Business & Productivity Software Pt.2 | CompTIA IT Fundamentals+ (FC0-U61) | Free Course by ITProTV
All. Right everybody welcome back to IT Pro TV, I'm your host Don pizzette and in this episode we're going back into the world of CompTIA IT fundamentals. And we're continuing. On, with business and productivity software this is part 2 if you didn't watch part 1 you probably want to check that out and back, in the studios with us for this episode we've got mr. Ronnie Wong joining, us Ronnie thanks for coming back hey, Don thank you for having me as we continue, on taking a look at the idea of software, and the usage that we're gonna be, taking a look at inside, of the workforce, and now we're moving away from the, productivity. Which is just general, usage right we've went over some of the most basic. Ones like Word and Excel and PowerPoint, these are things that you'll probably see every day and just about everybody end up using but, there are going to be other types of software that are a little bit more specific. Maybe to your. Company, ok or to at least the style of your company or what your company does you're. Also gonna end up seeing that there's some software, that maybe, not everybody is gonna end up using this, can be very effective that helps, at, least us to accomplish the tasks that we need and then, of course we want to get into a little bit of accounting, software as, well that. Will you, know is prime more important, than anything else right to make sure that bills are paid it's, really gonna help us out here so we'll be diving into all those different, layers, of software that we want to talk about to, make sure that you at least understand. What they do alright, so the software we talked about in part one that was really broad. Software, right that every employee can find a way to make use of but in this episode the software is tailor a little more towards job, roles right. There'll be particular. Broll that need particular, software to do their work and if you're not in that job well you don't care about the software at all so, some of what we see here you might not have seen before or, you might not ever see again depending, on the type of work that you do so Ronnie what, job role do we want to start with well let's start off with the idea of project management as companies that can continue to develop, and grow right you, end up seeing that it's no longer just focused, on one thing at a start, you know splitting, off and different. Branches. Or different departments, will have different goals but, there still needs to be the idea of management between those things too and then of course every department needs to do that so let's talk about this side project, management alright. So in the project management world you know whenever you take on a project it's, a series of tasks, a series of things that need to get done and somebody. Has to be keeping track of that keeping track of what's being worked on and that person, is called a project manager and project.
Managers Need, what's, really specialized, calendar, software right I mean at the end of the day it's really a specialized calendar where it's not just their calendar, it's, everybody's. And, not just every person, but everything every. Piece of equipment every, room. They need to know is it booked is somebody going to be there am i making the most out of that resource, as possible. And then, tracking the deadlines, am i falling behind in projecting, out to say am I going to get this task done on time or we're gonna be behind schedule where, are we at that's. What project management software is all about and one of the most common, ones we're gonna stick with that that Microsoft, theme is a product called Microsoft, Project I've got it here on my laptop and what Microsoft Project does is it. Lets, you present. Really complex, information in, a user interface that at, first glance it seems, pretty, complex, but if you're a product manager you actually learn this stuff pretty quick and it becomes very intuitive, what, we're looking at here the key, component. Of what we're looking at is this right here it's called a task list this, is all of, the work that needs to be done and how. Long it's going to take and if, we start it on one day what, day we'll finish it so for example we've got this review, business strategy, landscape, that sounds like buzz, words right there but, inside of it we've got things like complete, a SWOT analysis, right there's a strength, weakness, opportunity, and threat analysis, so they want to do a SWOT analysis, they've, estimated it's gonna take five days and they're planning, on starting it on Tuesday. July the third if, they start it on Tuesday July the third and it takes five days then it's gonna finish on Monday, July the ninth right so we've got that information right here well maybe somebody calls and says Don it's, not actually gonna take five days it's, gonna take four, days okay. Well I can come in here and I can adjust this down and Sarah I'm gonna make that four days and now, the, system is gonna update and if, you saw what happened there this. Activity, complete, the SWOT analysis, is now gonna finish on July, 6th instead of July 7th or actually. It was accounting for the weekend wasn't it so. Yeah. So you know it when it was five days it was gonna finish on Monday, July 9th but when I lower that down to four days now it's finishing on Friday July 6 it's even accounting for the weekends - people aren't going to work on the weekends but, it's also updating.
All Of, the following, activities, to, adjust, their dates and say now that this one is one day earlier all of these others, can, be one day earlier as well, and now, we get a better measurement, of when our activity, is going to finish reviewing. The business strategy landscape, was a, 20, how. Many days was it originally it was a 27, day activity, by, shortening, that up now it's a 26, day activity and my overall, project length, starts to change so. That's kind of the key piece, of project, management but, in addition to that you, get things like Gantt, charts where you can see the relationships. Between one activity and another one activity can't start until another finishes, you get a timeline, so you can tell what exactly should, be going on at the given time what, is supposed, to be happening right now in my company and we can come in and we can look at all the different things that are slated to be occurring at that particular time. One, of the most valuable, pieces that, project. Management offers you is what's, called resource, management I need. People to do these tasks, ok and sometimes. The tasks are assigned to somebody really generic here like I've got marketing, lead marketing, lead is just some generic thing right well maybe I don't want it to just be marketing, lead I want this to be assigned to run, along right, so Ronnie is gonna be the one who's, doing the, SWOT analysis, hope you got your paperwork ready Ronnie yeah so I've, got him assigned well. Right, now I know who is going to be working on that and if it looks like it's falling behind schedule I know who to call and yell at me like what the heck Ronnie why aren't you done right but, what's really cool here is as a project gets more and more complex, I may, add more. And more activities to it so I might come in and add some other activity, in here. Like. I. Don't. Know uh sweep. The floor somebody's got to sweep the floor right so. I'm gonna say sweep, the, floor. Right, and I. Need to put when it's going to occur this is gonna be a two day activity, takes it takes a lot of time sweep. And I, wanted to start on the. Third, and. Whoops I wanted to start on the third and. When. I come in and I schedule, that to. Start on the third it's. Gonna run from July third to July fourth, right which is overlapping. With the task above it okay, now I get a little warning about that because the way I calculated the dates but I'm not too worried about that but the point is that it does overlap now can I have two tasks going on at the same time absolutely. But, what if I assign Ronnie to do this one as well okay. What, I've done is what's called over-allocation. Ronnie. Is now scheduled to do two things at once that's not gonna work one of these is not going, to get done and it's very hard to see that when you're just looking at calendars. When you're just looking at generic, information with. Project management software it tracks, that and it gives us warnings, see the little red person, icons over here and that's, how I know I've got a problem I've over, allocated. A resource, that's, really, really cool stuff at first, glance, project. Management software doesn't, look much different than, what we can do an other software, like I can create a chart.
Like This in Microsoft Excel it'll. Do it right I can, create a calendar, view of, the, activities, I can do that in Outlook I don't, need anything special I can use Microsoft Publisher to create a calendar even Microsoft Word can create a calendar but, the, logic. That goes on behind the scenes is what, makes software, like this very powerful now. As an individual. I might, use Microsoft, Project right here by myself, I'm the p.m. I'm tracking this but. In a large company, you might have multiple PM's, maybe. You've got a team of 10 project, managers and they, need to be able to share information between each other well. What I've got here is with a locally, installed software and Riley hinted, at this in part one is that, there's more than one model for, deploying software and. With project, software like this it's not uncommon to use a slightly different model which is called Network. Hosted, software, Microsoft. Has a product called Microsoft, Project server it's. A server, you run on a central location and all, of your project managers can launch project, and they. Can connect to the server and the cool part about that is as one person updates the project, the other people see it they're able to check in on that and see the updates in real time and understand where the company is at that's very powerful but, it requires a lot of infrastructure, Microsoft. Project itself isn't very cheap but then the server piece is even more expensive but the money can save you in the long run by properly, managing your projects makes it absolutely worth, it and that's, really, really cool stuff so unlike. Microsoft Word where, it's usually a single person using it or Excel it's a single person using it when we start to get into project, management or a really, business, focus software in general you. Usually end up where it's more, than one person accessing. It and so, then you're not just locally installed but you're also locally, hosted you have a server that's somewhere in your location that's giving, you a central, repository of, that data that you can access that's kind of a critical piece inside.
Of A project management now, Don since you mentioned the idea here of the the network hosted. Type, of software as well we. Know that project management software or, you might know but I know in. The last few years has even gone further than just having a server on on, our own site even, the cloud-based ones. That, are out there too so, Don can you show us an example of that yeah, absolutely you, know and cloud based is a great solution because setting, up a server it's, not easy. Maintaining. This server is even harder like ID give, it enough time anybody, can get a server online and get people connected to it but then keeping, it running month, after month year after year doing, the updates, and all that becomes a bit of a nightmare so, going to cloud, hosted, cloud, hosted, is where you say I'm not gonna have a server here I'm gonna have a server out there in the cloud that is. A big, difference and when you go to the cloud world you've, got a couple of choices and stick it with Microsoft Project, you can use office 365, and have. A project, server that's actually hosted by Microsoft so you don't worry about the server and then you just take your Microsoft, Project, and you connect, server, at Microsoft, side or. You. Can go even further and, use, a product like what we use here lights per TV we use a product called smartsheet, and, with smartsheet we can do project, management just. Like I was showing you a moment ago right so here's my task list here's, my Gantt chart just like I showed but. In this scenario it's, entirely. In, the cloud I don't, even install software on my computer I just browse to their website I go to art-sheet calm I login and then, here's my project and I can come in and I can take some tasks, right so, here. I've got a couple of tasks laid out and. These. Are our two tasks. That well. I guess those are kind of overlapping let's let's. Add, in you. Know task 41, and, task. 42. So. I'm just gonna punch these in and I'm gonna set them both, to be on. Seven. One eighteen. So those are two overlapping. Tasks, they occur at the same time and as, far as who they're being assigned to I can come in I can assign them to. Run. Along right. And. Let's. See I don't, want to I, don't want to send you much email notifications, so when you're dealing with cloud software like this how does he know I'm adding things well. It'll, send email notification, so that's what I was telling you not to do so, I'm gonna come in here and just add Ronnie again so, now here I am simultaneously. Adding. Ronnie to activities, again and this, project management software will track that and when I pull up Ronnie's, calendar, I'll see a red flag on there that lets me know it, actually waits it, does a refresh, because, it's cloud based a lot of stuff doesn't happen in real time like it does in Microsoft Project so this one actually does ask and I believe it's every half hour to look for double bookings and things and notify. Me so that I am aware, I've. Got a person, trying to do two things at once that's not gonna work out for me but, I get, the same basic functionality that, I would have with, any type of cloud or any type of project management software where, I can come in start scheduling these tasks and activities putting. People to work pulling, up calendar views I'm in the game view here but I could switch to a calendar view and. Jump. In here and oh you know I kind of messed it up by putting my tasks. Several. Months prior to the actual project, but, I can come in here and find it they were the, actual, calendar view right.
Here So very similar, what we do with the the, software on our own desktop, the difference here being that it is entirely, hosted, in the cloud and, that does make a big difference as far as the support side, this. Example here is project management it, doesn't have to be project management it could be any type. Of software, a lot of people have gone to cloud-based software for their email contacts, calendar, final. Storage any. Number, of things have gone cloud hosted, these days with, project, management or job. Focused. Role, focused, software like this it's, usually pretty specialized, so it's hard to find people to support it and the cloud model is really. Ideal because now we don't have to worry about supporting, it ourselves we, let somebody else do it and we just pay a subscription yeah, Don there's no doubt that the idea here that most people don't get is that they might wonder why, don't I have it on my machine if I'm gonna need it well you may not it's just like what Don said at the beginning of the episode it might be your job role that requires you to have it but at the same time knowing that those things exist sometimes you also hear the term like, line of business in other words just that specific focus, of that software and here's one that you'll pricey as well which, is the idea of some project management software now, besides that there are other types of software that are highly specialized, in this way as well so what we want to do of course is introduce you to a couple of different ones that you might also, encounter. As to so, let's take a look at my machine and we're at least gonna show you some, of the ones that's, really big if your business. Is related. To sales ok and some businesses. Are, right and it is related sales more, than likely you'll use something that's a customer. Relational. Management. Base you, know a system, or manager that, will allow you of course to track the potential, customers, as well as your, existing. Customers, and everything else that happens to Salesforce. Is one of the biggest ones this out there that you can see and so, here it says number, one customer, relationship, management platform. On, cloud, base for sales service marketing, don't, require IT experts, to set up or manage, that. Don, that sounds, like a solution. For me that, the, idea of actually going to the cloud really does seem to help even, in something like setting, it up like what you were mentioning here and the, only difference for. Us then is that we pay and then we get everything integrated, in the way that want to but, they do a lot of, something like this so if, your sales related your, pregnancy something that's fairly similar, to this in this actions, and what it does, the. Other one that you might do is even more specifically, focus so for example, right here at IT Pro TV we, have multi, Studios dawn and the. Idea the project manager software that you're showing smart she's it, actually, seems like it helps out a lot and what we might do but, what do we need something specific because we needed studio, management. Well that's a more specific business-related, case and there's one that we have is what we use is one called Fox OMS, and if you're not running a studio right, where you have multiple studios that you're keeping track of as, well as who's gonna be in those studios, well. Then you. Might not need something like Fox OMS, but on this one I can, go in here and if I were is the studio manager I could, see if I schedule something and another. Show, was already taking, place and here we are done in studio five right here but, if I looked, into the other studios and I realize I had scheduled another one it would show up here too or you know try to and, there's, different views that we can see once we actually find that studio in studio five for that time period I can, then scroll down and see there's dawn he's booked for this one as, well as all Ronnie right there so Russia's, skate you know scheduled, and you can see what's actually being in use at this point you, of course can change that focus, away, a little bit more to if you like, to see the idea a calendar.
View Oh that's terrible. More, of a month type, of calendar that way you can project out into the future or. Even by, the week that. Changes, for you or if you're just focusing, and on today and, changing. Up the timeline so, either way whether I'm looking for it by the host or, by, the actual, studio here we, can see where it really does it allows, me to find what's in use and what's not in use of resources and building, oh and Ronnie said you know if you're if you're managing studio productions, like we do this offer is really, valuable we love it we use it every day but. If you're not working, in a recording studio this offer is absolutely. Useless to you right the, point here is none, of that reflects, poorly on the software it's that there are a ton of software options, that are out there that are built around a very specific need. And there's, there's no, way that we could possibly cover, every, aspect of every different business that's out there so there, is generalized. Software, that everyone uses like the Microsoft Office suite you'll want to familiarize yourself with that you're gonna encounter that all throughout, your life, or at, least clones, of it like LibreOffice. And OpenOffice you. Know you will see those throughout your life other, ones though are very specialized, and when you go to a new company, they'll, likely have to do what's called onboarding, ought to teach you the software that they use even. Software like Salesforce, where, maybe. I worked for one company doing, sales and then, I leave and I go work for another company that's also doing sales you'll, find that Salesforce can be heavily customized, and altered. And changed and, made so that it's very specific to a company, so now yeah I might be familiar with Salesforce, but I go to a new company and it's. Like learning all over again starting from scratch, business. Applications, are critical. They're really, important they're what helps, a business, function, but. They're, typically, customized. Or tweaked to that particular, business so there's gonna be a learning curve there don't, panic. When you go to work for a company and they've got specialized, software like this they, they know that they know that they've got an on board that they've got to teach and give you a chance to learn or if they don't then they likely have our time hiring and retaining employees so that's a different. Challenge people have but, that type of software it can be very very. Very. Very. Niche. Niche. Product where just, maybe, even only a couple of companies run that software but. Hopefully. Hopefully. It's it's stable, it's gonna be around awhile and you just have to learn it and get in there and figure it out all. Right now we talked, about our our, kind, of business focus software one, type of software we haven't talked about you mentioned the beginning the episode was, accounting.
Software And this is one that, doesn't, deviate, much from company, to company because, there are a lot, of laws, and regulations, around it accounting. Is a very, tricky beast so Ronnie can you give us an example of accounting, software yeah the accounting software is kind, of when. We talk about a niche niche, focus right that's, where, we're gonna see that because, even though companies will use just about every accounting software that's out there there. Are these, products, are so incredibly, detailed it's amazing, on what they can track and what they don't track so, let's take a look at one and I've just pulled up the website on my screen here one, called QuickBooks, that's available for your company and depending. On the size of your company you're gonna see that. Sometimes. A product will fit exactly right and then as you scale up in others that your company grows matha. Take the product that you were you, were you know used, to being able to use as a small, business. Owner and have, to scale. That up and others go to another product to find that there's even more details, that you have to track where, that existing, software may not work but QuickBooks has been out there for a long, long time, that, contract, just about everything, especially when, we deal with accounting, now I was, Joe you might think I'm joking, but let's, take a look at just this idea of some of these icons, at the time you can manage bills. If you want to so, if you're paying and tracking bills it gives you that ability of course to get those invoices, in and then of course to ask you'd be able to pay those as they come out as we need to. Track. Mileage, for companies. That also have to have something like this as well where, you, know if you're turning in those mileage, records they have the ability for you to have that in place of course income, versus expenses, that's always, a good one that's, that's what we hope all right more income, less expenses, it, can at least give us that ability to see that invoicing. And payment once, again if I'm charging, someone and I want to make sure those payments come in we'll. Be able to do that as well so you never managing, contractors. Paying, out workers multiple. Users. That can be used here track, even time this actually being used on certain. Kind of clock. Employee, time and billable. Hours that's kind of a big one you know as well being. Not actually know you know when you can charge a customer for, the hours that's actually being used so, a lot of details, that are involved, here and there's probably even more yeah as I click on that little arrow that expands out any more inventory. Reporting. Its tax, estimates. Deductions, capital, attract projects, you, name it this software has you. Know is very, interesting. And it's gigantic. - when, you purchase on like this you can't expect it to cost them, $99. A lot of times right you, might end up seeing it's gonna cost a lot more and it may even be where the charge, is a little bit different like how big your company is, and it may expand and grow that way too you know another unique aspect of soft like this is that, updates. Really aren't optional, they're they're really required. That, when you're doing things like tax code tax code changes, from year to year so, even. Though you might go and buy a retail, copy the software and install it locally you'll, still need to update it you'll, usually purchase, a new version each year to make sure that you're getting the the, latest tax code and, other things that's kind of a critical piece of it and not. Entirely. Unique to accounting, but very. Very visible in the in the world of accounting and Ronnie was showing QuickBooks obviously there there are other products, that are out there peach, tree comes to mind and, even like Quicken for the home user so, it's a different versions of it and.
And Then there's ones that are very very focused on on things like taxes, like turbo tax but this software, it. Is, responsible. For making a business function. You've got to be able to take, in money you've got to be able to pay bills you got to be able to cut a payroll check that's, really, critical stuff, now, you. Might not use something completely, on premises, like QuickBooks you might go cloud-based, there's, plenty of products are out there like NetSuite, is one of the largest ones where, they do enterprise. Sales for for massive. Organizations, and and track records and report and. There's plenty of other things from, I'm. Trying to rember the name of the company that, makes. The as/400, stuff which. Is a big mainframe software for tracking for big enterprises there's several other players that are in that space but, the, key thing here is that if something goes wrong with this software as an, IT technician this will usually be a high priority problem, even though it might only affect one or two employees directly, it. Affects the entire company. The moment like a payroll check doesn't go out that that would be a big deal Odell, Don, this is actually some. Good things that we had to actually think about and focus we. Might not be where, we're having to learn every aspect of it I just realized you're gonna encounter some, software, like this where. You'll, be maybe supporting, it like in the general software but, more than likely and, something specialized, like this you may have to call for help as well when you start doing this too so, don't be afraid to use that tech, support number if you need to to, make sure that you get all the help that you need to set everything up yeah, and you know I, think we made fun of like Microsoft, tech support and some other episodes but with. Into it it's not so bad you know once you once you get past the first person on the phone there they're pretty helpful key, thing to remember with all of the software that we've talked about in these episodes is that, you absolutely. Need, to be backing up your work oh yeah because no. Matter you know no matter what goes wrong with software as long as you have a good backup of your documents, you'll be alright and software. Like QuickBooks I mean it is very, very forceful, about making you do a backup at least once a day there's. A reason for that if you lose all your financial, data that's really, really bad if I lose my personal, calendar I don't really care but if I lose, financial. Data for the company I mean you, can go to jail in some cases like you're you're fiscally, liable, for for maintaining some of this stuff so that's, really, important, having a good backup strategy, in place end users. Have to learn how to use the software IT. Technicians. Have to learn how to support the, software, and throughout. Part one and Part two I feel, like we've covered a pretty wide range that's, offering giving you guys an idea of some of the things that we'll see there out there and. And kind of set the stage for what an IT workers expected, to be familiar with all. Right so Ronnie before we wrap this one up did you have anything else that you wanted to talk about in the world of business and productivity software well just remember that this is probably what you're gonna encounter more, often when users, need help if you're, in that support technician, role at some point most.
Of The time they're not going to be saying hey this is something I can't figure out it's gonna be because they need help and getting, that software, running or making, it do what they want, it to do so, be, familiar I familiarize. Yourself, with it and that will help you out as you continue on in your IT career all. Right well ladies and gentlemen that's gonna wrap up this episode and. It's the the you know the end of our hour part 1 part 2 here on business and productivity software but, stay tuned because we definitely have more CompTIA. IT fundamentals. Coming up but for now signing, off our IT Pro TV I've been your host on pizzette now I'm running wrong and we will see you next time. Thank. You for watching, IT, Pro TV.
2019-04-10 19:45
