Yesterday I conducted an "Introduction to Configurable Reports" webinar and it went very well.  We covered every report type, from a List Report to an Advanced Matrix, and all the features like Conditional Highlighting and downloading free reports from the Intelex-Exchange portal.  Attendees were asking questions throughout and their grateful thanks were offered at the end.  I plan to follow-up with them in a couple of weeks to find out how many reports they've made or if there is anything else we can do to help.  Happy report building!

Check-out some of the reports we built...

Matrix Report with Conditional Highlighting

Advanced Matrix

Let's face it, the term environmental management system is not quite a household name - at least not yet. I've been interested in finding out whether more people have been consulting Google for anything related to "environmental management" ever since saving the planet became really fashionable so I did some research and have compiled the results in a chart. They reveal that while there has been an increase in queries for terms such as "green business" and "carbon footprint" the volume of searches for "environmental management" has not increased at all. In fact, it has declined steadily. Closer inspection of the chart shows that "carbon footprint" became a really hot search in late 2006. My guess for why this happened is media exposure. People tend to search for what they see or hear from the media. According to IMDB.com, the documentary, An Inconvenient Truth was released in August 2006. I'm pretty sure it's partly responsible for why people started inundating Google with searches for "carbon footprint". This begs the question: How does one get Al Gore to film a documentary about Environmental Management Systems?

With Intelex, you can add employees and assign their security access manually.  If you have more than a handful of employees though, there's an easier way!  The convenient solution we propose is the Intelex CSV Employee Import.

The CSV Employee Import tool is an excel spreadsheet that is saved as a 'CSV' (Comma Separated Value) file.  Accepting only this format, the Employee Import attempts to import all employee data provided it is entered correctly into the CSV file.  The Import will achieve one of two outcomes; it will either import a new employee record or update an existing one, it's just that simple!

The Import tool can also be used to populate Employee Demographic Data (EDD) for customers who have purchased the Standard Safety Incidents (SSI) module.  One simple spreadsheet can rid you of painstaking field-by-field entry.  Ask your Project Consultant about it today.  It's the common sense solution.

Account Managers Bevin Lyon and Shaun Wong will be representing Intelex at the 2008 ASTD International Conference and Exposition. The first annual ASTD conference was held in 1944, since then the event has grown to over 9,000 visitors in 2007!

"The ASTD (American Society for Training &Development) is the world's largest association dedicated to workplace learning and performance professionals." Its members come together from more than 100 countries worldwide.

The training and development focused conference will take place at the San Diego Convention Center June 1^st - 4^th,2008. If you're in the area  please don't hesitate to stop by for a visit.

Ontario's Energy Conservation Week is quickly approaching. According to the Ontario Power Authority  "... to keep our power grid healthy, Ontarians will need to reduce their energy consumption by 6,300 Megawatts (MW) by 2025 - that is equivalent to taking one in five electricity consumers off the power grid!"

Canadian manufacturers consume tremendous amounts of energy on an annual basis so their participationin programs like Energy Conversation Week as well as their commitment toongoing process improvement, will play a significant role in minimizing the amount of energy consumed across the country. As an additional benefit,reduction in energy consumption will also lead to short-term and long-term corporate monetary savings.

Contact an Intelex Account Manager to discuss how Intelex can help your organization reduce their energy consumption.

Intelex now has well over 300 clients spread across 5 continents.

The map below shows countries where businesses are running Intelex software. If I've missed a country, post a comment letting me know which one or send me an e-mail.

Here are the top 10 reasons to implement an Environmental Management System:

10. Get a public-relations advantage over your competitors

9. Give your employees another reason to feel good about their employer

8. Be prepared for internal and external audits

7. Increase the collective knowledge base of your corporate intellectual property

6. Improve enterprise efficiency through automated scheduling, email notifications, data management,and real-time progress reports

5. Identify potential environmental risks before they become an expense

4. Achieve ISO14001 certification

3. Reach a wider audience of environmentally-aware consumers and manufacturers

2. Fulfill consumer demand for environmentally-friendlier products and services

1. Reduce your corporate footprint on the environment

According to the International Organization for Standardization [ISO], ISO 9000 and ISO 14001 are the most well-known and frequently adopted management standards. To date over 100,000,000 million organizations across 161 countries haveachieved these certifications.

_{© 2008 ISO- Used with the permission of ISO Central Secretariat.}

The ISO 9000 standards were designed to regulate quality management while ISO 14001 focuses on environmental management. Both standards aim to drive continual improvement intheir respective areas.

The increase in media reports about issues with overseas suppliers has pushed all things quality-focused into the spotlight. From conferences to consulting firms to software providers ? total quality management [TQM] is a hot topic. And nowhere is this more evident than in North American where manufacturers that previously took a hands-off approach to dealing with overseas suppliers, are now actively engaging with their providers to ensure conformance with organization and government regulatory standards.

Although implementing a Quality Management System can sound like a daunting task, it doesn't have to be. In fact, it's easier thanyou think ?thanks to out-of-the box and customizable total quality management software solutions. If you're in the market for a Quality Management System, look for a programthat includes specially designed modules to address each of the following topics: 

• -Non-conformance & Product Defects
• -Supplier Management
• -Supplier Non-conformances
• -Customer Management
• -Quality Objectives & Activities
• -Quality Policy
• -Training Management
• -Document Control

For trial access to the Intelex Quality Management Systemcontact an Account Manager.

With a growing emphasis being placed on regulatory compliance, Document Control software has become less of a luxury and more of a necessity.  As an organization grows the intellectual property associated with the organization typically reflects its financial success. Consequently, this growth is also evident in the number of internal and external communications/records that are produced. To that end, the more documents produced the greater the likelihood for compliance error.

A document control system not only streamlines the file management process to ensure government, industry, and company standards are complied with, it also eradicates the potential for duplication of employee efforts; thereby, increasing overall organizational efficiency and performance.

With that in mind, the Intelex Document Control System was designed to achieve the following document management objectives:

• -Provide a central location to host all internal and external documents, including licenses and permits.
• -Track document revisions to ensure the most current files are being used by organization members.
• -Track document approvals and distribution to ensure employee, industry, and government regulatory compliance.
• -Archive obsolete documents for auditing purposes.
• -Set document-access restrictions when applicable.
• -Provide real-time dashboard reports.

The potential to achieve these objectives is a great start, but at the end of the day a document tracking system has little value if employees aren't utilizing the software. This is why Intelex's Software Developers placed a premium on designing a system that was truly user-intuitive.

Today, Intelex's Document Tracking Software is being successfully used on a daily basis by hundreds of companies across North America such as Subaru, Ferro Corporation, Devon Energy and the City of Edmonton.