What a difference a year makes! I know it seems a bit trite to post about the year in review, but I think it’s an important exercise for everyone to run through. In addition to remembering what we did, it also helps put the year into perspective and get a nice picture of the goals that were accomplished. For me, this means a great deal since I started a new role at CNS exactly one year ago.

Being responsible for Product Development at CNS is no easy task. Not only does it encompass taking ideas and developing them into new products, it also involves working with our existing products and making them better. It involves working closely with our customers to get feedback so we know where and how to enhance our products and which new ideas will succeed. I many cases, it is working with internal teams to develop new processes for their jobs. In short, there are a lot of hats to be worn on any given day.

So, what have I done this year? As it turns out, quite a lot and hopefully you’ve seen some of the benefits of my hard work!

1. The PROSuite Dispatch position was a huge change to our process that has allow us to better prioritize and respond to tickets so emergencies can get to the top of the list and your hold times are minimized. We still have some work to do in this area, but looking at how things were before this position, we are all in a much better place today.

2. Ticket Process / User Training – Along with the new dispatcher position, we made some pretty significant changes to our internal ticket handling processes and introduced service level objectives. Tickets are now better organized and there are metrics in place to help avoid tickets aging without a resolution. We also developed a training program for end users to help them understand how the system works so they can be empower to take full advantage of the program.

3. Windows 7/Office 2010 – I spent time working with Microsoft on a few different marketing programs for these two new technologies. In addition to working with our customer base, Microsoft has commended us on our knowledge and expertise and one of our customers is currently in a video showcase on microsoft.com!

4. Server Virtualization – We jumped into virtual servers in a big was in 2010. While not a new technology to us, we adapted our standard server deployment to utilize this technology whenever possible as it brings huge benefits to productivity and disaster recovery scenarios.

5. Project Management – The whole company has a renewed focus on project management and utilizes these principles to ensure that our development and deployment projects are on-time and on-budget.

6. The Cloud – I’d me remiss if I didn’t mention the Cloud. I travelled a LOT this year and learned a lot as well. CNS is currently in the early stages of redeveloping the traditional office and I am very excited to roll out this new product next year. Besides preparing our customers through the use of server virtualization, we have also just started an upgrade to our offsite storage backup solution. We will now be able to restore a copy of your server in the Cloud and allow you to continue operating without having to wait for failover equipment to arrive. We can also use this as a test lab to see how an application upgrade will interact with the system or demo a new piece of software.

There are a lot of things I didn’t mention here, like this blog, a revamped invoice process or new remote management tools that also augment your experience, as I tried to focus on key points and not individual areas. I hope that everyone is enjoying the benefits of these new aspects to our products. Drop me a line and let me know what you think!

Thanks for taking the time to read about CNS this year. I hope that you can take some time to review your year as well! Happy New Year!