Step 3: Populate VOGSY with your data

You have learned the concepts and mapped your processes. Now, in Step 3, you will bring your VOGSY environment to life by filling it with your essential business data.

Before you can roll out VOGSY to your organization, the system needs information to work with, such as your customers, employees, active opportunities, and current projects.

Before you begin importing your real data, it is critical to start with a clean slate.

• Reset Your VOGSY Environment: This action will wipe all of the test data you created during the "Map" phase. Importantly, it keeps all of your settings and configurations. This ensures you are populating a clean, correctly configured system.

• Where to find it: The reset VOGSY function is available in the settings section of the back office.

A key decision is determining the scope of the data you will import.

• Current Data Only (The Fast-Track Approach): The fastest way to go live is to populate VOGSY with only current data. This includes all active, "in-flight" opportunities and projects that are currently running or about to start.

• Historical Data: You may also choose to import historical data for more comprehensive reporting.
  
  Your VOGSY onboarding specialist can help you decide on the best strategy for your business needs.

You can use a combination of methods to get your data into VOGSY.

• Spreadsheet Imports: Use VOGSY’s templates to upload data in bulk. This is available for:
  - Organizations & Contacts
  - Employees
  - Timesheet entries
  - Financial transactions

• Finance Integration: When you connect VOGSY to your accounting software, you can directly import organizations and contacts.

• CRM Integration: When you connect VOGSY to your CRM software, you can directly import organizations, contacts, and sales opportunities.

• Manual Data Entry: Some data must be entered manually, most notably your projects.

There are several options for populating VOGSY.

• Upload data with the import features.

• Through the Finance integration, importing data.

• Through CRM integration, importing data.

• Manual data entry.

Mixing them and choosing the right combination of populating strategies makes sense.

VOGSY's onboarding specialist will ensure you select the correct mix of populating options.

Because project structures differ so much between software systems, importing active, "in-flight" projects is always a manual task.

To make this easier, VOGSY includes a Project Opening Balance feature. This allows you to quickly enter the total budget spent and hours logged on a project to date, ensuring your reporting is accurate from day one.

Ask your project managers for help populating their new and in-flight projects. This is not only efficient but also serves as an excellent hands-on learning experience for them.

Once your data is entered and VOGSY is fully populated, the system is ready to be put into production.

It is now time to prepare for the final step: communicating the launch to your teams.