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June 28, 2023

Sameday delivers a fresh employee experience with Microsoft Viva

Sameday, a rapidly growing Romanian courier company, aims to be the largest and most popular in the Balkans—delivering goods across Europe within 24 hours. To extend its vision of innovation to the entire company, Sameday designed an intranet that combines Viva Engage and Viva Connections. The platform streamlined internal communications and performance tracking, saving employees time and enabling the company to grow faster than its competition. With Microsoft's help, Sameday is building a strong foundation for a collaborative, meaningful, and efficient work environment.

Sameday

The fastest-growing Romanian courier company today, Sameday strives to become the largest and most popular courier company in the Balkans. It uses technology to create delivery solutions that open growth opportunities for people, communities, and industries. Octav Deliu, Group Head of Human Resources at Sameday, explains the company’s mission as "Linking people with merchandise and consumer goods around Europe in 24 hours or the same day, as our name implies." To achieve this ambitious goal, Sameday relies on technology and innovation.

Having already transformed the management of its 3,200 easybox lockers with Microsoft Azure, Sameday turned its attention to company culture. “We're a market leader in innovation. Our goal is to align that culture with human resources (HR) and employees as well,” explains Octav Deliu. “And everything we want to achieve should lead to two things—excellent employee experience and employer value proposition.”

Internal alignment was the first task. Sameday had a decentralized HR approach, with different departments using varying methods for evaluating performance and setting goals. “We wanted to change the subjective into objective, measurable goals,” adds Octav Deliu. “If you apply fair and equal objectives, people will be more engaged.” 

To get everyone on the same page, Sameday looked for a platform that would promote cultural unity across the organization. "We needed one unified platform that addressed various needs like onboarding, app links, announcements, and projects,” explains Octav Deliu. “And in Microsoft Viva, we found a good solution that fit our needs.” 

Building a culture of connectivity and inclusivity

Sameday had been relying on limited communication channels—emails, WhatsApp, and in-person meetings. When the company switched to hybrid work after COVID-19 restrictions ended, it found that it needed to provide more possibilities for communication to really bring people together. “That’s where Viva Connections came in and showed us the ability, we could have to connect with one another instead of having to sift through overloaded email inboxes,” describes Octav Deliu.

By combining Viva Engage and Viva Connections, Sameday developed its own intranet platform, offering a repository of information and a better way to connect. “We wanted communication to be a two-way street. So, the new intranet is meant to be a dynamic space where people engage in conversations as well as share best practices and work documents seamlessly,” explains Camelia Al Hasbani, Head of Learning, Internal Communications and Employer Branding at Sameday.

With the ability to connect colleagues across the board, Sameday is set to expand to Hungary and Bulgaria. “We will use the same approach to share experience among each other. That really helps with the expansion process,” says Octav Deliu. “It shows how Viva Connections is a product that really sells itself.” 

The intranet has also enabled HR personnel to perform actions quicker and ensure information is being disseminated well. “We can see and manage employees’ requests, like holidays or time off, and ensure those get sorted out,” shares Deliu. “With the analytics we get from Viva, we can also check if the emails we sent out have been read and see if there’s anything else we can improve on.”

Employees themselves have also been able to save time with a third-party chatbot integrated with Microsoft Teams. Available 24/7, anyone can perform basic actions such as making leave applications or requesting leave balance or medical certificates. “Having an automated response system has saved huge amounts of time because we used to rely on manual replies and actions,” explains Octav Deliu. “And I think having a shorter response time for minute details like these, really adds to an employee experience.” 

Having seen a positive change in HR with Microsoft Viva, Sameday looks forward to figuring out better ways to engage its employees. 

Seeing the progress made following the activation of the Microsoft Viva suite, Sameday continues to look for new ways to engage its employees. “We’re adapting to what works and what doesn’t. Because we have such a big mix of personnel—both blue- and white-collar workers, we need to ensure that we maintain an inclusive environment,” explains Octav Deliu. “This is just the start for us—in essence, we're composing music and playing it simultaneously with 4,500 employees. We have to continue adapting as we go.”

Providing transparent and accessible performance tracking

Creating company culture was one thing, ensuring performance was another. To do this, Sameday deployed other tools from the Viva suite—Viva Goals provides the metrics the company needs to grow.   “Previously, we would set our Objectives and Key Results at the beginning of each fiscal year. Then we would all just go off and do our own work, focusing on our own tasks,” Octav Deliu explains. “But now, we are able to keep everything in a single place. Employees and leaders are encouraged to share goals from the top down. And because of the visibility, there’s a lot more accountability and ownership."

With information easily accessible on Microsoft Viva, the management team is able to work more efficiently and make data-driven decisions. “We can track things like performance, turnover, cost per turnover, all of which will help us make important business choices,” says Octav Deliu. “With one platform, everything requires fewer clicks to complete, like booking a meeting room—employees can now do it almost instantly. The more time we save on a daily basis across the year, the more time we have for other activities and development. This incremental push of the needle helps us achieve more and outrun our competition."

“Everything requires fewer clicks to complete, like booking a meeting room. The more time we save on a daily basis across the year, the more time we have for other activities and development. This incremental push of the needle helps us achieve more and outrun our competition.”

Octav Deliu, Group Head of HR, Sameday

Sameday's adoption of Microsoft's solutions has positively impacted the employee experience, with the HR team already exploring Microsoft Power Platform to automate repetitive processes. HR is also preparing the resources in Viva Learning to enhance employees’ professional development.

“Culture is a long-term journey,” adds Al Hasbani. “We are trying to shift mindsets and build new habits. We are helping our colleagues work more collaboratively, communicate meaningfully with their teams, and grow together. Microsoft solutions are helping us build the foundation, so that our employees can gain more to do meaningful and valuable things.”

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