefits will be the
same for all three potential vendors. (Refer to Appendix D – CatapultERP for all calculations)
To determine the break-even point, the “Pay Per Hour” will serve as benefits and the price of
the implementation and training will serve as the costs. Without any variable costs provided
Catapult, the analysis will assume there will be no running costs. The break-even point will be the
total hours.
Payback analysis has been conducted to determine the length of time and how many hours
saved required to recover costs on investment. Payback analysis determines the payback period
which is the amount of time to recover the cost of the investment. Since our client is a non-profit
organization their funds are very limited. The investment must provide a short payback period
otherwise the implementation is not worth while. In this analysis, we determine the payback period
by simply dividing the total monthly benefits from Year 1-5 by the costs from Year 0. The payback
period will be in months but can be converted into years.
The net present value analysis will be conducted using the implementation/training costs as
year 0 cash outflows and yearly benefits will serve as the cash inflows. The NPV will use a 5%
discount rate and will measure the profitability of the solution for the first 5 years after
implementation.
After carefully analyzing the costs and benefits using the break-even and payback analysis,
we were able to determine the break-even point and pay back period. The analysis was all done
under the assumption that the event coordinator will save the maximum of 33 hours of manual
32 | P a g e

work every month and an average wage of $20.67 per hour. The break-even point and pay back
period was relatively high as it will take 1935 hours to break even and 59 months for the payback
and this is not taking into consideration of maintenance costs and commissions off the software
registrations. Finally, the NPV for Catapult is -$4,561.85 at five years. This means that this solution
will not be profitable after 5 years but will be profitable in 6 years. This is an extremely long time for
any new solution to yield any benefits, especially for a non-profit organization.

ITK Consulting Inc.

The estimated costs from year 0 are from the deployment and training of ITK’s event
management of Clickdimensions solution. The costs of Clickdimensions and Microsoft Dynamics are
not included in the analysis because pathways are already using the software. The costs of Year 1-5
are dependent on the need of the organization which can change at any moment. The costs are
shown in Figure A; Benefits from year 0 include the amount of labours hours saved per month,
monthly benefits, and yearly benefits (of the remaining 7 months after deployment). Refer to
Appendix D – ITKConsulting for all calculations.
Once again, the analysis was all done under the assumption that the event coordinator will
save the maximum of 33 hours of event related work, every month and at average wage of $20.67
per hour. The break-even point and pay back period was relatively high as it will take 193.5 hours to
break even and 6 months for the payback, these numbers are again subject to change because the
cost of maintenance and the software could possibly increase both break even costs and payback
period, which is all dependent on the needs and requirements of the organization. Finally, the net
present value is $31,438.15 for first 5 years after implementation. This is much more profitable than
Catapult’s solution.

PowerObjects
All estimated costs and benefits are based on monetary and non-monetary gains and losses
associated with the proposed solution, PowerZapEvent, offered by PowerObjects. We have decided
not to incorporate costs of existing software and applications that are currently being used by
Pathways such as Microsoft D365/CRM fees. The assumptions being made for the first 7 months are
as followed. The Director of IT will deploy the solution right after the proposal phase which is before
the month of April. The hourly rate is derived from the annual salary based on the average industry
benchmark for a Director of IT and for an Event Coordinator working for non-profit organizations.
The last assumption is that Pathways will require a total of 1 hour to install the add-on, and 12 total
hours for a user to be completely proficient, learn and be trained in all the functions in
PowerZapEvent. The following costs related to Year 0 is based on the monetary costs of self-training
using a benchmark industry average hourly wage for the Event coordinator and The Director of IT.
We used the license cost per user of $2 for two users for 6 months, as the first month (30 days) is
offered as a free-trial period. The costs associated with Year 1 through 5 are variable costs that vary
 33 | P a g e

depending on if additional storage will be needed, incurred maintenance cost, and if Pathways
wishes to invest in additional services and add-ons. Therefore, these costs cannot be currently
forecasted at this moment. (Refer to Appendix D – PowerObjects for all calculations)
The break-even point and pay back period was relatively high as it will take 30 hours to break
even and roughly 1 month for the payback to occur. Finally, the net present value is $34,822.15 for
the first 5 years after implementation. PowerObjects is projected to be the most profitable of the
three possible vendors.

Risk Assessment
In this section we will assess the riskiness of each vendor based on 7 risk criterion that have
been identified. We use a combination of consequences and probability to analyze each risk
identified for each vendor. Through a rating system created by the team, we have categorized the
likeliness of a risk from occurring into 5 categories, “1- Rare”. “2-Unlikely”, “3- Possible”, “4-
Probably”, and “5-Likely”. The team has also divided the consequences of a risk into 5 categories, “1-
Insignificant”, “2- Minor”, “3- Medium”, “4- Major”, and “5- Catastrophic”. The figure below (Figure
8) shows a compilation of our analysis, this will be followed by a detailed description of our analysis
for each vendor.

Risk Register
Vendor Name CatapultERP ITKConsulting PowerObjects

Score
(Likelihood x
Risk Factor Likelihood Consequence Consequence) Likelihood Consequence Score Likelihood Consequence Score
1. Poor
Implementation Unlikely Major 8 Unlikely Major 8 Unlikely Major 8
2. User
Acceptance Rare Major 4 Unlikely Major 8 Rare Insignificant 1
3. Poor Quality Unlikely Major 8 Unlikely Major 8 Rare Minor 2
4. Project
Schedule Unlikely Medium 6 Possible Medium 9 None None 0
5.
Implementation
Cost Rare Major 4 Possible Major 12 None None 0

Total Score (out

of 125) 30 45 11

Legend
Score Likelihood Score Consequences Total Score (Likelihood x Consequence)
Risk Does Not
0 Exist 0 None 1, 2, 3, 4 = Acceptable Risk
34 | P a g e

1 Rare 1 Insignificant 5, 6, 8, 10 = Acceptable risk but needs to be monitored

2 Unlikely 2 Minor 15, 16, 20, 25 = Unacceptable Risk
3 Possible 3 Medium
4 Probable 4 Major
5 Likely 5 Catastrophic
Figure 8 - Risk Register

Poor Implementation
This risk denotes a possible risk that could potentially arise through the duration of the project. A
failed implementation will render the solution useless, therefore, the solution will not work. The
impact of a failed implementation will result in major consequences. We assessed the likelihood of
poor implementation based on the following factors: vendor’s experience in the market and the
education industry.
• CatapultERP - We predict that Catapult can easily implement Click Dimensions. Catapult has a
long experience in working with Microsoft Dynamics, with countless successful projects. In
addition to their experience, they have worked with Pathways in the past, meaning they
already know how Pathway’s system works making it a little easier when implementing the
project. Therefore, we believe there is an unlikely risk Catapult would complete a poor
implementation of the project.
• ITKConsulting - We estimate it is an unlikely risk that ITK Consulting will not be able to meet
Pathway’s needs. The reasoning for this is because ITK’s core knowledge engages the use
Microsoft Dynamics 365. ITK also values such as integration, speed of deployment/usability,
best of breed functionality, and customization.
• PowerObjects – Since this is a self-installation solution, the risk will only occur if the self-
implementation phase of this add-on is not coherently setup effectively for Pathways.
Judging by Rolf’s IT experience, the risk is rare for poor implementation, but it can ultimately
have a major impact on the entire solution being utilized. The other downside is that it can
affect current applications (Microsoft Dynamic 365) and migration of stored data if the self-
implementation does not go as planned. On the consensus of experience and knowledge,
this will be an unlikely risk.
User Acceptance
Failed user acceptance will result in an inadequate use of the solution and wasted resources.
Depending on the vendor, the impact of failed user acceptance will result in either major or
insignificant consequences. We assessed the likelihood of poor implementation based on the
following factors: vendor’s experience in the market and the education industry.
• CatapultERP & ITKConsulting – Since both Catapult and ITK are proposing the same solution,
we will combine this risk assessment together. As previously stated, Pathways is currently
using Clickdimensions for their other needs. Meaning, they have already accepted the
solution. With the proposed upgrades to Clickdimensions, pathways will need to accept the
new features. User acceptance could be done through training and testing the solution.
From the several training videos provided on YouTube’s platform, it should be relatively easy
35 | P a g e

for Pathways to learn, understand and utilize the program. Due to the nature of the solution
requiring continuous maintenance and upgrades, Catapult would always be there to offer
their support if needed. Therefore, we believe that the possibility of users being unable or
having trouble using Clickdimensions will be a rare risk of occurring.
• PowerObjects - PowerObject’s offers a one month-free trial for users to test and learn about
all the specific functionalities that PowerZapEvents has to offer. Hence, the risk for
occurrence is rare, considering that it meets most of the requirements specified in the RFI.
The one-month free trial and no-implementation cost results in no significant resources
being lost. If Sydney or Rolf chooses not to utilize the add-on within Pathways due to some
issue that arises in the future, Pathways can uninstall the add-on and revert to previous
existing system after the free-trial has expired.
Poor Quality
Poor quality is the result of inadequate testing. Rushing the testing phase can be one of the
reasons that Pathways will encounter challenges with the solution in the future. Depending on the
vendor, the impact of poor quality will result in major or minor consequences. We assessed the
likelihood of poor implementation based on the following factors: vendor’s experience in the market
and the education industry.
• CatapultERP - Catapult have completed 40 CRM implementations in the past and several
have had similar requirements as Pathways. Catapult have had a long experience of
producing quality work with a 98% customer retention rate to back it. We believe it is
unlikely Catapult would provide a poor quality of work, while completing the project.
• ITKConsulting - ITK Consulting has nearly a decade of experience in providing solutions with
Microsoft Dynamics 365, which is why we are confident that it is an unlikely risk that ITK will
inadequately test the solution or provide a poor-quality solution.
• PowerObjects – As stated previously, PowerObjects offers a 30-day free trial for all their add-
ons, where all features can be fully explored and be fully tested. This 30-day time span is
more than enough to sufficiently run and monitor at least one event for Pathways to see if
any bugs or functionalities are flawed. This can lead to the final decision of whether any
future subscriptions will be made with PowerObjects. Microsoft has awarded PowerObjects
with its “Microsoft 2017 Partner of the Year Award” for demonstrating excellence in
innovation and implementation. We can conclude that all their add-ons are due-diligently
tested before they are being offered to its users, even Microsoft can endorse this. Given a
scenario where if a stage was missed in the testing phase, it is more than likely that their
large-user base using the same PowerZapEvent add-on has already reported it for
PowerObjects to resolve.

Project Schedule
Changing a project schedule is a result of inadequate time management for any project.
Being behind schedule is a common risk experienced in many projects with unforeseen events
occurring at any time and it could prove costly to Pathways. Depending on the vendor, the impact of
a project’s schedule changing will result in either major or no consequences. We assessed the
36 | P a g e

likelihood of poor implementation based on the following factors: vendor’s experience in the market
and the education industry.
• CatapultERP - The expected schedule of the project is roughly a month and half. Catapult
provided a very precise period, which shows that they have the confidence to complete the
project within the proposed time. Due to the precision and lack of ambiguity, we believe
Catapult would be on schedule throughout the duration of the project. Due to the nature of
the project being more of an add-on onto current systems, it is highly unlikely that difficulties
will arise. Catapult have completed similar projects on greater scales for organizations like
Vancouver and the British Columbia Ministry of Advanced Education. The projects finished
with a high degree of success and satisfaction from the clients, therefore, this will be an
unlikely risk for Catapult.
• ITKConsulting - ITK Consulting indicated that the implementation would take between 3 to 5
days depending on needs assessment (which is conducted by ITK). Compared to CatapultERP,
ITKConsulting provided very high-level specifications on their project details. Also, similarly to
CatapultERP, ITK Consulting has also previously worked on many similar implementation
projects and they are very experienced in what they do. We believe that the project’s
schedule to change is a possible risk because the vendor did not specify the project details.
• PowerObjects – PowerZapEvents is a self installation add-on, therefore, the project schedule
to implement is set by Pathways. This risk does not exist as Pathways can modify the project
schedule and implementation plan however they see fit.
Implementation Costs
This risk is closely related to the previous risk, increasing implementation cost can be
detrimental to Pathways. Pathways has a limited and inflexible budget because they are a non-profit
organization. The impact of a failed implementation will result in major to no consequences. We
assessed the likelihood of poor implementation based on the following factors: vendor’s experience
in the market and the education industry.
• CatapultERP - We expect the implementation costs to stay as specified in their RFI response
unless a major change is needed, or a major problem arises, which is unlikely. Also factoring
in the recent successful project that Catapult completed with Pathways, we rank this risk to
be unlikely.
• ITKConsulting – As stated previously, ITK estimates that it will require about 3 – 5 days to
implement based on needs assessment. This needs assessment is ambiguous, and it could
easily change the suggested implementation plan to be much longer, thus, increasing the
costs for Pathways. However, ITK does have a reputation for having smooth implementations
therefore, we rank this risk at possible.
• PowerObjects – This risk does not exist for PowerObjects. Reiterating from before that
Pathways can modify the project schedule and implementation plan accordingly based on
their own terms.
37 | P a g e

Recommendation
To begin with our recommendation, we will use the following chart (Figure 9) to describe and
summarize our feasibility assessment.

CatapultERP ITK Consulting PowerObjects

Raw Raw Raw
Weighted Score Weighted Score Weighted Score
Score Score Score
(Raw score x (Raw score x (Raw score x
(Out of (Out of (Out of
Weight) Weight) Weight)
Criteria Weight 100) 100) 100)
Technical
Feasibility 10% 90 9 90 9 90 9
Function
Feasibility 40% 100 40 100 36 95 38
Cost/Benefit 30% 20 6 65 19.5 90 27
Risk 20% 50 10 50 10 65 13

Total Weight
Score 100% 65 74.5 87
Figure 9 – Vendor Assessment Summary
Based on our analysis, we are recommending PowerObjects and their add-on,
PowerZapEvents. Each Vendor had very similar reputations, each vendor has been operating and
offering Microsoft Dynamics 365 solutions for several years. In terms of technical feasibility, each
proposed solution was very straight forward. Both Clickdimensions and PowerZapEvents are add-ons
created based on simplicity. Furthermore, Clickdimensions and PowerZapEvents both cover all the
essential functional requirements identified by Pathways. So, our recommendation is weighted
heavily on the Cost Benefits Analysis. Both Catapult and ITKConsulting received low to medium
scores. Catapult received the lowest score because of how long the expected payback and break-
even point will be. The payback period and break-even point for Catapult was 59 months which
translates into roughly 5 years. On the other hand, for ITKConsulting, they received a more
moderate score. Their payback period and break-even point was 6 months. Finally, PowerObjects
scored the highest in the Cost benefit category, due to two factors. First, due to PowerObjects’ low
cost add-on, the payback period and break-even point would be in the first month of
implementation. Second, PowerObjects offers a 1-month free trial for all its PowerPack add-ons.
This means, for the first month of implementation, Pathways does not need to pay anything and
they can test, learn and experiment with the add-on, free of charge. After the free trial month,
Pathways can then either chose to continue using their services and pay the low fees or decide to
remove the add-on from their servers without any restrictions. Therefore, we recommend
PowerObjects and their low-cost add-on, PowerZapEvents as the most optimal solution.
38 | P a g e

Implementation Plan
This section will help Pathways prepare for the implementation of the recommended
solution. Due the simplicity and small scale of the implementation, this plan will follow a waterfall
approach. A waterfall approach is a sequential approach, with distinct phases. As previously stated
in the feasibility analysis, PowerZapEvents is a self-installation add-on, therefore the implementation
timeline for the solution is very short. The chart (Figure 10) below is a sample timeline for the
implementation starting in the first week of May.

Sample Implementation Plan Timeline

Phase
1. Planning
2. Installation & Conversion
3. Testing & Training
Figure 10 – Implementation Plan
After the implementation, Pathways to Education will have a simple event management add-
on to handle all the required event related activities conducted by the Alumni Coordinator. The
structure of this section is as followed, Planning, Installation & Conversion, Testing & Training and
Documentation.
Dates Comments
The planning phase should
take about 4 days, allowing
all parties involved in the
April 30th – May 3rd
implementation to familiarize
themselves with the
implementation process
The installation & conversion
phase will be quick, as it is a
May 4th
small add-on. This phase
should only take one day.
As previously stated in the
feasibility assessment, there
are no implementation risk
associated with
PowerZapEvents add-on.
Therefore, testing and
May 7th – June 4th
training will run in parallel
with each, as the Alumni
Coordinator tests the
solution, she will in turn self
train herself in using the
solution.

Planning
As stated, PowerZapEvents is a self-installation add-on, the planning for the implementation
is very straight forward. The people needed for the implementation are Rolf, the systems
39 | P a g e

administrator, and both Sydney and Jason as the users of the solution. The following chart (Figure
10) will show a breakdown of the main activities in the planning phase as well as the people involved
with each activity.

Main Activities
Activity People involved Description
The purpose of this activity is to familiarize everyone
with the solution. The outcomes of the meeting should
Planning Rolf, Sydney, and allow each person involved to:
Meeting Jason 1. Understand what PowerZapEvents is
2. Who is responsible for which activities for the
implementation
The purpose of this activity is to familiarize Rolf with the
steps for installation. The outcome of this activity will
Read prepare Rolf for the Installation & Conversion phase of
Installation Rolf the implementation plan. The installation manual can be
Manual found on this link:
https://www.powerobjects.com/guides/powerpack-add-
ons-import-guide/
The purpose of this activity if to familiarize each person
on how to use PowerZapEvents. The outcomes of this
activity will allow each user to smooth transition into
Read User Sydney, Jason, and
using the add-on. The user guide provides in-depth
Manual Rolf
details on how to use PowerZapEvents. The link for the
user guide:
https://www.powerobjects.com/guides/powerzapevent/
Figure 11 - Planning

Installation & Conversion

The installation for the solution is very straight forward. Rolf will be the sole person
responsible for the installation of PowerZapEvents. The installation process is go very smoothly once
Rolf has completed the activities stated in the planning phase. The follow chart (Figure 12) will
outline the activities necessary for installing PowerZapEvents. Please note – The activities must be
done in sequential order.

Installation & Conversion Activities

Activity Description
Using the Following Link, Rolf will download the solution
1. Acquire Solution Package package. Link:
https://www.powerobjects.com/powerpacks/powerzapevent/
Following the steps from the installation manual from the
2. Import Solution into Microsoft
planning phase, Rolf will import the solution into the
D365
Microsoft D365 on the Pathways Servers.
40 | P a g e

Next, following the steps set in the installation manual from

3. Registration
4. Creating Security Roles
Figure 12 – Implementation & Conversion
the planning phase, Rolf will register Pathways to enable
usage of the add-on.
Finally, following the steps in the User Guide from the
planning phase, Rolf shall create security roles for each user of
the add-on. Rolf should create PowerZapEvent User Roles for
both Sydney and Jason. The system administrator will have full
access to the add-on without creating any additional security
roles.

Testing & Training

Too reiterate, there are no implementation risk associated with implementing
PowerZapEvents. This means during the 30-day free trial use of PowerZapEvents, the add-on can be
removed at anytime, free of charge. Therefore, user acceptance testing (UAT) is required. UAT will
test whether PowerZapEvents works for the alumni coordinator. The alumni coordinator will test the
solution against each functional requirement module in the RFI. To test the solution, the alumni
coordinator will follow the user guide provided in the planning phase. Therefore, as she is using the
user guide to test the solution, she self trains herself on how to use the solution as well. The
following chart (Figure 13) will detail the activities required for testing.

Test
Event Management Module
Account Management
Module
Information Analysis Module
UAT/Training Checklist
Instructions
Follow the Instructions given
in the user guide. Read from
subtopics “Creating Event” to
“Setting up Event Series”.
Read the instructions in the
user under the subtopic
“Event Sub-Menu”, titled
Participants.
Read the subtopic “Event
Tools” in the User guide.
Additional comments
After reading the user guide
sub topics, the alumni
coordinator will be able to
perform all the required
tasks for event management.
The alumni coordinator can
then determine if the event
management features satisfy
her needs.
After reading the
instructions, the alumni will
understand how
PowerZapEvents is integrated
into the Alumni Database.
Thus, the alumni coordinator
can then determine if the
account management
features satisfy her needs.
After reading the subtopic,
the alumni coordinator will
41 | P a g e

have a good understanding

of all the information analysis
tools available in
PowerZapEvents. The alumni
coordinator can then
determine if the information
analysis tools satisfy her
needs.
Figure 13 – Testing/Training
Please note - If the alumni coordinator deems PowerZapEvents to be unsatisfactory, then she
can ask the system administrator to just delete the solution with no consequences.

Documentation
All the required documentation for the implementation can be found on the PowerObjects
website. The following chart (Figure 14) will detail where specific documentation can be found.

Installation & Conversion Activities

Document
Master Install Guide
Training/User Guide
Frequently Asked Question for
PowerZapEvents
Link
https://www.powerobjects.com/guides/powerpack-add-
ons-import-guide/
1. Video Demo:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TITL3aLltnA
2. User Guide:
https://www.powerobjects.com/guides/powerzapevent/
http://powerobjects.parature.com/link/portal/30110/301
61/ArticleFolder/60/Frequently-Asked-Questions

https://www.powerobjects.com/support/powerpack-
PowerObjects Add-on Support
support/
Figure 14 - Documentation

Closing Remarks
Over the course of this project, we identified several business processes that could be
improved at Pathways. After a few discussions and meetings with Jason and Sydney, we came to an
agreement that the alumni processes will be prioritized. We found the process to be extremely time
consuming and filled with a lot of repetitive manual tasks. We believe that by using an integrated,
event management add-on to Pathways CRM system, we can help eliminate substantial manual
tasks and save the alumni coordinator a ton of time. The event management add-on will allow
Pathways to better manage all event related tasks, all alumni profiles and leverage event related
data to better serve the Pathways alumni. Based on our analysis on possible vendors for Pathways to
42 | P a g e

Education, we concluded that PowerObjects would be the best feasible option. PowerObjects is the
best option in terms of costs, risk, and fulfilling the requirements needed by Pathways. We at
CapConsulting is looking forward to Pathways to Education to implement and utilize our
recommendation because we strongly believe it will help their business overall in terms of
increasing their business value, process optimization and efficiency.
43 | P a g e

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● HelloSign API. (2017). Integrate the HelloSign API into your website to start accepting
Esignatures Quickly Retrieved September 26, 2017, from
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● About Us. (2017, April 07). Retrieved October 24, 2017, from
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● Lewin's Change Management Model: Understanding the Three Stages of Change. (n.d.).
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● Leavitt, H. J. (1965). Applied organizational change in industry: structural, technical and

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Appendix

Appendix A

Figure 1-1.2
E-signature Process
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Survey Process
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Appendix B

Figure 2
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Appendix C
Use Case Diagram
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Appendix D

CatapultERP
Assumptions/Costs

Benefits

Break-even

Payback

Net Present Value

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ITKConsulting Inc.
Assumptions/Costs

Break-Even

Payback

Net Present Value

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PowerObjects
Assumptions/Costs

Break-Even

Payback

Net Present Value

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Appendix E

CapConsulting
Request for Information

Prepared by:

CapConsulting Consultants

Business Technology Management

Ryerson University
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13/01/2018

Table of Contents

Project Overview 54
RFI Schedule & Contact Information 55
Technical Requirements 56
Management Requirements 61
Vendor Pricing 64
Vendor Section 65
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Project Overview

This is a Request for Information (RFI) only and does not constitute a commitment. This RFI will collect
information from various vendors to assess which vendor provides the most relevant requirements.

CapConsulting is seeking out information from vendors to develop, maintain, and provide add-ons and
readily available built-in plugins for Microsoft Dynamics 365. The solution will be utilized by the non-
profit charitable organization, Pathways to Education. Pathways to Education is a national, charitable
organization working to make Canada a Graduation Nation. Partnering with dedicated organizations in
low-income communities, Pathways supports youth to graduate from high school and achieve their full
potential. For over 15 years, their award-winning combination of academic, financial, social, and one-on-
one supports continues to successfully break the cycle of poverty through the power of education.

The solution will help Pathways to Education Canada improve its overall alumni event management
process efficiency by decreasing the manual workload that the Pathways Alumni Relations Coordinator
must do on a day-to-day basis. The chosen solution will automate key activities including event sign-ups,
signing forms over a secure platform, storing Pathways Alumni information in a centralized database,
sending customizable notifications to the appropriate parties, and generate reports based on data
gathered. The information analyzed will be based on approximately 20-30 events that occur annually,
with each event hosting between 5 to 40 Alumni attendees.

CapConsulting consists of a team of 6 members who are currently in their final semester at Ryerson
University’s undergraduate Business Technology Management program. In the last five months, as part
of our final graduation project, we have simultaneously collaborated with Pathways to Education Canada
in the project’s planning and development stages. This project will allow each member to complete their
bachelor’s degree as well as gain real world experience by developing a feasible solution for a non-profit
organization.

This request outlines functional and non-functional requirements needed from the proposed add-ons
and built-in plugins, complete pricing information, and vendor section that must be completed by the
service provider. Vendors will be evaluated by CapConsulting with Pathways to Education Canada based
on the ability to meet the demand of the mandatory requirements, comparing cost-effectiveness,
completeness of all requested sections in this report, and the solution that adds the greatest value for
Pathways to Education.

It is important to note that all CapConsulting requests that all questions and answers are to be sent to
Ngoc.Minh.Tran@ryerson.ca at CapConsulting by February 19th, 2018 4:00pm to be considered.
55 | P a g e

RFI Schedule & Contact Information

RFI Schedule

Pathways to Education - Improving Alumni Processes RFI Schedule

Date Milestones
th
Feb. 6 2018 RFI Submitted to Vendors
th
Feb 20 2018 RFI Response Submission Deadline
th
Feb 27 2018 Vendor Presentations
Note – CapConsulting hold the right to extend the schedule for milestones under certain
circumstances. Vendors are required to adhere to the above RFI schedule unless specifically notified
of change in RFI schedule.
Contact Information
Please Submit the RFI responses by e-mailing Minh Tran at CapConsulting and Sydney at Pathways
to Education Canada
Client Information
Sydney Howe
Alumni Relations Coordinator, Pathways to Education Canada
439 University Ave #1600, Toronto, ON M5G 1Y8
Email: SHowe@PathwaysCanada.ca
Phone: 416-646-0123 ext. 506

Ryerson Student Contact Information

CapConsulting
Team Members: Minh Tran, James Cao, Abdulmunim Ali, Ryan Yau, Zeshan Jang, Akif Chowdhury
Main Contact: Minh Tran – Ngoc.Minh.Tran@ryerson.ca
Secondary Contact: James.Cao@ryerson.ca

Ryerson University

Business Technology Management Program

ITM 90AB - Prof. Linying Dong – E-mail: ldong@ryerson.ca
Ted Rogers School of Management - Information Technology Management
55 Dundas St W, Toronto, ON M5G 2C3
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Technical Requirements

Note - Assign one of the following Availability Codes to each of the following Requirement ID:
A Feature is Available
N Feature is not Available

Legend
FR Functional Requirement
NFR Non-Functional Requirement
H High priority
M Medium Priority
L Low priority

Pathways to Education - Alumni Processes Project

Requirement Description Requirement Support in Solution
Requirement Feature
Description Priority Comments
ID Availability
FR - 1 Event Management

The system shall allow the

FR - 1.1 administrator to create, H
modify, and delete events

The system shall allow the

administrator to create
FR - 1.2 H
and send event invitations
to all selected alumni
The system shall allow the
administrator to create
and customize forms.
FR - 1.3 Forms can be: H
1. Data collection forms
2. Media release forms
3. Survey Forms
The system will allow
Alumni to submit any type
Fr - 1.4 of forms: H
1. Data collection forms
2. Media Release Forms
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3. Survey Forms

The system shall send a

notification/reminder to
the attendee:
When they have accepted
FR - 1.5 M
and registered for an event
When an event is going to
happen:
T
The system shall send a
notification to the
administrator:
When an Alumni registers
FR - 1.6 M
for an event
When an Alumni
completes a Media release
form

The system shall be able to

create and modify an
FR - 1.7 M
attendees list for each
event

After an event has

occurred, the system
FR - 1.8 should send a feedback L
survey to all event
participants

The system should allow

FR – 1.9 event registration forms to L
be reused for future events

FR - 2 Account management
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The system shall allow

FR - 2.1 each alum to create a user M
account

The system will shall allow

the administration to verify
FR – 2.2 M
and confirm the
authenticity of the account

Each user account created,

shall be pre-populated
FR - 2.3 with the pre-existing data M
from the Alumni Database

The data retrieved from

each event will be used to
FR - 2.4 M
automatically update each
alumni profile.

FR - 3 Information Analysis
The system must report on
statistics such as:
1. alumni participation rate
2. number of attendees
per event
FR - 3.1 M
3. number of events per
week/month/year
4. Number of attendees
who’ve registered but
didn’t show up

The system shall be able to

FR - 3.2 M
generate reports
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The system shall be able to

FR - 3.3 L
archive reports

The system shall be able to

FR - 3.4 L
view archive reports

NFR - 4 Speed
The system should operate
at little to no lag time
NFR - 4.1 H
despite number of active
users

The system should support

10 - 20 simultaneous active
NFR - 4.2 H
users

NFR - 5 Privacy/Security

The system must ensure

that personal user
NFR - 5.1 H
information remains
confidential always

The system must ensure

that the data is stored and
NFR - 5.2 maintained accuracy and H
consistency

NFR - 6 Capacity/Storage
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The system must be able

to store data for each
event. (1 - 2 GB per event)
This data includes any
NFR - 6.1 documentation created M
during events,
documentation includes:
1. Media release form
2. Feedback Survey Data

NFR - 7 Scalability
The system must be able
to handle increasing
NFR - 7.1 amounts of data as the M-H
number of events and
users increase.
NFR - 8 Disaster Recovery
The system should be
scheduled to be backed up
NFR - 8.1 after every event after H
regular business hours
(1am-4am)
NFR - 9 Performance
The system should be
reliable in the sense that
there are little to no
mistakes when updating
NFR – 9.1 each alumni profile. H
Alumni Profiles Main
consist of text fields.
(Name, Phone Number,
Contact Email etc.)
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Management Requirements

● Project plan (Please provide a proposed project plan, with timeline & Milestones, that
indicates the steps to be taken from start of the contract to implementation of the
application):

● Project schedule (Please provide a proposed detailed project schedule, outlining the tasks
from start of the contract to implementation of the application):

Note - Please provide all cost items in CAD of last business day at time of submission.
62 | P a g e

Pathways to Education - Improving Alumni Processes Management

Requirements
Pathways to Education:
Staffing
Requirements (in
the sections, please
state the staff
requirements
needed to develop Vendor (Insert name here):
the product both by
Pathways to
Education and by
Yourselves)

Design Requirements:
Design and
Development (in
the sections, please
state the Design and
Development
requirements
Development Requirements:
needed to develop
the product both by
Pathways to
Education and by
yourselves)

Implementation Requirements:
Implementation
and Delivery (In the
sections, please
state the
implementation and
Delivery
requirements need Delivery Requirements:
to develop the
product both by
Pathways to
Education and by
yourselves)
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System Acceptance UAT Requirements

Testing (in the
section, please state
the requirements
needed to ensure
optimal user
acceptance testing
and cost associated
with it i.e. beta sites,
stress tests etc.)
System Maintenance Schedule and Costs:
Maintenance (In the
Section, please state
the Maintenance
requirements:
Schedule and Costs,
both fixed and
variable, that will be
required to support
the product)
Training (In the Training Options:
section, please
provide the
potential solutions
that will address the
training and
learning of the
product by admin
and users i.e. video
modules, on-site
training etc.)
Documentation (In Document Options:
the section, please
provide the types of
documentation that
will be prepared and
provided for the
added feature/s e.g.
User Manual,
Training Documents)
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Vendor Pricing

Vendors are required to provide a detailed pricing list of features and options that are available for their
application. Vendors who have their own version of the pricing list may also attach it with the RFI
response. Vendors may add costs that are not outlined in the pricing list below.
Note – Please provide all cost items in CAD of last business day at time of submission.

Pathways to Education - Improving Alumni Processes Pricing List (Vendor to

Complete)
Costs Quantity Units Subtotal
Up-Front Costs
Application/Feature Development
Software
Hardware
Database
Consulting
Training
Administrative
On-going Costs
Upgrade
Scheduled Maintenance
Storage
Application Installation
Discounts
Applicable Taxes
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Vendor Section

Vendors are required to complete the following table and provide detailed answers to the outlined
questions. Vendors may provide any additional information that may seem relevant to the project.

Pathways to Education - Improving Alumni Processes Vendor Information (Vendor

to Complete)
Questions Comments
Company
Have you worked on
a similar project
before? (Microsoft
Dynamics
Customization)
What are the size of
the companies you
have worked with in
the past?
Software/Hardware
Is it a customized off-
the-shelf solution, or
do you develop the
solution based on
customer's needs
and requirements?
Who Provides
Training?

Pricing
Are there any
applicable taxes?
How does this impact
the non-profit
Organization?
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Are there any

addition costs not
outlined in the
pricing section of the
report?
Are there any
training and
documentation
costs?

Upgrade & Maintenance

Are upgrades to the
added feature/s,
client-specific or
universal?