• TRAINING • Project Management • Databases & Data Warehousing • Cloud Computing • Mainframe Migrations • Certified Veterans Enterprise (CVE) • Registered Education Provider (REP) • GSA Contract holder

Project and Program Management

BlackBox Partners has adopted the Project Management Institute’s (“PMI” ®) methodology as a baseline in our own project work. We adapt our base methodology to the existing methodologies of client organizations, but when something is missing we are able to quickly draw from the PMI’s ® Project Management Body of Knowledge (PMBOK ® Guide) to complete a project process. Though not the only standard or a perfect standard, the PMI’s ® methodology is sound and has gained wide industry support in the Information Technology and Telecommunications sectors. Essentially, the PMBOK ® Guide describes five processes that are part of every project and nine management areas that are essential for the proper delivery of the project. This model is used in wide variety of industries – from construction to aerospace.

IT and Database Architecture

Electronic databases hold the most valuable and essential information of an organization. Almost every function of modern business or government is performed with the use of databases that hold customer, financial and budgetary, employee, and inventory information.

Organizations require experts with years of experience in an array of Database Administration Services to support both active application development and ongoing maintenance of existing database installations. These experts need to understand both the technical and functional aspects of database projects in order to maximize the benefit of the investment in information resources.
Key to the maximization of investment is a fluency in the data types and business functions that warrant relational databases (which contain data that will be changing constantly and must be optimized to read and right) versus those that warrant a data warehouse (which contains data that is unchanging but routinely read and manipulated for the purposes of reporting and forecasting).

BlackBox’s database specialists have the expertise to serve your organization during all phases of data-centric projects: analysis of business functions and existing data sources, development of data models, installation of database applications, tuning of databases, operation of systems, and ensuring the security of the data, We have certified consultants experienced in delivering quality Oracle, Microsoft SQL Server, Sybase, MySQL, and Microsoft Access database solutions.

Customer Relationship Management (CRM) Solutions

The ability to create, track, and maintain up-to-date records of customers or internal business stakeholders is essential to successful business. BlackBox CRM services leverage Microsoft Dynamics CRM 3.0, a customer relationship management (CRM) solution that provides the tools and capabilities needed to create and easily maintain a clear picture of customers, business process or anything needing to be tracked from beginning to post entry. With a variety of modules to meet specific vertical and horizontal needs such as sales, constituency management, outreach, and customer service, Microsoft Dynamics CRM delivers a fast, flexible, and affordable solution that drives consistent, measurable improvements in business processes enabling closer relationships with customers and helping to achieve new levels of profitability.

Even for companies with the most complex of processes, BlackBox’s experienced functional staff configure Dynamics’ capabilities to easily communicate with customers and employees, manage outreach campaigns, streamline business process and drive activities.

Data Warehousing and Oracle Implementations

Data Warehouses (DWs) and Business Intelligence (BI) platforms are essential tools in extracting the business value out of large data sets collected throughout organizations. They have become the method of choice for delivering executive reports, conducting trend analyses, forecasting, and providing competitive information to decision makers – especially for large datasets.
Data Warehouses use the same software and hardware technologies as classical database systems; however they are designed in a different way in order to optimize the fast retrieval of data. This different design is described as a “dimensional” model because it is architected around the dimensions against which the data is most likely to be retrieved in an optimal fashion. DWs are not designed to update or alter the data within the data set; instead the manipulation of data is conducted in pre-cleaning, extraction, and transformation of the data steps that precede the loading of the data into the warehouse.

Business Intelligence tools are then attached to the DW in order to manipulate and display essential information for strategic decisions and tactical planning. In combination DWs and BIs can automate collection and presentation of data and free staff from mundane tasks.
BlackBox’s specialists bring full DW lifecycle experience to projects, having implemented DWs in both Federal and commercial environments. We specialize in Oracle solutions but can implement DW theory across any platform.