Project Management Practice Inc.
Project Management Consulting Firm Builds Global Team and Gains $80,000 Annually with Microsoft Windows Small Business Server
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Company Overview
Project Management Practice Inc. is a technology consulting company which builds custom solutions and conducts training in the area of project management and related technology infrastructure. The organization caters to customers in the pharmaceutical, IT and telecom sectors. Its main Canadian branch office is located in Montreal, Quebec.
With customers based in Asia, Europe and North America, Project Management Practice staff spend a significant amount of time working offsite at customer offices to provide the highest level of service.
Business Challenge
Effective communication and collaboration is key for this highly mobile and geographically distributed workforce. Team members working on the same project rely on tools such as e-mail in order to exchange ideas, solve customer problems and design solutions.
With a number of different calendaring and online communication tools in place, the company was struggling to provide a unified communication platform that allowed teams to easily connect and collaborate. Project Management Practice also needed to find an effective way of accessing and managing high volumes of content while on the road.
“Traditionally, we relied heavily on FTP sites to provide our teams with access to shared solution- development documents and training manuals. But frequently, we ran into log-in problems because our staff always travels, and has to rely on network connections that are not always ideal,” says Sean Creaghan, Vice President of Business Development, Project Management Practice Inc. “With different e-mail systems being used by various team members, we were running into problems with file compatibility and attachment limits. For example, we found that we couldn’t send a document that was 2.3MB in size to some of our staff because their attachment limit was 2MB. This was really bogging down our processes.”
Without its own in-house IT department, the company’s consultants have to deal with any IT infrastructure issues themselves, taking them away from client work.
“Project Management Practice fits the saying ‘the cobbler’s children go without shoes’ very well,” says David Healey, Director of Service Delivery at technology consulting company Indigo27. “With a busy, growing business they did not have time to set up and support a complex collaboration environment. They needed a solution that would help their team work together more effectively, while being easy to deploy and maintain. And for their busy staff to adopt this new tool, it would have to require very little training time.”
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Solution
In the winter of 2003, Project Management Practice engaged the technical expertise of Indigo27 Inc. to design and develop an effective communication and collaboration solution. Indigo27 recommended a system based on Microsoft Windows Small Business Server 2003 and Microsoft Office System, because the products are feature-rich and easy to use. The easy deployment and integration of the software helped Project Management Practice get its new solution up and running in only a month. After a short pilot program, the organization proceeded with a full deployment in April 2004.
A stable and secure environment
With Microsoft Windows Small Business Server 2003, Project Management Practice employees have a complete business server solution at their fingertips. The server provides messaging and collaboration tools, security-enhanced Internet access, protected data storage, reliable printing, the ability to run line-of-business applications, and faxing features.
Project Management Practice provides its staff with a consistent and stable IT environment with Windows Small Business Server 2003 built on Microsoft Windows Server™ 2003. The new solution allows Project Management Practice to realize optimal network performance and uptime.
The company can also monitor server performance through the server’s improved monitoring tools and usage reports.
“We have been impressed with the performance of the Windows Small Business Server 2003,” says Creaghan. “We had heard that this server had a great uptime record, and it turned out to be true. In the eight months that we have been using this solution, the server has not gone down once and we have never had a security breach or a virus.”
Project Management Practice’s customer information is protected by the server’s security features. The Windows Small Business Server 2003 includes simplified wizards and user interfaces to help customers ensure all required security steps are taken upon setup. The server has software access restriction policies which help Project Management Practice ensure only approved software installations make their way onto its network, helping protect it against viruses and other attacks.
Project Management Practice is also safeguarded against data loss by the server’s volume shadow copy service. The volume shadow copy service includes point-in-time backups, which help backup procedures run quickly and with minimal errors.
Working together across distances
Microsoft Windows Small Business Server 2003 helps Project Management Practice team members work together more effectively, no matter where they are located. Staff can access business information and resources with the Web-based Remote Web Workplace portal. The portal provides remote access to staff desktops, e-mail and other tools, eliminating dependence on FTP sites and enabling secure access to critical business information through a Web browser.
Using Microsoft® Office SharePoint® Portal Server 2003, Indigo27 created a virtual place for Project Management Practice staff to share ideas, participate in discussions and work together on documents or tasks, and communicate via e-mail or by instant messaging.
The powerful document management tools in Microsoft® Windows® SharePoint® Services deliver check-in and check-out functionality, version history and roll-back features. These tools create a rules-based document management system which ensures team members are always working on the most up-to-date document drafts. Alerts about changes or updates made to documents stored within team sites are also automatically sent to the entire team, further streamlining document control.
“We really wanted to get a better handle on our intellectual property. We develop a lot of content, and we never knew who had the latest version of a document,” says Creaghan. “With Microsoft® Windows® SharePoint® Services, document version control is no longer an issue.This new solution has given us control over our documentation process, and is allowing us to easily and efficiently manage all documents created by our staff and customers.”
Improved productivity
The new technology tools are also helping Project Management Practice’s busy teams to achieve new productivity levels. Microsoft Office Outlook® 2003 messaging and collaboration client provides a centralized and effective way of managing e-mail, sharing calendar information and instant messaging. Finding important messages is made easier by the program’s improved search capabilities, while powerful spam tools ensure that only appropriate e-mails find their way to the user’s Inbox.
Outlook 2003 also helps Project Management Practice ensure high levels of productivity with the new Cached Exchange Mode. The Cached Exchange Mode allows the user to download messages and other Outlook 2003 data to their computer during network downtime. The program adjusts its performance and look depending on the network speed with the help of connection awareness tools. This ensures optimal e-mail performance regardless of network connection, again helping to ensure optimal productivity levels.
The simple, intuitive and familiar Microsoft Office System interfaces allowed Project Management Practice to adopt the new solution without additional staff training, which helped minimize costs and downtime.
“The Project Management Practice staff is already familiar with the look of Microsoft Office programs, so we were able to roll out these tools to the organization with zero end-user impact,” says Healey.”
Business Benefits
With the help of Windows Small Business Server 2003 and Microsoft Office System, Project Management Practice has created a rich collaboration environment for its highly mobile staff. The organization has improved productivity and service levels, creating better relationships with its customers by engaging them in the solution development process. With a reliable network and desktop performance, the company has also been able to reduce IT support requirements within one month. When the company conducted a ROI audit of its new solution, they found that productivity increases and customer service improvements will translate into revenue gains of close to $80,000 by the end of the first year of implementation.
Creating stronger teams
The tools within Windows Small Business Server 2003 and Microsoft Office System have allowed Project Management Practice to overhaul its collaboration environment. The organization has standardized its e-mail system on Microsoft Outlook 2003, and Microsoft Exchange Server 2003 through Small Business Server 2003. The new technology has resolved the file compatibility and storage limit challenges Project Management Practice struggled with in the past. Shared calendaring has allowed the company to spend less time on coordinating meetings and schedules and more time working with customers. Working together on projects is also made significantly easier with Microsoft® Windows® SharePoint® Services included in Small Business Server. Team members can now log onto shared work sites no matter what city or country they are working from, access their projects, and work with their team members on a joint task.
“Being able to work together in a more effective fashion is allowing us to provide better service to our customers, translating in the end into a stronger market position for us,” says Creaghan. “With this solution our staff can quickly access the team member or information they need, which means we can deliver the solution to the customer quickly, and can make sure our competitors never even have a chance of getting there first.”
Welcoming customer input
The solution’s scalability and ease of use has allowed the organization to also create an extranet. Customers use the extranet to work directly with Project Management Practice, providing feedback and input into the solutions the organization is building for them. By leveraging the extranet, Project Management Practice has not only improved customer service, but increased efficiency. Customer input into the design process creates solutions better fit to individual customer needs, reducing the need for modifications and troubleshooting time.
“This technology has allowed us to involve all stakeholders for the first time throughout the solution development process,” says Creaghan. “Our new collaborative capability is helping us build better and longer-lasting relationships with customers. Our customers really appreciate being able to work with us through the online team sites. They know that we not only welcome their input, but we also make it very easy for them to get involved. Without a doubt, this technology is helping us work with customers in ways not possible before.”
The ability to better serve customers is translating into the biggest ROI driver for Project Management Practice. The company’s ROI audit showed that productivity gains resulting from increased responsiveness to customer needs, reduced time spent on coordinating teams, and increased output driven by improved collaboration, account for close to $66,000 of the total annual gains the organization is realizing with the new solution.
Reducing support requirements with a stable environment
Thanks to the stability of the Windows Small Business Server 2003, additional savings are also being realized through the reduction of IT support time. The reliable performance of the server has meant that staff time previously spent on network maintenance and support has now been allocated to servicing clients, helping the company to save more than $13,000 annually. Any updates or servicing the server may need from time to time are now remotely managed by Indigo27, again freeing up Project Management Practice staff to assist customers.
As well, the organization has been able to centralize IT operations on Windows Small Business Server 2003 and Microsoft Office System, reducing infrastructure complexity and support needs. Having a central repository of information has also allowed the organization to create a disaster recovery plan. The plan gives them the security of knowing that should their systems be affected, business can be back to normal within minutes.
“We've definitely seen benefits from centralizing our data. It’s easier to back up now, and it’s easier to manage overall because we only need to service one set of tools,” says Creaghan. “We’re also protected against data loss because of centralization. With Microsoft® Windows® SharePoint® Services, all of our documents reside in one spot so we no longer have to deal with situations where, for example, a laptop containing critical information has broken down and that information is lost. It’s helping us simplify our internal processes while ensuring security of information.”
Project Management Practice is planning to expand the way it uses the new technology tools. The organization will soon be using Information Rights Management technology within the Microsoft Office System to further increase information security. With Information Rights Management, Project Management Practice will be able to set up rules regulating who can access and edit documents or e-mail messages. It will also be able to protect its intellectual property from unauthorized printing, forwarding or copying.
Microsoft Office System
Microsoft Office is the business world's chosen environment for information work. It provides the software, servers and services that help you succeed by transforming information into impact.
For more information about Microsoft Office System, go to: http://www.microsoft.com/office.
For more information about Indigo27 Inc., call (613) 236-9449 or visit www.indigo27.ca.
For more information about PM Practice Inc, call 1-800-736-3613 or visit www.pmpractice.com.
