4-page Case Study - Posted 10/26/2006

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FranklinCovey

Time-Management Company Raises Efficiency of Communications with New Server Solution

Situation

FranklinCovey was founded in 1997 with the merger of the Franklin Quest Company and the company formed by Stephen Covey, author of The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People. Today,

FranklinCovey was going to have to spend money to upgrade its communications. And Exchange Server 2007 cost $100,000 less than the alternative.  Dan See Service Delivery Executive EDS

As a company long associated with produc¬tivity, FranklinCovey seeks to maintain an efficient working environment. In early 2006, when the company was told that it had to update its voice-mail solution or lose vendor support, it decided to look at options for improving communication by moving to a unified messaging system.

At the time, the company used the Microsoft® Office Outlook® 2003 messaging and col¬laboration client and Microsoft Exchange Server 2003 to provide e-mail communica¬tions for its 1,500 employees. FranklinCovey also relied on Microsoft Office Outlook Web Access for its mobile workers.

“We were particularly concerned about the communication needs of the mobile em¬ployees,” says Dan See, who is a Service Delivery Executive with EDS and serves as Director of Infrastructure for FranklinCovey. “We thought a unified messaging system that would include voice mail and e-mail messag¬ing would be just what they needed. It would provide them convenient access to all their vital business communications, both at the office and on the road.”

See, like Rick Gordon, Systems Administrator, works for Microsoft Gold Certified Partner EDS and is dedicated to the FranklinCovey account. Both See and Gordon work on-site at FranklinCovey, overseeing critical IT services.

See and Gordon also experienced difficulties managing the e-mail system. “We had chal¬lenges maintaining the e-mail messages that needed to be retained to meet regulations, such as those for Sarbanes-Oxley,” says Gordon. An employee might have messages that had to be saved for varying time periods—for example, one year, three years, or indefinitely. Handling those needs required three separate personal folders, and the company had to rely on the employee’s diligence in retaining the e-mail messages.

To maintain the company’s e-mail com¬munications, FranklinCovey was backing up its data to tape drives every night. And although the company rarely experienced a disk failure, when it did, it sometimes took more than a day to recover the data.

See and Gordon decided that the most cost-effective method might be just to upgrade the company’s existing voice-mail system, although that alone would not resolve the management issues. But when See asked the vendor for a quote to update the voice-mail system and integrate it with the company’s e mail system, he received a shock. The vendor demanded a price of U.S.$130,000 for the upgrade and an additional $20,000 to add the voice-messaging component. “When we saw the high cost of integrating voice mail and messaging solutions from outside vendors, we started looking at other options,” he says.

Solution

While the negotiations with the vendor were proceeding, FranklinCovey looked at Microsoft Exchange Server 2007. “I had heard that Exchange Server 2007 offered unified messaging,” says See. “And when we discovered we could deploy it for about $40,000, that alone made the business case for the deployment.”

FranklinCovey was one of the first companies to deploy Microsoft Exchange Server 2007. Working with IT professionals from Adtech Global Solutions (AGS), a Microsoft Certified Partner that assisted with the unified mes¬saging component, See and Gordon deployed the solution for FranklinCovey. The IT team set up a server cluster of three server com¬puters. They deployed two server computers on the internal network to handle the mail¬boxes, central authentication server, and Microsoft Internet Security and Acceleration Server 2004, which provides firewall and integrated virtual private network (VPN) services. Adtech integrated Exchange Unified Messaging with the company’s existing Avaya G3 PBX by using a Dialogic PBX-IP Media Gateway.

On another computer on a perimeter network, the IT team deployed the Edge Transport Server role of Exchange Server 2007. Thus isolated from the internal network, the Edge Transport Server provides Simple Mail Transfer Protocol (SMTP) routing and can quarantine or reject incoming messages according to defined rules. Although it does not directly connect to the Active Directory® service, the Edge Transport Server can make use of Active Directory through Active Directory Application Mode. The company installed the Exchange Server software along with the Windows Server® 2003 R2 Standard x64 Edition operating system, Microsoft Office Outlook 2007, and Microsoft Office Outlook Web Access.

To provide backup for its new messaging system, FranklinCovey relied on the local continuous replication (LCR) feature in Exchange Server 2007, which automatically replicates data to a single server computer, providing a backup copy of the production database that can be used for recovering the e-mail data if a disk fails.

The implementation went smoothly. “This was a lot easier than similar deployments in the past,” says Gordon. Even setting up the unified messaging was not difficult. “The hardest thing was setting up the dialing rules,” he says. “We finally decided we needed only three—one for local calls, one for domestic long distance, and one for international long distance.”

Benefits

For FranklinCovey, the deployment of Exchange Server 2007 signaled new improvements in operational efficiency and productivity. At a cost much lower than that of upgrading its voice-mail communications, FranklinCovey gained a solution that has improved communications for its remote workers, while helping it reduce its VPN costs and better manage its communications. The deployment is the first step in creating a software infrastructure that will support the company for years to come.

Provides a Cost-Effective Unified Messaging Solution

Because FranklinCovey could deploy Exchange Server 2007 for less money than it would have spent upgrading its existing voice-mail system, the decision to use a solution based on that software was obvious. The Microsoft solution meant that FranklinCovey gained an efficient, unified messaging system, without changing its voice infrastructure. “FranklinCovey was going to have to spend money to upgrade its communications,” says See. “And Exchange Server 2007 cost $100,000 less than the alternative. That made the return on investment immediate.”

Should Reduce the Cost of Remote Connectivity by About 40 Percent

FranklinCovey also expects to see savings on remote connectivity as the deployment proceeds. “With Exchange Server 2007 and Outlook Web Access, users can connect to the e-mail system from remote locations,” says See. “For people who only need access to e-mail or Shared Folders, Outlook Web Access is all they need. As a result, FranklinCovey should save about 40 percent on VPN costs, because fewer VPN connec¬tions are needed.”

Improves Remote Communication

The mobile workers at FranklinCovey will be able to stay in touch from almost anywhere, because voice mail, e-mail, and faxes are all routed through Exchange Server. “If salespeople are someplace

If salespeople are someplace without Web access, Exchange Server 2007 makes it possible for them to have their e mail messages read to them over the phone.  Rick Gordon Systems Administrator EDS

Both See and Gordon believe the attractive new interface in Outlook Web Access should make use easier for remote and mobile workers. “If it weren’t for the support in the Office Outlook client for working offline, you could use Outlook Web Access all the time. Outlook Web Access gives you access to everything in the Office Outlook client, including the Scheduling Assistant. People can determine the best time to meet, set up a meeting, and book the conference room even when they’re traveling.”

Exchange Server 2007 also includes support that could be very valuable if a Windows Mobile® powered smartphone or other device is lost or stolen. “An administrator can actually remotely wipe the device clean of all data if a mobile device is lost or stolen,” says Gordon. “That’s a great security feature.”
Simplifies Installation and Management

The Exchange Management Console in Exchange Server 2007 impressed Gordon, too. “In the Exchange Management Console, everything is intuitively located,” says Gordon. “Having three panes, including one showing all the available actions, helps me find what I need much faster.”

Gordon also likes the command-line interface of the Exchange Management Shell. “For small jobs, I prefer to use the console,” he says. “But for something like moving our 1,548 mailboxes to Exchange Server 2007, it’s much faster to write a script. With a script, I can direct the process to run when the system is not busy, and I don’t have to sit there and watch. I can also string multiple jobs together for even more efficiency.”

Boosts Productivity and Reduces Help Desk Calls

FranklinCovey expects that features like the Scheduling Assistant in Office Outlook 2007 and Outlook Web Access will help employees become more productive, because they won’t have to wait until they are in the office to check other employees’ calendars and set up meetings.

The self-service and management features of Exchange Server 2007 will also help increase the productivity of IT workers. For example, with the AutoConnect option, which uses a Web service to automatically connect the client to Exchange Server 2007, users can set up and configure their installations of Office Outlook themselves.

Users can also change their voice-mail PIN (personal identification number) from Office Outlook or Outlook Web Access, which reduces the number of help-desk calls for voice mail, as well. “We think help-desk calls at FranklinCovey could decrease by as much as 20 percent,” says See. “And with the new, intuitive management features of Exchange Server 2007, help-desk personnel can manage the day-to-day operations of the e mail system, while we redeploy the highly skilled IT professionals to more important corporate projects.”

Offers Faster Data Restoration and Fewer Full Backups

Exchange Server 2007 will also make a difference in restoring data. “On the rare occasions when we have had a disk failure, it took a long time to fix,” says Gordon. “But with LCR, we should be able to restore within minutes, instead of hours.” And although FranklinCovey now backs up all its messaging data to a tape drive nightly, eventually it expects to need full backups only weekly, with incremental daily backups, even with the increased data from voice mail.

Streamlines Record Keeping for Compliance

Another feature of Exchange Server 2007 that FranklinCovey appreciates is Managed Folders. With this feature, users can organize messages in Office Outlook folders that are provisioned and managed by the system administrator. If certain messages need to be kept for a certain period of time—for example to satisfy Sarbanes-Oxley requirements—they can be managed with a rule. “Sarbanes-Oxley compliance is a big deal for any public com¬pany,” says Gordon. “People don’t under¬stand how to save the e-mail communications that auditors may request. But with Exchange Server 2007, we can create the folder and put a rule in place to save it for the required time, automatically. That will simplify the pro¬cess significantly. I expect that improvement will save 100 work hours or more per year.”

Supports Long-Range Plans

Exchange Server 2007 is just the first step in the long-range plan that FranklinCovey has for upgrading its infrastructure. The company has recently adopted 64-bit computing and enjoyed the increased performance that resulted from that adoption. It also plans to deploy more Microsoft offerings in the near future, including the Windows Vista™ operating system; Microsoft SQL Server™ 2005 database software; and Microsoft Office Live Meeting service, Microsoft Office Communications Server 2007, and Microsoft Office SharePoint® Server 2007, as well as Microsoft Dynamics™ CRM.

“Based on its experience with Exchange Server 2007 and everything that Microsoft has invested in the latest releases, FranklinCovey is making a large investment in its Microsoft-based infrastructure,” says See. “I’m confident that we can deploy the software right away. FranklinCovey can standardize on one vendor and one skill set and run the business more cost-effectively and efficiently.”

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:
http://www.microsoft.com/

Microsoft Server Product Portfolio

For more information about the Microsoft server product portfolio, go to:
www.microsoft.com/servers/default.mspx

For more information about EDS products and services, visit the Web site at:
http://www.eds.com/

For more information about Adtech Global Solutions, visit the Web site at:
http://www.adtechglobal.com/

For more information about FranklinCovey products and services, call (801) 817-1776 or visit the Web site at:
http://www.franklincovey.com/

This case study is for informational purposes only. MICROSOFT MAKES NO WARRANTIES, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, IN THIS SUMMARY.

Document published October 2006