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About Hall Consulting & Research

HCR is a professional services firm that specializes in assessing the financial and strategic impacts of IT investments to support decision-making and planning. We also help leading IT vendors assess and credibly communicate the business value of their products. Hall Consulting & Research was founded by Andrew Hall, a leading business value consultant and analyst. 

HCR partners with a network of consultants, researchers, advisers, and vendors to deliver some of the highest quality assessment tools and services available globally.

Andrew Hall - HCR Founder and President

Andy Hall is an industry-leading consultant in the assessment and communication of the business value of technology. Prior to founding Hall Consulting & Research, Andy was a Principal with Lawrence Associates LLC and an IT Business Strategist and Managing Consultant with Microsoft Consulting Services. In these roles, he developed a wide range of business value assessment tools/methods and conducted and managed dozens of business value studies for strategic Microsoft customers. He also wrote business value white papers and case studies on a variety of technologies for leading IT vendors such as Microsoft and Intel. He also has thirteen years of broad business experience – including seven years as a strategy/management consultant in IT business assessments, business strategy, financial/value analysis, sales/marketing, supply chain management, business process improvement, product development, and people/project management. Prior to Andy's consulting career, he was responsible for strategic planning, marketing, operations improvement, and financial planning at a manufacturer. He has an MBA from the University of Pittsburgh and a BS in Engineering from Penn State University.

Andrew Hall

Current Research/Assessment Focus

  • Business Intelligence
  • Windows 7 and Vista
  • Office 2007
  • Microsoft Desktop Optimization Pack (MDOP)
  • SharePoint (Windows SharePoint Services, Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007)
  • Windows Server 2008
  • SQL Server 2008
  • Licensing contract analysis – EA (Enterprise Agreements), SA (Select Agreements), Software Assurance
  • Correlation between maturity/capability levels (IOM) and business performance
Recent Business Value Project Work
  • Extensive Windows Vista & Office 2007 research, business value modeling and customer studies
  • Business Intelligence business value model
  • MDOP (Microsoft Desktop Optimization Pack) ROI models
  • White paper and model assessing the business value of advancing IT infrastructure maturity (Infrastructure Optimization Model)
  • Windows Vista customer TCO studies
  • Business value of servers public white paper based on 22 customer studies
  • Small Business Server 2003 public white paper based on 21 customer studies
  • Business Value of TechNet public white paper based on 10 customer studies
  • Retail Point of Service TCO client study
  • Development/delivery of business value sales training
  • 2 open source business value studies (Office, Desktop OS, and Server OS) for a country government and large utility
  • Windows Server 2003 business value study
  • 5 business value of Microsoft certifications (MCSE, MCSD, etc.) public case studies
    Numerous desktop TCO studies
  • 6 customer desktop (Windows XP / Office 2003) TVO (Gartner's Total Value of Opportunity) business value studies
  • 8 licensing (Enterprise Agreement, Software Assurance, Select Agreement) business value studies
  • 2 public desktop business value case studies (Samsung, Hyundai)
  • 2 database business value studies (SQL Server vs Oracle)
  • Project portfolio strategy for transportation customer (including ERP, CRM, BI, SCM, HRMS)
  • Project portfolio strategy for education customer (including Windows Server 2003, Exchange, Content Management Server, development platform [J2EE and .NET])

HCR Guiding Principals

Our Approach to conducting business value services is based on the following principles:

Transparency
Tools (such as spreadsheets) used are as open as possible.  Inputs, assumptions, and calculations are visible and can usually be modified by the customer.  Inputs and assumptions can be traced to their origin.

Best practice methods
We use well-established industry best practice procedures, calculations, and tools.  Our methods are aligned with the best 3rd party research from scholarly sources, as well as, Gartner, IDC, Forrester, and many others.

Comprehensive, yet efficient, analysis
We approach engagements from multiple perspectives to ensure we assess all the most significant implications of the investment being considered.  This often includes:  qualitative and quantitative benefits; direct and indirect costs; scorecards and direct benefit calculations; etc.  We also focus engagements primarily on the aspects that are likely to have the greatest impact to make engagements efficient.

Customer involvement, buy-in, and verification
Results are more credible and accurate when the customer is involved in providing inputs and verifying methodology and results.

Credibility
Our results are credible because we follow the best practices above.  We also extensively leverage 3rd party research and tools to enhance accuracy of results.

Customization
The specific tools/models, methods, and data sources are customized for each customer situation because no one approach is best for all customer situations.  We are able to leverage a wide variety of approaches to satisfy the needs of a broad range of customer needs.