Our Processes

We're tenacious about getting Ready-Aim-Fire in the right order, especially when it comes to making significant technology investments.  Proper analysis and planning takes time up front, but nearly always results in a better, lower cost solution, and frequently results in a faster implementation time-to-ROI.

Typical Stages in the Gateway Group Process:

1.       Strategy Clarification. Our planning process typically starts with understanding, or helping to clarify your strategic business objectives. Input typically comes from the CEO and executive team. Output from this stage typically includes a measurable definition of a successful project outcome along with a narrative vision statement of the successful outcome. Achieving clarity in this stage guides decision making through all subsequent stages.

2.        Information Gathering and Education. Typically comprised of several concurrent activities:

• Technical assessment of existing equipment, physical environment, network readiness.
• Organizational readiness to support the likely new technology.
• User education of capabilities of new technology and impact assessment on operations and customer / partner relationships.
• Cost analysis of supporting legacy equipment, carrier contracts and other costs.
• Competitive and Best-In-Class Scan to help set benchmarks for success.
• Solutions Scan to determine relevant current technology offerings, capabilities and general costs.

3.       Analysis, Report and Recommendations. Output of this stage is typically a report on data collected, a situation analysis, recommendations and high-level budgets.

4.       High-Level Solution Design.  High level solution design with prioritized requirements. Often includes task, job and organizational definitions to support the proposed solution. These documents a basis for vendor selection and/or a Request For Proposal document.

5.       Vendor Candidate Identification.  An active search for vendors, typically Value Added Resellers with the qualifications to translate the High Level Design into a detailed design solution and implement it.

6.       Vendor Selection. Either by a formal RFP process or through interviews and presentations.  Our expertise at RFP development and vendor selection will help you find the best partner without exhausting your staff.

7.       Contracting. Clear definitions of deliverables, responsibilities, timing and variable costs is vital to a successful and cost effective implementation. We help you get it right.

8.       Implementation oversight. Major system implementations typically require expertise beyond that typically found in in-house staff and overloads already busy people.  Mistakes made during a large implementation can be very expensive and career limiting.

9.       Utilization Facilitation. Sadly most major installation never live up to their promise because of a lack of follow-up efforts to implement and use the systems’ capabilities. We help users apply what you bought to achieve your business objectives through departmental counseling, communications and training.