APPENDIX A: MICROSOFT DYNAMICS AX
FUNCTIONALITY
Objectives
The objectives are:
• Identify the key features and benefits of Microsoft Dynamics® AX in
financial areas.
• Identify the key features and benefits of Microsoft Dynamics AX in supply chain management areas.
• Identify the key features and benefits of Microsoft Dynamics AX in customer relationship management and human resource management areas.
Introduction
Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012 is Microsoft's Enterprise Resource
Planning (ERP) solution for large and midsize enterprises that empowers your people to anticipate and embrace change, enabling your business to thrive. This appendix provides an overview of the various modules of the Microsoft Dynamics AX.
Modules discussed in this appendix include the following:
• Financial Management
• Supply Chain Management
• Trade and Logistics
• Master Planning
• Project Accounting
• Customer Relationship Management
Financials
The Microsoft Dynamics AX Financial Management module provides fast, reliable, and comprehensive accounting, financial reporting, and analysis. It also provides all the functionality that is required to update accounts efficiently and comply with reporting requirements.
Basic capabilities of the Financial Management module include the following:
• General Ledger
• Liquidity Management (Bank Management)
• Accounts Receivable
• Collections
• Accounts Payable
• Fixed Assets
• Expense Management
Dimensions are used across the various modules in Microsoft Dynamics AX. They can be used for tracking profit, cost centers, departments, value streams, product lines, or any other reporting units. The ability to update the general ledger online provides fast and accurate financial reporting. Financial dimension features also include the following:
• An advanced control feature that enables the driving of contextual value restrictions on financial dimensions.
• Financial controllers can specifically restrict authorized values or value combinations at the entry point on chosen table collections or journal names, or upon posting to chosen ledger accounts.
• Dimension sets that combine dimension types can be built to drive and control the dimension value dependencies.
• Data reliability is increased regarding financial dimensions across the company and according to specific corporate needs or policies. Because all the Microsoft Dynamics AX modules are part of one system, a transaction in one module automatically updates corresponding accounts in the general ledger.
Financial Management – Business Analysis
Decision makers in a global marketplace face the following questions everyday:
• Is the business healthy?
• Who are my best customers?
Microsoft Dynamics AX enables accurate and timely analysis to provide
companies with the edge they must have to successfully compete. Starting with a larger overview and drilling down to the details, Microsoft Dynamics AX helps companies learn from historical data, investigate opportunities, and to quickly target markets and customers with pinpoint accuracy.
Analysis in Microsoft Dynamics AX is based on Online Analytical Processing technology (OLAP). This enables multidimensional analysis by using the Microsoft SQL Server Analysis Services. With Microsoft Dynamics AX, the OLAP functionality and the ERP system are integrated so that all mappings occur directly in Microsoft Dynamics AX, taking full advantage of business
information and making the most of relationships between tables, extended data types, and enum labels. There are a variety of dimensions to explore that include time, products, geographical regions, or sales channels. CEOs, CFOs, managers, controllers, accountants, and sales and marketing staff can create, view, and understand reports that previously were complex, expensive, or time-consuming. The data used for analysis is regularly updated because it includes changes as they occur in Microsoft Dynamics AX or subsequent data sources.
Financial Management – Financial Reporting
The Financial Statement feature enables the building of a custom reporting structure and mapping ledger accounts or dimensions to the reporting structures. In financial statements, users can map:
• Ledger accounts
• Financial dimensions
• Combinations of the two
The Financial Statement feature is a powerful reporting tool that explores financial figures depicted in a company context and from a business perspective. For example, financial row structures can be created to focus on cost accounts and the cost accounts can be drilled by:
• Cost centers
• Departments
• Combinations of the two
With the financial statement reporting feature, users can create many different financial reports to comply with legal requirements and international accounting standards such as the following:
• Balance sheet
• Income statement
Financial statements are fully compatible with Extensible Business Reporting Language (XBRL). The taxonomies can be converted into row definitions ready to map. This enables the generation of XBRL output from the financial
statement.
Because of integrated workflow capabilities, users can define approval authorities based on employee hierarchies, user groups, users, or rules. Submitters and approvers can also be alerted to various activities during the approval process.
Expense Management provides defined rules, expense policies, which employees must follow when entering, submitting, or approving expense reports.
Implementing expense policies can help companies manage expenses effectively and monitor travel and entertainment expenses.
Expense Management provides the following actions to be taken if expenses are exceeded:
• Flag the transaction and display a message to submitter and approver, but enable submittal and approval.
• Flag the transaction and display a message to submitter and approver, but do not enable submittal.
Financial Management – Multicurrency
When transactions are made in several currencies, it can be a time-consuming and error-prone task to reconcile fluctuations in relative currency value. Microsoft Dynamics AX manages the following three currencies:
• Transaction currency
• Base currency
• Secondary reporting currency
Microsoft Dynamics AX makes it possible to track all transactions in all currencies and automatically calculate and update realized and unrealized gains and losses.
The detailed currency information is stored in the subsidiary ledgers in addition to the general ledger.
Financial Management – Printing Documents
When printing documents such as invoices or packing lists, you can use defined settings for the original or copy records in print management. These settings include the following:
• Number of copies to produce
An original or copy record contains the information that is used by print management to print the document. The record that is used to print a document determines:
• The footer text for the document
• The printer to use
• How many copies to print
For example, to print three copies of the sales order packing slip, each with different footer text, you need to set up an original record and two copy records. The print management setup information for each document type is defined in a hierarchical list and that consists of the following:
• Modules
• Accounts
• Transactions
• Combination of these three
When a document is generated, it is printed according to the effective original record and effective copy records. An effective record can be inherited from a higher level in the hierarchy or created as a new record for the current level in the hierarchy, or it can override an inherited record that has the same name.
Financial Management – Key Features and Benefits
Financial Management provides the following key benefits:• User-friendly, timesaving accounting
• Fast and efficient reporting and analysis Financial Management offers the following key features:
• Intuitive and adjustable layout
• Dimensions
• Financial statements
• Multi- and second-currency management
• Transaction validation and transaction approval
• Intercompany accounting and consolidation
• Multiple budgets
• Fixed assets
• Credit assessment and credit control
• Electronic payment
• Collection letters and interest calculation
• Report generator
• Audit trail
• Print management
Fill in the Blanks
Fill in the blanks to test your knowledge of this section.
1. ___________ can be used for tracking profit, cost centers, departments, and regions.
2. _____________ transactions posted to one subsidiary are automatically posted in the other subsidiary.
3. Financial analysis in Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012 is based on _____ technology.
4. Detailed currency information is stored in the __________ ledgers in addition to the general ledger.
Expense Management – Overview
Microsoft Dynamics AX Expense Management helps companies manage, track, and reimburse travel and entertainment expenses.
Expense Management has a strong value proposition for organizations with discretionary spending. Travel and entertainment expenses are generally a
company's second largest controllable expense. To help curb these costs, Expense Management provides a mechanism to define and apply expense policies, in addition to flagging and reporting abusers of the policies. Additionally, automating the entry and reimbursement of travel and entertainment expenses reduces processing costs versus manual entry.
Expense Management is tightly integrated with other Microsoft Dynamics AX modules, such as Project accounting, Accounts payable, and General ledger. A per diem is a daily allowance provided to an employee who is traveling for business. Expense Management enables you to define the per diem amount for hotel, meals, and other incidental expenses for each location. The location that is specified can be as general or specific as wanted and can reference a city, county, region, or country.
Users can easily access Expense Management functionality from Enterprise Portal. This provides a robust user interface that is available to all employees, not only those who use the Microsoft Dynamics AX client.
Users can create, delete, or modify expense reports and cash advance requests online from any point of the world; or even define other users to enter expense reports on another's behalf.
Expense Management – Key Benefits
Expense Management provides the following key benefits:• Analyzes and tracks a company's travel and entertainment expenses
• Plans and calculates future expenses and reimbursement amounts for various locations
• Creates multiple expense reports online
• Defines delegates for generating expense reports and managing relative delegate information
Expense Management – Key Features
Expense Management has the following key features:• Setup of various payment methods for travel and entertainment expenses
• Categories for tracking specific types of expense transactions
• Record track of the per diem rates, mileage rates, and corporate card numbers by employee
• Workflow configurations
• Alerts to submitters and approvers about various activities during the approval process
• Definition of expense reasons for generating reports
• Expense policy system
• Import of credit card transaction files
• Allocation of per diem amounts
• Statistic groups to combine various expense categories for reporting
• Online printing of expense reports and cash advances
Multiple Choice
The Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012 Expense Management module helps companies manage, track, and reimburse ___________ expenses.
( ) revenue and customs ( ) travel and entertainment ( ) medical and recreation ( ) general and administrative
Multiple Answer
What Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012 modules are Expense Management tightly integrated with? Mark all that apply. (Select all that apply)
( ) Project accounting ( ) Accounts receivable ( ) Accounts payable ( ) General ledger
Supply Chain Management
SCM involves a highly interactive process of controlling, planning, and implementing all the activities associated with moving goods from the raw material stage through to the end-user stage, with the lowest cost and the highest quality. Regardless of whether a company operates with a single
production/distribution site, or multiple sites in different geographical locations, the system must capture and reflect the elements which will enable optimal and appropriate decision-making and monitoring throughout.
The multisite functionality introduced in Microsoft Dynamics AX enables you to work with multiple sites in a single legal entity.
Before activating multisite functionality, customers must first analyze their business requirements and determine how to use the multisite functionality. Make sure that you create a reliable working model of the company's operational sites and processes before implementing this feature.
For example, there is a company with three operational sites, located in different states in the United States. The relationships of the sites to each other, the flow of goods, the various work centers, warehouses, and so on, must be thoroughly understood before multisite is activated.
By using information that is stored in Microsoft Dynamics AX, users can do the following:
• Analyze the relationship between costs and sales, including specific details, such as sales on:
o Different item groups
o Individual items
o Customer groups
• Accurately monitor revenue across the company, based on factors such as the following:
o Country
o Region
o Customer group
o Time period
Supply Chain Management – Key Benefits
Supply Chain Management provides the following key benefits:• Multisite inventory storage and tracking
• Synchronized, real-time product movement
• Improved order fulfillment and accuracy
• Reduced process inefficiencies and excess inventory
• Enhanced workload balancing and planning
• Compliance with industry standards
• Reduced transportation costs
Supply Chain Management – Key Features
Supply Chain Management offers the following key features:• Multisite Functionality - Associates all inventory transactions to the relevant sites in different geographical locations in a single company.
• Optimized Multichannel Fulfillment - Causes maximized inventory utilization and real-time order management.
• Cross-Docking Capabilities - Enables same-day order fulfillment and reduces costs.
• Business Process Synchronization - Enables immediate, online transfer of documents between suppliers, logistics operations, transporters, customers, and the manufacturer.
• Facility and Labor Optimization - Maximizes space usage and reduces order cycle time, product damage, and replenishment costs. Provides data to monitor and measure results.
• Performance Management - Enables measurement and action on key performance indicators.
• RFID Functionality - Increases efficiency from receiving through put-away, and enables creation of RFID-enabled tags at the pallet, case, or item level.
• Constant Replenishment - Supports min/max inventory levels on a constant basis, therefore accommodating smaller orders.
• Integrated Transportation Functionality - Considers multimode and multiroute shipment options. This causes more efficient movement through the whole supply chain.
• Quality Control - Monitors the quality testing requirements;
manages non-conforming products and items and tracks and resolves customer or vendor problems.
• Enhanced Costing and Inventory Valuation - Improves the performance and accuracy of costing and inventory valuations.
Multiple Answer
What are the goals of the Microsoft Dynamics AX Supply Chain Management module? (Select all that apply)
( ) Increase revenues ( ) Reduce inventory ( ) Lower costs
( ) Improve time to market
Warehouse Management – Overview
Warehouse Management provides all the functionality that is required to guarantee the warehouse is operating effectively and efficiently. Warehouse management includes capabilities for the following:
• Receiving items from both external suppliers and internal sources
• Structuring item storage
• Picking items before shipping
• Packing items for shipment or transfer
• Dividing warehouses into zones with different storage purposes
• Associating one or more warehouses to different sites Warehouse Management is completely integrated with other areas of functionality in Microsoft Dynamics AX, including Logistics, Inventory Management, and Production.
Warehouse Management – Key Features and Benefits
Warehouse Management provides the following key benefits:• Facilitates efficient internal and external transfers
• Optimizes warehouse storage area
• Reduces operational costs such as warehouse size and labor
Warehouse Management offers the following key features:
• Serial number and batch number control
• Item registration and placement
• Multiple inventory dimensions
• Location control
• Arrival overview
• Shipment reservation
• Consolidated picking and delivery
• Staging
• Pallet transport
• Warehouse zones and hierarchy system
Trade and Logistics – Overview
Trade and Logistics provides universal sales and purchasing functionality in addition to inventory management tools. These operations are fully integrated with other Microsoft Dynamics AX modules and support other Supply Chain Management and Production functionality.
Trade and Logistics encompasses sales order processing, purchase order processing, and inventory management, in addition to elements of distribution and warehouse management.
The Intercompany functionality saves time and money because it enables several subsidiaries or distribution centers to trade internally within one Microsoft Dynamics AX installation. When you use Intercompany functionality, you do not have to create manual sales or purchase orders, and you have more control and visibility regarding transfers.
Trade and Logistics – Sales Order Processing
Selling, delivering, and invoicing products are necessary for every business. Microsoft Dynamics AX automates these processes.
Companies can use the sales order to deliver and invoice goods to the customer, to print quotations, order confirmations, picking lists, packing slips, and invoices. As part of this process, Microsoft Dynamics AX does the following:
• Calculates applicable taxes and fees
• Checks stock
• Verifies credit for the customer
The system guarantees that the customer obtains the appropriate price based on trade agreements, quantity discounts, and specials. If items are out-of-stock, on-screen messages offer suggestions and shipment information. Products can be reallocated from other orders for special customers.
The system tracks items that are back-ordered, and then initiates shipment when items arrive from production or from the supplier. Throughout the sales order process, Microsoft Dynamics AX captures all the information needed for statistical analysis and commission payment.
Sales Order Processing functionality supports tasks related to the following:
• Quotations
• Orders, including:
o Multiple Ship To
o Direct vendor-to-customer shipping
o Enhanced delivery date control
• Returns
• Subscriptions
• Confirmations
• Picking lists
• Packing slips
• Invoices
• Credit notes
• Backorders
• Cash on delivery
• Commissions and taxes
• Statistics and reports
• Credit card processing
• Sales price agreements
Throughout the system, sales orders can be entered in foreign currency. All posted transactions are transferred to domestic currency and hold information about the amounts in both domestic and foreign currency.
Trade and Logistics – Purchase Order Processing
Purchase Order Processing tracks products being ordered and maintains vendor information. It updates inventory and the appropriate financial accounts when purchases are ordered, received, and invoiced. In addition, because of the recent enhancements, a company can invite suppliers to bid on specific products or services and issue a request for proposal (RFQ) to multiple vendors. The RFQ replies can then be recorded and transferred to specific purchase orders.
Purchase Order Processing supports the following purchase related tasks:
• Issuing requests for proposal (RFQ)
• Creating the purchase order
• Entering vendor and order information
• Entering items or services to be purchased
• Posting the purchase order, packing slip, receipts list, and invoice As part of this process, the system does the following:
• Calculates applicable taxes, fees and charges
• Updates stock values
• Verifies credit for the vendor
• Identifies and highlights obstacles
• Updates Accounts payable and General ledger
• Guarantees that prices are calculated using trade agreements, quantity discounts, and specials
Generally, Purchase Order Processing supports tasks related to the following:
• Purchase requisitions
• Orders, with direct vendor-to-customer shipping
• Returns
• Requests
• Subscriptions
• Packing slips
• Receipt lists
• Invoices
• Backorders
• Supplier schedules
• Taxes
• Statistics
• Reports
Throughout the system, purchase orders can be entered in foreign currency. All posted transactions are transferred to domestic currency and hold information about the amounts in both domestic and foreign currency.
Trade and Logistics – Inventory Management
Inventory Management is central to Microsoft Dynamics AX Trade and Logistics functionality. Inventory information is linked to the following areas in Microsoft Dynamics AX:
• General ledger
• Accounts receivable
• Accounts payable
• Materials and Manufacturing resource planning (MRP)
• Human Resources
• Projects management
Inventory Management manages the cost and quantities of items purchased and sold. This functionality supports retail businesses with merchandise inventory and manufacturing companies with finished goods, materials, and work-in-progress from the physical and financial standpoint.
The system tracks inventory movement and enables computation of costs of goods sold. Multiple units of measure can be used for purchasing, selling,
stocking, and pricing items. Inventory movements are tracked with quantities and costs. This causes controlled inventory.
Note that with the multisite functionality activated, you can set up a preferred vendor for every item and use site specific prices for items.
When processing a sales order, Microsoft Dynamics AX does the following:
• Calculates what is that is required to fill the order.
• Checks physical inventory.
• Produces necessary production, purchase, or transfer orders automatically.
• Calculates statistics on sales and purchases.
As part of managing physical inventory, Inventory Management performs the following actions:
• Inventory tracking - Tracks any item in inventory through inventory dimensions, configuration specifications, and lot ID.
• Master Planning - Sets up the system to determine what is required to fill an order when it is received.
• Automated orders - Creates necessary production and purchase orders to satisfy customer orders.
• Reservations - Reserve material to guarantee its availability for a specific order.
• Sales orders and purchases - As they affect inventory, they are reflected in inventory.
Trade and Logistics – Financial Analysis
Also, as part of the inventory management process, Microsoft Dynamics AX supports these financial statistics:
• Inventory values can be calculated at any time.
• Inventory turnover amounts and rates can be calculated at any time.
• Quantity of items sold can be calculated at any time.
• ABC classifications enable analysis of which items are most profitable from a sales perspective, and the cost of carrying the item in inventory.
• Sales and purchasing forecasts can be produced by using quantities sold and planning estimates.
• Budgets can be calculated using purchasing trends.
Trade and Logistics – Key Features and Benefits
Trade and Logistics provides the following key benefits:• Sales, purchase, and inventory functionality is fully integrated with other elements of Microsoft Dynamics AX modules.
• Reserving inventory functionality is linked to sales and production orders.
• Financial data and statistics related to sales, purchasing, and inventory are current and available.
• Picking lists functionality creates picking lists only for available items, and at the same time considers customer service priorities.
• Direct shipping from vendor to customer expedites delivery. Trade and Logistics offers the following key features:
• Integrated sales processes and purchase processes.
• Master planning is integrated with purchase, production, and transfer order processes.
• In sales order processing, if items are out-of-stock, on-screen. messages offer suggestions and shipment information.
• Sales and purchase orders can be entered in foreign currencies.
Matching Activity
Categorize the following items:_____ 1. Can be for both products and services. _____ 2. In Sales Order Processing, this can be converted to a sales order.
_____ 3. Creates picking lists only for available items.
_____ 4. Sets up the system to determine what is required to fill an order when it is received. _____ 5. Puts items on hold for production or sale, guaranteeing their availability for a specific order.
_____ 6. Determines which items are most profitable from a sales perspective, and the cost of carrying the item in inventory.
_____ 7. Can be calculated using purchasing trends.
_____ 8. Can be used for purchasing, selling, stocking, and pricing items.
a. Purchase orders b. Release sales order
picking
c. Multiple units of measure
d. Master Planning e. Quotation f. Budgets g. Reservations h. ABC analysis
Master Planning – Overview
Master Planning uses data provided by the Microsoft Dynamics AX Trade and Logistics, Projects, Work Centers, and Production Series to do the following:
• Minimize inventory carrying costs
• Optimize product flow from suppliers through production to customers
• Run intercompany transactions
• Satisfy customer demands
• Improve overall business performance
The finite and infinite capacity and material planning helps companies do the following:
• Project long-term needs
• Foresee fluctuations in demand
• Adjust their plans accordingly
The shop floor can be managed more efficiently by reducing manual entry and web-enabling employee information such as time registration. By collecting and analyzing production-related information, such as work hours and production activities, companies can improve cost control.
Gantt charts are available in Master Planning to provide graphical illustrations of schedules related to a project for: • Planning tasks • Coordinating tasks •
Tracking tasks Gantt charts can be used, for example, to assess the consequences of staff rotations visually, through the graphic tool in a simple manner. Gantt plans can be defined to help envision the production flow from one computer to another.
Master Planning – Planning Across Multiple Sites
Master Planning – Forecast and Master Scheduling
The Forecast Scheduling feature in Master Planning uses product forecasts to project long-term needs for materials and capacity. With Forecast Scheduling, companies can do the following:• Foresee fluctuations in demand and adjust their plans accordingly.
• Simulate different product sales scenarios to obtain reliable pictures of gross demand. This provides a basis for negotiating better agreements with subcontractors and for fine-tuning production capacity.
• Forecast more accurate production plans to eliminate stockpiling inventory and still meeting customer delivery demands.
The Master Scheduling feature provides an overview of short-term purchase, production, and resource requirements based on existing orders, forecast scheduling, or both. This process streamlines the whole production process. Master scheduling causes planned production, purchase, transfer of intercompany orders, and net requirements.
Master Planning – Intercompany Planning
Companies that need a quick overview of demands and supply in the chain of internal companies can benefit from using Master Scheduling to create a cross-company coverage plan.
Master Scheduling between multiple companies is possible in Microsoft Dynamics AX under the condition that all companies are running in the same database. This functionality enables the chain of companies to do the following:
• React to a demand from the selling company
• Transfer to a purchase order
• Change the purchase order into a sales order in the related company
• Transfer the sales order into a purchase order in another related internal company
Order line explosions and planned order functionality are fully functional between internal companies and part of the process can be automated to make
Master Planning – Key Features and Benefits
Master Planning provides the following key benefits:• Minimizes lead times, controls processing costs, and guarantees maximum on-time deliveries.
• Provides a detailed overview of inventory which assists in
purchasing or producing the appropriate products at the appropriate time.
• Provides continual tracking, evaluating, and re-planning based on changing demand for materials and capacity.
Master Planning offers the following key features:
• Forecast scheduling using product forecasts
• Finite/infinite scheduling
• Sales order explosion
• Futures and action messaging
• Support of multiple plans for forecast and master scheduling
• Support of master scheduling for intercompany
• Support of master scheduling across multiple sites
Multiple Choice
In what form does Microsoft Dynamics AX provide graphical illustrations of schedules related to a project?
( ) Microsoft Excel® spreadsheets
( ) Microsoft Visio® diagram
( ) Microsoft Project®
( ) Gantt chart
Multiple Choice
Master Scheduling between multiple companies is possible in Microsoft Dynamics AX under what condition?
( ) All companies are running database servers in the same domain ( ) All companies share the same database of items, bills of material,
routings, and so on
( ) Cross-company security roles must be created to provide access to each company's database
Production – Overview
When selecting an ERP system, manufacturers are faced with a dilemma, where they can do one of the following:
• Select a solution that has strong manufacturing functionality at the expense of general business functionality
• Purchase a separate system, such as financial management, and integrate the two
Microsoft Dynamics AX offers a solution with the full range of functionality in one system. By using Microsoft Dynamics AX, manufacturers can do the following:
• Manage the whole production process from availability of raw materials to the shipment of finished goods to customers.
• Maintain multiple production sites over different geographic locations and run them by a single Microsoft Dynamics AX company.
• Use the full benefit of a comprehensive production management solution, when combined with the Work Center functionality.
• Expand on the foundation of the Microsoft Dynamics AX Financials, Trade and Logistics, and Master Planning functionality.
• Extract data from anywhere in the whole production system. This enables immediate important managerial decision-making information.
• View a simplified overview of even the most complex production processes. This provides high-level information that is easy to access.
Production – Across Multiple Sites
Production includes features that support a company's ability to maintain a variety of production sites distributed over different geographic locations. The production sites must be contained in a single legal unit, that is, they must be run by the same defined Microsoft Dynamics AX company.
With a new dimension, the production unit, companies can now structure and assemble all their resources and data in groupings that are relevant to each site or company.
The production unit provides the following:
• Reflects the physical layout of resources and data particular to each site or company.
• Is used to filter information (in key forms), to enable the user to print documents or view analytical data for each site or company.
• Is not stamped on any inventory transactions. The following illustrates one site that has two production units.
Production – Key Benefits
Production provides the following key benefits:
• Real-time insight into manufacturing processes
• Manages stock more effectively
• Manages production more efficiently and profitably, and at the same time reduces overall costs
• Supports production at multiple sites
• Centralizes information about productions
• Customizes your production plans as situations occur
• Determines the best fit between a work center and a specific operation
• Saves valuable time by selecting the next best alternative resource for a production
• Gets an overview of all productions
• Selects the best route for an operation on a given day
• Controls resource use; makes sure a resource is available when needed
• Obtains a complete overview of the current status in your production environment
Production – Key Features
Production offers these key features:• Real-time monitoring of work-in-progress (WIP)
• Master Scheduling
• Multisite production support
• Real-time information and instant calculations
• Creates production order directly from a sales order line, with automatic selection in the valid date and quantity ranges
• Subcontracting
• Phantom BOM
• Configurable BOMs, selected by relevant date and quantity
• Available-to-promise (ATP) functionality
• Gantt planning functionality with ability to do drag-and-drop rescheduling
• Calculation of route scrap during production estimation
• Uses alternative resources for an operation in a scheduling conflict
• Ability to track the setup job or the process job per operation
• Flexible routing with simple or complex routes
• Manage primary and secondary operations
• Production progress and overview
• Forward and backward scheduling from various dates
• Detailed tracking of cost related to resources and throughput
• Lean manufacturing
• Use of kanbans to control production
• Uses mandatory combination of the date interval and the quantity interval in selecting the active versions of the BOM and routing
• Suggestion of changes to BOMs and Routings based on quantity (quantity-depending BOMs and route versions)
• BOM and route planning in the multisite environment
Service Management – Overview
Service Management is designed for companies that want to manage their service operations as a business.
Service Management provides capabilities best suited for:
• Business-to-business service instead of business-to-end user service
• Complex service arrangements that consist of repetitive and non-repetitive service tasks on manufactured objects, instead of simpler routine services such as cleaning or security
Service Management has a high degree of integration to the existing functionality in the Project accounting module. This integration enables service managers to track the exact costs of performing a service with regard to hour, expense and item consumption, and how much revenue is earned from a particular service transaction. By tracking these costs, managers can optimize service levels and the revenue stream the company gains from performing services.
Based on the recent enhancements, Service Management can now use the information residing in the Supply Chain Management (SCM) modules. This enables faster work flow for users of Service Management, a better
understanding of where the service customer is today, and a deeper registration of Sales related data into the Service Management module.
Service Management – Through Web
Service Management provides a dynamic management of service orders and service agreements both for customers and service companies. With Technician Portal and Customer Portal, both service companies and customers can manage and oversee service orders, service agreements, and more through a web portal. Through the Technician Portal, the service technician and service company can handle daily operations and communication without relying on physical nearness. The Technician Portal enables you to do the following:
• View the data relevant for the technicians execution of service
• Connect to the service company to provide a record of the service made
By using the Customer Portal, the customer can seek information about both past, current, and future service agreements and service orders through the Web. Through the Customer Portal the customer can also create new service orders. The Customer Portal enables the Service customer to do the following:
• View the data relevant for the service operation done on service items
• Connect to the service company to initiate a service request
Service Management – Key Benefits
Service Management provides the following key benefits:
• Manages daily operations and communication without relying on physical nearness of the service technician and service company.
• Creates service agreements; service orders are generated periodically as specified in the agreement.
• Creates service level agreements; service level agreements enable to track service ordering and evaluate the Service department
performance.
• Creates ad hoc repair orders.
• Tracks changes made to service objects that use BOM versions.
• Tracks repairs, and gathers statistics on repair items and costs.
• Creates repair BOMs, and subsequently modifies these BOMs.
• Creates service subscriptions and accrues revenue from these subscriptions appropriately.
Service Management – Key Features
Service Management offers the following key features:• Service subscriptions, including revenue accrual
• BOM versioning
• Service agreements
• Service level agreements
• Service orders
• Repair
• Customer Portal
• Technician Portal
• Web service orders
• Sales to service integration
• Service dispatcher
Matching Activity
Match the Service Management Portals to the functionality they provide in Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012:
_____ 1.
Technician Portal _____ 2. Customer Portal
_____ 3.
Technician Portal _____ 4. Customer Portal
a. Connect to the service company to initiate a service request.
b. View the data relevant for the service operation done on service items.
c. Connect to the service company to provide a record of the service made.
d. View the data relevant to execution of service.
Project Accounting
As the demand for faster and better service increases, so does the pressure to automate processes and balance costs associated with projects and service requests. For the growing number of companies that provide services to customers, either as their core business or in addition to their products, the challenge is to effectively manage knowledge, opportunities and resources. Project Accounting provides a strong platform to help companies effectively administer projects and achieve the results that they want.
With Microsoft Dynamics AX, companies have the tools to facilitate:
• Registration
• Invoicing
• Analysis
Project Accounting provides a strong platform to help companies plan, monitor, and follow up on projects. The module supports a variety of functions including managing time and materials in projects and advanced fixed price projects. Because of integration with Microsoft Office Project Server TM 2007 and the Microsoft Dynamics AX Project and Supply Chain Management modules, companies now have even more options for managing their projects effectively.
Project Accounting – Analyzing Projects
With Project Accounting, companies have many ways to analyze their projects. This includes the following:
• Work Breakdown Structure (WBS) which enables an activity hierarchy and provides an overview of activity deliverables.
• Flexible project hierarchy structure that includes a graphical overview, and details fixed priced projects.
• Statistics provide the necessary overview of the financial status of a project.
• An easy way to view both invoiced and non-invoiced transactions using Invoice Control.
• Committed cost (any cost that will be charged to a project but has not been charged yet) is tracked against projects and enables project costs to be controlled more efficiently.
• An easy way to view the efficiency rates of employees and billable hours being charged to a project using Hour Utilization.
• View and forecast the cash flowing in from project invoices, sales orders, subscriptions, and fees, and cash flowing out from project purchase orders, item requirements, expenses, and hours using Cash Flow.
• With the trade agreement functionality implemented, sales prices and discounts can be set up and applied to groups of projects.
• Project data can be easily exported to Microsoft Excel and presented in pivot tables.
Project Accounting – Internal Projects
Both internal and external project types are supported in Project Accounting. For internal projects, the following three configurations are available:
• Time - gathers hours without ledger postings, for example, holidays and training.
• Cost - posts all costs of hours, expenses, and items to the Profit & Loss (P&L) statement and cannot be capitalized.
• Investment - uses the estimate system to capitalize the costs of hours, expenses, and items during the project. On elimination, the work-in-progress (WIP) value can be posted to a:
o Fixed assets account
o Ledger account
o New project as an expense transaction The main characteristics of internal projects are as follows:
• They do not have customers and cannot be invoiced.
• On-account transactions are not allowed.
Project Accounting – External Projects
For external project types, two billing methods are available:• Time and Material
• Fixed Price
The flexible project hierarchy structure for external projects enables companies to work with parent/child projects.
• The parent/child project combinations can consist of any of the external project types. This enables the combination of, for example, a parent project of the type Fixed Price with a child project of the type Time and Material.
• This flexibility enables companies to invoice costs to the customer who are not a part of the fixed price project.
Project Accounting enables efficient project management with full financial overview and control.
Project Accounting – Key Features and Benefits
Project Accounting provides the following key benefits:• Manages and monitors multiple projects
• Monitors activity deliverables and creates tasks for project activities Project Accounting offers the following key features:
• Work Breakdown Structure (WBS)
• Project hierarchy structure
• Registration of hours, costs, and item consumption
• Registration of additional revenue and committed costs
• Converts project quotation lines into project forecasts
• Creates production orders directly from a project and automatically creates and posts project transactions
• Trade agreements
• Easy viewing of invoiced and non-invoiced transactions
• Invoicing of hours, costs, revenue, and items
• Compares the project economics to the budgeted amount
• Consultant self-service web sites
Multiple Choice
Internal projects can be invoiced. ( ) True
( ) False
CRM and HRM
Customer Relationship Management (CRM) may mean many things to many people. CRM is actually a plethora of concepts, ideas, and strategies offered by a large array of CRM specialists. The essence of CRM usually includes the following three disciplines:
• Know your customer
• Act on what you know
• Learn about what you know
Therefore, the main objective of Customer Relationship Management is to keep and grow customers. Microsoft Dynamics AX can offer many new features in the CRM module that enable a clearer view of a company's sales processes and helps companies to do the following:
• Better manage and conduct their sales processes
The Sales and Marketing functionality in the CRM module emphasizes the salesperson and the sales organization. It gathers all a company's business information and keeps it structured and easily available for use in supporting the sales and marketing efforts of the company. This helps companies gain insight that is required to identify their customers' demands, and to make optimal sales and marketing decisions.
CRM – Centralized Customer Information
Business relationships can be managed more effectively with all business information that is stored centrally in one database. The sales force can plan and evaluate activities and easily spot new opportunities because of the structured and available information. By using this detailed information, they can create, administer, and distribute campaigns directly from Microsoft Dynamics AX. With the global address book in CRM any employee can be a customer expert. The global address book is a repository for every person or organization that your organization comes in contact with. Customers can be linked to each other across the whole Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012 system. Multiple entities across
different companies in the enterprise can also be tracked in the address book. Information about all the following entities is tracked:
• Customers
• Vendors
• Employees
• Business relations
• Contact people
• Competitors
CRM – Key Areas
The four main areas of the Sales and marketing functionality in the CRM module are as follows:
1. Sales Force Automation (SFA) - This includes functionality regarding external business contacts in Microsoft Dynamics AX that are named business relations, and their employees, referred to as contact persons. SFA also includes activities performed by the sales personnel in connection with the business relations.
2. Sales Management (SM) - This deals with the sales performance of individual sales personnel, sales units, and the whole company. 3. Marketing Automation (MA) - This focuses on gathering a group
of activities; for example, email messages and direct mailings to a group of selected business relations, therefore, gathering information about a whole marketing campaign.
4. Telemarketing (TM) - Telemarketing gathers a group of business relations and administers contacts or surveys to this group by
CRM – Automating Sales Processes
Even on the road, the sales force has access to important information. By using a mobile phone, a handheld phone, or a browser, they can access customer-related information such as:
• Projects
• Invoices
• Order history
• Current total revenue
With the Microsoft Dynamics AX Enterprise Portal, most sales force activities in the application can be performed through the portal. Enterprise Portal
significantly strengthens functionality by:
• Giving users access to information regardless of their physical location
• Increasing the usability for members of the sales force, therefore, increasing efficiency
For companies, this can help increase the bottom line and save money by:
• Cutting moving expenses
• Reducing office space
• Reducing the need for furniture
• Reducing incidentals that support employees in an office setting CRM includes a price simulation tool to aid sales personnel in calculating and saving various pricing scenarios for sales orders. The price simulation tool enables discounting on a total quotation basis or on a quotation line basis and calculates the effect of discounting on the contribution margin. CRM empowers companies to maximize benefits from all their business relationships and generate profit. Self-service portals for sales representatives and customers are fast and easy to start. Customers can use these portals to do the following: • Browse through personalized product catalogs • View the shipping status • Maintain their own contact information
Because CRM saves data in one centralized database, individuals and
departments can share information effortlessly. For example, the sales manager can access projects, invoices, order history, and current revenue immediately without the sales team needing to generate special reports. The result of the centralized database is:
• Better pipeline management
• Improved control and co-ordination of sales force activities
All areas of the company can also benefit from the synchronization between CRM and Microsoft Outlook by synchronizing these three objects:
• Tasks
• Calendar appointments
• Contacts
With CRM, companies are in constant contact with customers. By knowing customers and their needs, companies can deliver the exact products and services the customers seek and gain their loyalty.
CRM – Key Benefits
CRM provides the following key benefits:
• Achieves better efficiency and reduces cost
• Centralizes the storage of data and tracks business information
• Gains maximum value from customers by better understanding their needs
• Optimizes sales force knowledge with more thorough analysis and better efficiency
• Improves the business health of the company
CRM – Key Features
CRM offers the following key features:
• Single database, single source code, single set of business logic modified using the same tool box
• Uniting ERP and Customer Relationship Management (CRM) systems
• Marketing Automation
• Sales Force Automation
• Sales Force Automation through Enterprise Portal
• Sales Management
• Competitive quote tracking
• Price simulations
• Project quotation integration
• Business Analysis
• Tracking business information through the Global address book
• Email and SMS integration
• Integration with Microsoft Office Excel
• Integration with Telephony Application Programming Interface (TAPI)
• Lead Management
• Opportunity Management
• Defining business processes and responsibilities in the organization
Human Resource Management – Overview
An agile human resource management system can help companies quickly develop their organization to meet the challenges of a fluctuating business environment. Microsoft Dynamics AX Human Resource Management module helps companies:
• Gather and structure employee information
• Encourage employee development
• Streamline employee performance
• Offer competitive on-cycle and off-cycle compensation
• Reward long-term and short-term employee performance
• Promote talent retention and motivation
• Maintain an overview of the organization
• Create the appropriate internal environment to drive business forward
Human Resource Management – Managing Recruitment
Recording and managing recruitment using Human Resources makes the procedures, paperwork, and manual follow-up work easier. Projects, applicants, and qualifications are recorded centrally. This information can be used in a particular project and in subsequent projects. This module is integrated with the others and therefore:• An applicant automatically becomes a member of the network.
• The project is associated with the organization.
• An applicant is directly transferred to the Employee module when hired and his or her employment history is updated automatically.
Human Resource Management – Recruiting through the
Web
The e-Recruitment feature improves the breadth and effectiveness of recruitment projects by enabling the Internet's wide reach. Companies can advertise available positions on the Enterprise Portal to reach a larger pool of potential candidates.
E-Recruitment supports and collects online applications that can be screened before they are approved and saved, or rejected and deleted. When an application is approved, information about the applicant is automatically transferred to the Applicant form in Human Resources.
Staff can learn from the experience of previous recruitment campaigns and select the appropriate media and methods for sharper communication.
Human Resource Management – Simplify Mass Hiring
Companies can use Mass hire projects for seasonal, intermittent, or contractual human resource demands. By using Mass hire project, users can enterinformation one time and apply it to all people hired for the project. This lightens the data entry load, especially with multiple hires.
When ending the project, employment can be quickly ended for all or some hired in the project. This makes both the start and end of the project easier.
Human Resource Management – Using Employee
Information – Storing Data
Human Resource Management helps companies gather and structure information for an optimal overview of their employees and their organization. Companies must be certain they have the appropriate people in the appropriate positions when striving for larger goals and starting new initiatives.
Making sure attractive and satisfying career planning for employees is a challenge that demands organized documentation of the agreements made between employer and employee. With the documentation stored in Microsoft Dynamics AX, companies can do the following:
• Quickly view a complete skill profile for an employee or a job
• Perform skill gap analysis to identify the employee strengths and areas to improve
• Define actual and target values for employee, applicant, and contact person skills
• Set clear development goals and activities and determine deadlines for them
• Set measurable performance goals and monitor the employee performance
• Provide a uniform framework for resource managers to reach employee development goals
Human Resource Management provides the following to enable companies to stay on track and achieve goals:
• Skill gap analysis (compares an employee's skill profile with a profile that is defined for a particular job as of a particular date)
• Skill wheel (visualizes the employee skill profiles and the results of a skill gap analysis)
• Competence reporting
• Action planning
Human Resource Management also enables companies to do the following:
• Store employment information and agreements
• Record employee hiring and exit information
• Keep track of transfers between departments
The framework is easily adapted to fit the requirements of a company so the required data and information can be extracted.
Human Resource Management – Compensation
Management
Fixed compensation plans help an employer make sure that employees are satisfied with the wages they are earning, and that management can maintain control over compensation costs. Human Resources for Microsoft Dynamics AX supports step, grade, and broad band fixed compensation plans that can be based on market price indicators. Competitively priced fixed compensation plans are an effective tool for attracting top performers and retaining key employees.
Variable compensation plans link an organization's strategy to the actions and performance of its workers. Variable compensation plans offer companies a competitive motivational advantage by making desired performance levels toward important key performance indicators, and what the reward will be when targets are achieved, visible to employees.
A pay for performance, or incentive pay, program can motivate employees and lead to greater employee performance and productivity. Performance ratings connected to features in compensation management enable companies to provide compensation to an employee that is commensurate with his or her business performance.
Human Resource Management – Key Benefits
Human Resource Management provides the following key benefits:• Strengthened focus on employee competency
• Centralized and dynamic employee information
• Simple and dynamic restructuring of organizational units
• Effective and cost-efficient recruitment process tools
• Monitors the efficiency and well-being of the organization
• Identifies skill gaps to determine required employee development
• Determines development and performance goals
• Provides a uniform framework for resource managers to support employee development goals
• Aligns compensation and benefits structures with market standards
• Recognizes high and low performers and delivers appropriate rewards
• Increases transparency in compensation processes by implementing fixed and variable compensation policies
• Improves compensation decision-making through fast access to valuable information
Human Resource Management – Key Features
Human Resource Management offers the following key features:• Core Human Resource Management administrative functionality
• Payroll information
• Job application information storage
• Management of loans
• Management of line, matrix, and project organizations
• Job profiles and role descriptions and requirements
• Recruitment process management and statistics
• E-Recruitment capabilities
• Mass hiring capabilities
• Employee absence management
• Individual and collective absence
• Automated correspondence through Microsoft Word® integration
• Microsoft Outlook integration support for interview administration
• Applicant matching to job profile requirements
• Media response measuring
• Development and performance goals
• Setup and definition of competencies and competency groups
• Managing and measuring actual skills compared with skill targets
• Graphic tools for skill-gap analysis
• Feedback analysis through online questionnaires and reporting
Questionnaire – Overview
The Microsoft Dynamics AX Questionnaire module enables companies to design effective questionnaires quickly, simply and without any technical experience. Business managers, human resources personnel, and administrative personnel can design and implement basic questionnaires in a matter of minutes.
It is easy to schedule or plan questionnaires for a range of audiences including employees, customers, and job applicants. The planning functionality also offers easy administration of mail correspondence with target groups inside and outside an organization. The Questionnaire module supports web integration so
questionnaires can be deployed through a corporate intranet and through public web sites.
The Questionnaire can be set up to include the following:
• Multiple-choice or free-text answers
• Instructions to be displayed before a question is answered
• How long the individual has to complete the form
• Whether questions are asked randomly or in a particular order
• Whether all questions must be answered
• Rich media such as pictures, audio, and video
Questionnaire – Survey Analysis
The Questionnaire module can be used for a range of activities. This includes the following:
• Customer or employee satisfaction surveys
• Job development dialog
• Ethical and environmental measurements
• Management and staff testing
The Questionnaire is a powerful tool for designing, constructing, and analyzing surveys. This also turns raw data into useful information.
Questionnaire – Key Features and Benefits
Questionnaire provides the following key benefits:• Easy design and execution of questionnaires
• Deploy questionnaires through corporate intranets and web sites
Questionnaire offers the following key features:
• Simple step-by-step approach to questionnaire design
• Integrated with the web
• Flexible analytical tools
• Rapid design and deployment of surveys
• Response history by questionnaire and individual
Multiple Choice
Companies can use what Microsoft Dynamics AX feature to help hiring for seasonal, intermittent, or contractual Human Resource demands?
( ) Mass hire projects ( ) e-Recruiter tool ( ) HR Builder
( ) e-Recruitment Wizard
Multiple Answer
The Questionnaire module enables questionnaires to be set up that include which of the following features? Mark all that apply. (Select all that apply)
( ) Multiple-choice or free-text answers
( ) Instructions to be displayed before a question is answered
( ) How long the individual has to complete the form; whether questions are asked randomly or in a particular order; whether all questions must be answered
( ) Rich media such as pictures, audio, and video
Summary
This tutorial introduces Microsoft Dynamics AX Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) system. The various modules of Microsoft Dynamics AX are described, including the interrelations between the modules and their key features and benefits. The modules discussed in this section are:
• Financial Management
• Expense Management
• Supply Chain Management
• Warehouse Management
• Trade and Logistics
• Shop Floor Control
• Product Builder
• Service Management
• Project Accounting
• Customer Relationship Management
• Human Resource Management
Test Your Knowledge
1. Which Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012 series provides universal sales and purchasing functionality, in addition to inventory management tools?
( ) CRM
( ) Human Resource Management ( ) Warehouse Management ( ) Trade and Logistics
2. Which module provides high level oversight and definition of organizational or personal objectives?
( ) Cost Accounting ( ) CRM
( ) Human Resource Management ( ) Master Planning
3. An employee satisfaction survey is an example of this module. ( ) Production
( ) Questionnaire ( ) CRM
4. Name the capabilities that the Service Management module is best suited for.
5. What reporting language is fully compatible with financial statements in the Financial Management Module?
6. What two project types are supported in Project Accounting? Mark the two that apply.
( ) Internal ( ) External ( ) Long-term ( ) Short-term
7. What module enables companies to manage, track, and reimburse travel and entertainment expenses?
( ) Service Management ( ) Cost Accounting ( ) Expense Management ( ) Financial Management
Quick Interaction: Lessons Learned
Take a moment and write down three key points you have learned from this chapter
1.
2.
Solutions
Financials
Fill in the blanks to test your knowledge of this section.
1. Dimensions can be used for tracking profit, cost centers, departments, and regions.
2. Intercompany transactions posted to one subsidiary are automatically posted in the other subsidiary.
3. Financial analysis in Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012 is based on OLAP technology.
4. Detailed currency information is stored in the subsidiary ledgers in addition to the general ledger.
The Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012 Expense Management module helps companies manage, track, and reimburse ___________ expenses.
( ) revenue and customs (•) travel and entertainment ( ) medical and recreation ( ) general and administrative
What Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012 modules are Expense Management tightly integrated with? Mark all that apply. (Select all that apply)
(√) Project accounting ( ) Accounts receivable (√) Accounts payable (√) General ledger
Supply Chain Management
What are the goals of the Microsoft Dynamics AX Supply Chain Management module? (Select all that apply)
( ) Increase revenues (√) Reduce inventory (√) Lower costs
(√) Improve time to market Categorize the following items:
a 1. Can be for both products and services. e 2. In Sales Order Processing, this can be converted to a sales order.
b 3. Creates picking lists only for available items.
d 4. Sets up the system to determine what is required to fill an order when it is received. g 5. Puts items on hold for production or sale, guaranteeing their availability for a specific order.
h 6. Determines which items are most profitable from a sales perspective, and the cost of carrying the item in inventory.
f 7. Can be calculated using purchasing trends.
c 8. Can be used for purchasing, selling, stocking, and pricing items.
a. Purchase orders b. Release sales order
picking
c. Multiple units of measure
d. Master Planning e. Quotation f. Budgets g. Reservations h. ABC analysis
In what form does Microsoft Dynamics AX provide graphical illustrations of schedules related to a project?
( ) Microsoft Excel® spreadsheets
( ) Microsoft Visio® diagram
( ) Microsoft Project®
Master Scheduling between multiple companies is possible in Microsoft Dynamics AX under what condition?
( ) All companies are running database servers in the same domain ( ) All companies share the same database of items, bills of material,
routings, and so on
( ) Cross-company security roles must be created to provide access to each company's database
(•) All companies are running in the same database
Service Management
Match the Service Management Portals to the functionality they provide in Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012:
d 1. Technician Portal
b 2. Customer Portal
c 3. Technician Portal
a 4. Customer Portal
a. Connect to the service company to initiate a service request.
b. View the data relevant for the service operation done on service items.
c. Connect to the service company to provide a record of the service made.
d. View the data relevant to execution of service.
Project Accounting
Internal projects can be invoiced. ( ) True
(•) False
CRM and HRM
Companies can use what Microsoft Dynamics AX feature to help hiring for seasonal, intermittent, or contractual Human Resource demands?
(•) Mass hire projects ( ) e-Recruiter tool ( ) HR Builder
