- HighEdWeb Professionals Association

The HighEdWeb conference, which took place October 4-7, 2009, is a gathering created just for higher education web professionals. This conference is the perfect place to mingle with web developers, marketers, designers, writers, managers and all those team members in-between who are exploring the unique web issues facing colleges and universities.  It was important for Cascade Experts to take part in this event because the value gained by the exchange of ideas, stories, and experiences within our community is immeasurable.  By attending as a participant and not a vendor, it is our goal to translate the information and knowledge gained with these interactions into increased value in our consulting services.  Most importantly, it is our daily integration of best practices, well-designed processes, and advancements in modern web practices discovered at events like these that increase the value our clients can obtain by using our consulting team and Cascade Server CMS.  This adds to our excitement in attending and what we are able to bring back our clients.

Hannon Hill: “A CMS Experience You Can Trust”
Cascade Experts was very proud and excited to see our friends at Hannon Hill participating as a vendor at the HiEdWeb Conference.  Their organization recently hosted a great conference of their own, so putting forth the effort to participate in this event is just another great example of their dedication to the industry and most importantly their clients.  It has always been our opinion that the team at Hannon Hill employs some of the most ambitious, intelligent, and hardworking young professionals in the CMS industry today.  During our time in Milwaukee, we had the opportunity to discuss many of the exciting features that are being added in Cascade Server.  This makes us even more excited about the coming release of Cascade Server 6.4 and we look forward to incorporating these tools soon.  We must say, the dedication and effort put forth by the Hannon Hill team shows a continuous commitment to product improvement, development and reaffirms their commitment to provide a positive client experience.

New Friends:  Online Communities in Higher Education
Innersync is an interactive studio that understands the importance of social networking and online communities in the higher education arena.  In a series of very inspiring developments, Innersync has established that an approach combining progressive internet technologies with compelling design is needed for an organization to build rewarding relationships with their audiences.  Innersync accomplishes this by offering a service that supports a profile driven interface similar to what you might find with Facebook, LinkedIn, or Ning.  What sets their offering apart from the “freemiums” is an understanding that these communities provide tremendous value and the platform used to tap that value must be owned by the organization in order to effectively define, measure, and tailor the experience for the intented audience. We applaud Innersync for bringing this approach to the college and university setting and are proud to use their products for the management of our own site.

In Conclusion…
Cascade Experts had a great time, learned a wealth of knowledge, and forged new and valuable relationships.  In our opinion, it is one of the most valuable web conferences one can attend and we hope to extend our experience gained to the services we provide to you.  We would definitely recommend you consider attending this conference in 2010 and many thanks to all those who have helped make Cascade Experts a success.

The Cascade Experts team is proud to say we have long realized that our strength as an organization comes from creating a culture where the client comes first and we proactively listen to your needs.  It is important for us to create an atmosphere where we think of ourselves as a partner rather than a vendor. With this philosophy, your challenges during these tough economic times are our challenges and it is our responsibility to deliver successfully.

With Cascade Server projects in mind, we are taking the management of projects to a new level by extending our current project philosophies to include Six Sigma concepts and methodologies.   These methods are used by America’s most recognizable organizations such as Textron, GE, Motorola, Amazon, and Dell, and Cascade Experts believes that Six Sigma is a project methodology that strives for perfection.

So what exactly is Six Sigma?

Six Sigma is a rigorous and disciplined methodology that uses data and statistical analysis to measure and improve  operational performance by identifying and eliminating “defects” in manufacturing and service-related processes. Commonly defined as 3.4 defects per million opportunities, Six Sigma can be defined and understood at three distinct levels: metric, methodology and philosophy.  The word Sigma is a statistical term that measures how far a given process deviates from perfection. The basic idea behind Six Sigma is that if you can measure the number of “defects” in a process, you can systematically figure out how to eliminate them. This will help you get as close to “zero defects” as possible, thus insuring a project thats completed on time, on budget, and with a high level of quality.

At its core, Six Sigma revolves around a few key concepts….

• Critical to Quality: Attributes most important to the customer
• Defect: Failing to deliver what the customer wants
• Process Capability: What your process can deliver
• Variation: What the customer sees and feels
• Stable Operations: Ensuring consistent, predictable processes to improve what the customer sees and feels
• Design for Six Sigma: Designing to meet customer needs and process capability

What this means for your project…

• Each engagement will begin with the definition or initiation of the project.  With this, the project team will be defined and their various roles will be assigned.
• We define the project plan and scope of the effort in Cascade Server terms. This includes defining the requirements of the effort you manage. Explore the priority of each requirement and assign a cost and time estimate to each.
• We will determine how each task within the project will be measured for success. Establish checkpoints throughout the project to ensure the project is on track and meeting the quality levels you’ve established.
• The project will be executed with a defect identification and resolution process in place. Identify potential risks that could occur and how you’ll mitigate those risks should they occur.
• We will provide continuous reporting to the project owner and team on the progress of the project including the points of risk. We will also monitor how your project is doing compared with the plan including finances and resources.
• A review at the end of the project will be conducted to see how your project did in comparison with the plan and what could be done better in the future.

In conclusion…

If you are one who thought that Six Sigma was only for large corporations, you’re not alone. Many people believe that Six Sigma process improvement results can only be achieved by huge organizations. What they don’t realize is that any organizaion can benefit from having their projects managed with Six Sigma methodologies.  As your partner, your success is our success and we believe this is another tool that will create additional value for your organizaion.

So, we ask…Who would you trust?