The Tale of Two Systems
In the rush to get on board with the latest technology, many businesses find themselves stuck in a rut of confusing, incompatible systems and software. Worse, there are often incompatible views from the team on what to do about it. Sound familiar?
It’s a common problem and one of the first things I’ll clean up when working with a company. Conflicting systems are one of those things that have a huge financial impact on your business – but because it’s hard to quantify, the overwhelming job of sorting things out gets put on the back burner.
Today I’d like to talk about a company I’ve worked with to fix this exact problem; if their story hits close to home, now you know that you don’t have to deal with it yourself, you can just call me.
The Tale of Two Systems
It was the best of systems, it was the worst of systems…
This company had been in operation for quite a long time. As staff had come and gone, and support companies had too, they’d adopted a variety of different ways of working, and different toolsets to support that. Some staff were using Google apps for email and file storage, while others used Office 365. However, one of their key clients required them to send reports and extracted information in a specific format which only one system supported.
Staff were beyond frustrated by the conflicting systems. They had documents in different file formats, causing problems when emailing, sharing and printing. Email was stored in Gmail but accessed via Outlook by many staff. There was also the additional cost to the company for two sets of licenses. Not to mention the unnecessary time taken navigating between each system.
The team had high levels of frustration and their productivity was significantly affected by having to switch between systems – but they had been in this situation for some years, and no one could give them clear guidance on the right approach to take to resolve it. That’s where we come in.
Recalibrate migrated all staff to Office 365, reorganised file storage systems and processes and eliminated the need for two sets of licenses. We set them on the right track and helped them to break the inertia and get moving forwards toward a better way of operating.
Benefits:
- Significant efficiencies and staff capabilities by having one system
- Improved staff morale, with less frustration
- Reduced training costs
- License cost savings
- The new platform provided great opportunities to support business growth
The change in morale was the biggest difference for me personally; it changed so much from the day I first met everyone to the day I had completed the migration that it felt like a whole new team of people.
A happy team is a productive one, and that’s something that will never change, no matter how advanced our technology becomes.