Introduction
This is the story of how a fictitious small business – ViaScope – implemented a SharePoint Small Business Intranet from dataBridge.
Situation
ViaScope is a 27-person software solutions company based in the Northeast that develops customized software solutions targeted at medium and large companies.
ViaScope, like most companies with 10 to 50 employees was finding it more and more difficult to communicate and collaborate effectively with their internal employees, contractors, vendors and clients.
Key Business Challenges
ViaScope was facing a handful of critical challenges that were hampering its ability to work efficiently and profitably:
1. Email plus attachment nightmare. The majority of their communication was done through email and attachments. This continually led to duplicated documents, multiple versions and outdated information.
2. Manual business processes. Most of the company forms were in Word and Excel that got filled out and then emailed around the company. The process for requesting PTO was done through email and purchase requests were manually carried from desk to desk for sign offs.
3. Outdated information. Their employee, contractor and vendor directories were individual Excel files that were updated and emailed to everyone once a month.
4. Inefficient information delivery. ViaScope was bombarded with calls and emails from contractors and vendors requesting white papers, spec sheets, price lists and general information.
5. Project Management Issues. Client projects ranged from two to six months and were hard to manage through email and phone calls.
6. Knowledge management. The majority of the company's information and expertise was walking around in the heads of its employees. There was no easy way for employees to document their knowledge which made the process of replacing employees who left very painful.
7. Resources needed to develop a company intranet. While ViaScope is very good at what they do, they do not have the expertise, time or employee(s) to dedicate to developing an intranet.
The Solution:
SharePoint Small Business Intranet from dataBridge
What makes dataBridge's SBI the best online intranet solution? We eliminate the learning curve. You get a dedicated SharePoint expert to help you tailor it to your needs. We provide the IT staff to get you started and support you along the way! You get much more than the award winning communication and collaboration platform from Microsoft, dataBridge provides the staff to help you develop your company's custom Intranet, Extranet or Project Management site. We work with you to set up your site and install the features you need; Site structure, functionality, best practices, training, development, the works!
Here's how we helped ViaScope solve their business challenges.
1. Convenient, Affordable and Timely
- No Commitment Low cost monthly billing. No contracts, cancel anytime.
- Pay as you grow Pay for what you use; scalable on your terms.
- No IT Investment No server, maintenance fees or employees needed.
- Generous Storage Expandable to any size.
- All Inclusive Includes all features and support - No software to buy.
- Ready in a Week Begin using your intranet in less than a week.
2. Company Departments and Business units
First, we had a brief discovery meeting to determine the company's departments and business units and the features/functionality each wanted: ViaScope's departments are
- HR
- IT
- Accounting
- Sales
- Operations
- Projects
We then created a site for each department with the requested features. For instance HR requested Announcements, Links, FAQ's, Document Library, PTO Request form and Change of Information form.
3. Groups and Roles of users
Next we identified the different roles or groups of people who will use the intranet: ViaScope employees were grouped into the following roles: Administrators, Content owners, Readers. We also created groups for contractors and vendors. Then we were able to assign each group to their respective content.
4. Site Branding
ViaScope chose one of the dataBridge SBI color schemes that best matched their company colors and provided us with their logo. The dataBridge design team created a branded header for their intranet.
5. Communication outside of the company
ViaScope also identified the need for a "Projects" area so they could have a secure client workspace for each client where they could store all client communications, files, and timelines. We created a Projects Site Template with the features ViaScope requested; (Document Library, Project Task List, Announcements, Discussion Board and Links) then created a private client site for each of ViaScope's clients. From the template ViaScope can create a new client site with just a few mouse clicks. Giving clients' access is as easy as adding the client email address and typing their name. SharePoint does the rest by sending them an email with their user name and password and a link to their project site.
6. Document Management
Companies of all sizes struggle with document management. This is one area where SharePoint really excels. We discussed with ViaScope how categorizing the documents and adding meta-data would help end users easily find the information they were looking for and guided them in setting up their document management center complete with automatic versioning and check-in/check-out of documents.
7. Directories – (Employee, Vendor, Contactor, Client)
We created a directory to track employee, client, contractor and vendor contact information. Now these directories are always current and a reliable place for ViaScope to find anyone's contact information.
8. Knowledge Management
SharePoint Wiki's (just like the famous Wikipedia) are a great resource for sharing information and documenting ideas. We set up a Wiki for the ViaScope developers to document best bets, issues, solutions and questions. The developers use the "Alert Me" notification feature which is available throughout SharePoint to receive notifications via email when new content is added to the site.
9. Project Management
Both internal and client project management are more efficient and productive. The executive team at ViaScope now has the ability to see the current status of any project, who the individual tasks of each project are assigned to and the status of each task.
10. Training
In addition to having a dedicated SharePoint expert to work with you dataBridge also gives your entire company access to online SharePoint training. Complete with Self Pace Training Modules and Best Practices. From Beginner to Advanced these training videos allow you to learn at your own pace. Plus we add new videos each month and let you submit ideas for their content.
The ViaScope Intranet
Today ViaScope has a secure online SharePoint intranet that is branded for their company. (half of the winning intranets from Jakob Nielsen's 10 Best Intranets of 2009 used Microsoft SharePoint) The home page of their Intranet displays the latest company announcements, a message from the president, corporate calendar events, links to frequently used resources and the current month's birthdays and anniversaries.
They have a site for each of their departments where documents and information are placed and automatically versioned. Where forms are now online and get routed to the appropriate person when they are completed. Contractors and vendors now have access to the information they need but not access to the rest of the intranet and each client has their own site with secure access to only their information which helps ViaScope better manage client projects and expectations.
