Catalyst Paper Corporation
Paper Company Adds New Pages to its Business Intelligence Solution
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Company Overview
Catalyst Paper Corporation is one of North America’s largest mechanical paper companies, operating four pulp and paper manufacturing divisions and a paper recycling division located in British Columbia’s south coastal region. The company produces over 2.4 million tons of paper products ranging from lightweight coated paper to specialty mechanical paper. Catalyst is also regarded as an innovator in the paper production industry – it’s one of the world’s few producers of sawdust-based pulps, a low-cost substitute for traditional pulp products.
Business Challenge
Producing consistent, reliable products and providing the best in customer care is the number-one priority for Catalyst. As part of this commitment, the company produces a detailed monthly analysis presentation looking at the root causes associated with claims and complaints. The presentation was based on multiple Microsoft® Office Excel 2003-based spreadsheets connected to several views generated by SQL Server™ 2000. The complexity of the views and spreadsheets made it difficult for staff to find the data they needed. Often, the involvement of the IT team was required. Novice users found it challenging to obtain the appropriate amount of detail, and reports had to be manipulated manually by expert users. In fact, one staff member was devoted exclusively to producing monthly reports. It became clear that a more efficient reporting system was needed.
“We had a single point of contact that was used to create the report, which was sent via email to our users,” says Mihai Strusievici, Manager, Applications Delivery, Catalyst Paper Corporation. “This presented two challenges: we had neither version control nor a central repository where the report was being saved consistently. The growing complexity of the reports and duplication of data was also making them difficult to interpret.”
Catalyst realized it needed to develop a strategic approach to creating, managing and sharing its business intelligence.
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Solution
Catalyst sought the help of Microsoft Gold Certified Partner Habañero Consulting Group. Habañero involved members of its Business Intelligence Practice to help analyze Catalyst’s quality assurance reporting needs.
After conducting an assessment, Habañero recommended that Catalyst upgrade to the 2007 Microsoft Office system, leveraging Microsoft Office Excel 2007 and Office SharePoint® Server 2007 for the front end, with an upgrade to Microsoft SQL Server 2005 on the back end.
“The consistency of the user interface between the 2007 Office system and previous versions allowed Catalyst to leverage its investment in user training, and made it easier for our users,” says Kelly Lautt, Business Intelligence Practice Leader, Habañero Consulting Group. “This solution gives employees access to real-time, interactive Excel spreadsheets from a Web browser through Excel Services running on SharePoint Server 2007. Catalyst can use these spreadsheets to maintain and share one central and up-to-date version while also protecting proprietary information.”
Catalyst’s database team easily created a dimensional model using features of SQL Server 2005 Analysis Services. Habañero applied its experience in design to create a series of spreadsheet reports for Catalyst, using dragging and dropping in Excel visualizations. Habañero also customized Excel 2007 pivot tables to provide a user-friendly way to explore data generated by the SQL Server 2005 cube.
The cube that feeds the reports is updated on a daily basis. The Excel reports are saved to SharePoint 2007 Report Centre and any time the reports are changed, automatic email alerts are sent to members of the Quality Management Services (QMS), Sales and Marketing teams.
“With SQL Server 2005, SharePoint 2007 and the 2007 Office system, we have an efficient workflow solution for detailed, easy-to-read daily reports on the state of quality management in the company. This system is so user-friendly that staff can run their own detailed reports, letting them proactively take action on any issues identified within our processes,” says Strusievici.
Business Benefits
Catalyst’s QMS, Sales and Marketing teams are expecting tremendous benefits from the software upgrade, including document version control, time savings and improved insight into business data.
Document Version Control
Previously, a large presentation based on the Microsoft PowerPoint® presentation graphics program was emailed on a monthly basis to more than 40 members of the QMS, sales and marketing teams. The presentation was being saved both locally and in employees’ Outlook® 2003 messaging and collaboration software inboxes, making it nearly impossible for users to know where the latest version of the report was saved, and also difficult for Catalyst senior management to track who was making changes to the report.
“With SharePoint 2007 we now have the ability to better manage the reports. We can track the versions and put controls around copies of the reports so that we can look at the history of changes and enforce accountability with report owners,” says Strusievici.
Catalyst can also help ensure that sensitive business information is being controlled and managed more effectively. Users now have the ability to specify security settings, storage policies, auditing policies, and expiration actions for business records in accordance with compliance regulations. Furthermore, with a large number of staff on the road or working remotely, employees can access the documents they need via SharePoint 2007 from wherever they are. This is more efficient for mobile workers, as they no longer have to download massive reports into their mobile device inboxes.
“We have four different mills, plus our Vancouver office that have to remain connected. We now have one central system that all employees can access to get the detailed information they need to resolve customer complaints quickly and accurately. The time to access the data is now a lot shorter than before,” says Stacey Wells, Project Manager, Sales-Service Assurance, Catalyst Paper Corporation.
With Office Outlook 2007, Catalyst is also able to fully interact with information stored in SharePoint, anywhere and anytime. Mobile workers can connect to SharePoint calendars, documents, contacts, or tasks with Office Outlook 2007 and have full editing capabilities, knowing that any changes they make to the information stored in Outlook 2007 are also reflected on the server.
“Enabling our mobile workers to not only have real-time access to documents and data through SharePoint 2007 and Excel Services, but to also allow them to work seamlessly with coworkers when out of the office, has created real efficiencies for our staff.” says Wells.
Time Savings
Catalyst is expecting a jump in internal efficiencies after upgrading to the 2007 Office system. The previous reporting process was so labour-intensive that it required the company to dedicate a staff member to producing PowerPoint presentations and other reports on a full-time basis. These reports were distributed on a monthly basis to the team. Since its employees did not contribute to the generation of the report, they often had questions about the data that appeared on their desks.
“We are expecting our new system to be a catalyst for moving to faster customer response times. We’ve gone from receiving updates on a monthly to a daily basis, which lets us proactively address the claims from our customers in a timely manner and easily identify any instances of repetitive defects,” says Wells.
In addition, Catalyst is now able to better integrate its workflow so that reports can be easily shared either in Excel 2007 or in a more dynamic PowerPoint 2007 format, allowing employees to leverage the SmartArt diagrams to graphically represent trends or other data interpretations.
Improved Business Insight
Committed to providing the best products and services to its customers, Catalyst is using the visualization tools in Excel 2007 to gain greater insight into the root causes associated with claims or customer complaints. The new conditional formatting tools, including colour gradients, heat maps, data bars, and performance indicator icons, enable the company to more easily discover patterns and trends in its data.
“Excel 2007 lets us generate a great deal more analytical reporting around product costs and quality issues. With full support for SQL Server 2005 Analysis Services, we can query our most current business data and, using the new cube functions, we can quickly and easily build a custom report,” adds Wells.
Microsoft Office System
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For more information about the Microsoft Office System, go to: www.microsoft.com/office
For More Information
For more information about Microsoft products and services, call the Microsoft Sales Information Center at (800) 426-9400. In Canada, call the Microsoft Canada Information Centre at (877) 568-2495. Customers who are deaf or hard-of-hearing can reach Microsoft text telephone (TTY/TDD) services at (800) 892-5234 in the United States or (905) 568-9641 in Canada. Outside the 50 United States and Canada, please contact your local Microsoft subsidiary. To access information using the World Wide Web, go to: www.microsoft.com
For more information about Habañero Consulting Group products and services, call (403) 451 - 8125, (604) 709 - 6291 or visit the Web site at: http://www.habaneros.com/index.html
For more information about Catalyst Paper Corporation products and services, call 604-654-4000 or visit the Web site at: http://www.catalystpaper.com/default.pasp
