About the CBOC
The Conference Board creates and disseminates knowledge about management and the marketplace to help businesses strengthen their performance and better serve society.

Working as a global, independent membership organization in the public interest, we conduct research, convene conferences, make forecasts, assess trends, publish information and analysis, and bring executives together to learn from one another.

Project Requirements
In the summer of 2003, CBOC found that they needed to be more responsive to their clients and to manage content in a more efficient manner. They began the process by deciding to prototype a Commercial-Off-The-Shelf (COTS) Web Content Management System (WCMS) with the goal of optimal flexibility, scalability and reuse of content.

CBOC hired BAU Solutions Canada Inc. to research, design and implement a secure, distributed, Internet site that would feature CBOC’s business documents. This complete content management solution would inter-connect people, information and processes using cutting-edge technologies on a scalable platform. The following major requirements for the solution were identified:

• Must be based on a commercial-off-the-shelf (COTS) product for Web content management.
• Must enable the creation and maintenance of static and dynamic content.
• Must allow for the separation of content from presentation.
• Must allow users to access, browse, search, store and manage virtually any type of document in a controlled, secure environment from anywhere throughout the organization.
• Must enable users to create, modify and manage complex business processes.
• Must be able to integrate with CRM.

The Solution
The BAU Solutions Canada Inc. team of database and dynamic web content specialists designed, developed, tested and implemented a comprehensive solution that combined a solid design methodology with leading edge COTS technologies on a scalable platform. The proposed solution included incorporation of the following technologies:

• Microsoft CMS – effectively produce and publish Web site content and develop and manage enterprise-level Internet, intranet, and extranet Web sites.
• Microsoft SQL Server – complete set of data management and analysis features, and it scales to support the largest Web sites, Enterprise Online Transaction Processing (OLTP) systems, and Data Warehousing systems.
• Visual Basic .NET – delivers the tools you need to build applications that will power today's organizations and drive the next generation of Windows, Web, and mobile software.
• Microsoft Sharepoint Portal Server – provides a rich, customizable Web portal that gives you quick access to business-critical information throughout your organization.
• Microsoft Commerce Server – rapidly build next-generation online businesses -- extend your site's functionality and enhance the user experience globally.
• Mondosoft’s MondoSearch – an advanced, multi-lingual enterprise search engine built with .NET. It helps users quickly find relevant data across the enterprise.
• iMIS - complete membership, fundraising, and Web site management solution that builds one-to-one customer relationships, with personalized customer service and advanced communication capabilities.

Microsoft’s CMS allowed for version control definition, document ownership, meta-data, and the overall management of articles contained within the site.

Further to the Web content publishing analysis and definition, BAU Solutions Canada Inc. designed and developed a prototype that allows users to enter content via a Web interface. The design and development of CBOC’s system was carried out with Microsoft CMS on top of a Windows 2003 Server and a MS SQL Server database. BAU Solutions Canada Inc. designed, developed and integrated a custom database to contain a repository of data as part of the overall prototype using MS SQL Server.

Integrated CMS
Following Phase 1 of this initiative, BAU Solutions Canada Inc. was invited to provide on-going Web maintenance and support services, and development and implementation of enhancements in support of the future goals of the CBOC. During this time, BAU Solutions Canada Inc. was tasked to support the iMIS CRM with the following functionality:

• The customer profile will be available on the website, customer will be able to modify their contact information, review their purchase and/or membership and also their current balance, upcoming payment, etc...
• The list of all available CBOC services, meaning that a list of all publications, all conference, all executive networks, all data and tables will be available to all web users. Specific information concerning an item description and pricing would also be available.
• Check for a valid membership, if not the user would be prompted to a page describing the service and the ability to purchase it on the fly (shopping cart).
• Web site visitors would be able to register for a conference, if they’re a new user they would also be required to fill a form to create their profile in IMIS.
• Ability to update customer activity records when an online purchase is made.

Project Outcomes
The solution developed by BAU Solutions Canada Inc. has allowed CBOC to achieve each of the objectives and requirements identified by the organization including:

• Accessibility to a secure, central repository from multiple locations, allowing users to access, browse, search, store and manage virtually any type of object.
• Team collaboration on documents with workflow functionality to support the approval process, increasing communication across the organization
• Increased productivity through an integrated set of information tools.
• Implementation of search engine technology to support the goal of easy access to information and business documents.