WORKPLACE TRANS FORMATION

Australian stories of workplace transformation

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Workplace transformation projects are often unique to every organisation, determined by culture, leadership, operational environment and business need, however the outcomes are often strikingly similar. These include smarter, simpler and more efficient ways of working that help people to collaborate and engage more deeply with their work, each other and the organisation’s purpose.

‘Transformation’ doesn’t mean starting from scratch. For many, modernising the workplace is an evolution, not a revolution.

We spoke to two organisations that have recently completed workplace transformation projects about why they changed working processes, how they went about it, the results and lessons learned along the way. They include a regional emergency service provider and a national retailer.

If their stories inspire you to think about making your workplace a more collaborative and productive place – we’ve got the resources to help you get started and deliver great results.

Introduction

Queensland Ambulance Service Section 2

By the Numbers THE EVERYDAY CHALLENGE

4,000paramedics and staff

5 mil. Queenslanders served

1.7 mil. km2 covered

THE COMMONWEALTH GAMES

652 accredited officers

1.5 mil. spectators

6,600athletes and officials

111 vehicles

15,000volunteers

18 venues

Outcomes Instant communication of last-minute operational changes.

Team members feel heard and queries resolved faster.

Greater self-sufficiency and crowdsourcing removed bottlenecks.

Improved emergency response times.

Simplified, centralised and secure storage of key operational documents.

MISSION TECHNOLOGY Keep people safe at the 2018 Commonwealth Games through Office 365 and faster emergency response times and boosted capability. Microsoft Teams

The ProjectTeam

MONICA FARROW Executive Manager Operations, Emergency Operations

CHRIS PERERA Senior Operations Supervisor

CHRISTINE STOWER Director ICT Governance, Strategy and Performance

The Case for Change Tell us about where you stood as an organisation when you embarked on this change? Our workplace transformation journey centred around improving our response times as an emergency service provider. The population we serve is getting bigger and older. We really needed a way to scale communications cost-effectively and efficiently.

What was your old approach and how was that problematic? Getting key information to frontline staff more efficiently was a top priority. Previously, staff were travelling to command centres for important briefings before major deployments or they’d be contacted by phone or email, which was time-consuming and limited our response times.

What concerns were there before you got started? We needed an affordable and scalable system that would enable staff to securely store and access information wherever, whenever and however in life or death situations.

The trigger was Cyclone Debbie. It reinforced issues we’d been aware of around staff welfare, HR and deployment processes. It really gave us a sense of urgency around improving our real-time communication and briefing processes. MONICA FARROW Executive Manager Operations, QAS

Key Insight Frontline staff were required to attend briefings at command centres prior to big deployments. This was time consuming and impacted operations.

Info sharing priorities Real-time information about staff transport, accommodation and rostering. Storage of generic information like media guidelines, codes of conduct and weather.

The Project Getting started is sometimes the hardest part. Tell us how you launched this transformation? The Commonwealth Games was the catalyst to get this initiative off the ground. We started looking into options that would help improve communications among mobile teams.

What other solutions did you consider? After briefly considering WhatsApp, we decided to go with Microsoft Teams because it offered much of what we were looking for in terms of functionality but also had synergies and simpler integration with our existing Microsoft platform and tools. It just made sense to use something that already existed within our systems that could also provide additional functionality. Being directly connected with internal Microsoft resources helped us finally get the project across the line.

How did you encourage people to use the new technology? We tested the system internally with a small group to ensure it could do what was needed. Then we scheduled a workshop with the commanders who would be looking after each venue at the Commonwealth Games, showing them how to install Microsoft Teams and providing a user guide.

This was followed by a ‘train the trainer’ program in which we taught the commanders how to train their officers. Project champions were very active, creating videos and responding to questions. Luckily, staff were already comfortable using Microsoft technologies and had the opportunity to get hands-on and familiar with Teams before they were rostered onto the Commonwealth Games.

Hot Tip Create champions for change - people who can jump in right away to answer questions and address concerns.

Key Insight Change management needs to be led from the top. Active involvement from the Assistant Commissioner set the tone and helped drive employee adoption.

What’s

Key Insight Through Microsoft Teams, staff became more self-sufficient at resolving issues by ‘crowd sourcing’ the answers to problems.

Hot Tip Build in time to test key infrastructure, like your network.

You’ve now completed the launch. Tell us about some

happening now?

of the benefits? Staff now receive critical information via their devices as soon as it’s available. This has reduced the need for teams to attend command-centre briefings, saving time on travel. Each Commonwealth Games venue had its own Teams channel. Given the dynamic nature of the operating environment during the Games, it was crucial to ensure everyone assigned to specific venues had access to critical information and updates as soon as it became available.

Not everything goes to plan. Is there anything you’d have done differently in retrospect? With the benefit of hindsight, we would have conducted more testing on our infrastructure before launch.

How would you sum up the impact on your workplace? We’ve worked out a way to support our staff in real-time. That flexible communication and collaboration model around a specific purpose is especially valuable in our dynamic environment

Amart Section 3

By the Numbers

48 years in business

63 stores accross Australia

2,000+team members

6 distribution centres

across Australia

MISSION To amplify our culture by connecting and engaging our team across the nation. To increase transparency, promote bottom-up communication and encourage collaboration and knowledge sharing.

TECHNOLOGY Microsoft 365, Yammer and Microsoft Teams.

Outcomes Teams feel more tightly knit and connected to the bigger vision, no matter where they are.

Better, more customer-driven product decisions informed by those on the ground, selling.

Faster, clearer communication of key company announcements.

Instant team feedback.

Increase in employee morale.

The ProjectTeam

NICK SHELTON General Manager of People

STEVE NORMAN General Manager of Buying

PARTNER

The Case for Change Tell us about where you stood as a business when Our teams felt out of the loop and that prevented us you embarked on this change? from realising the true value of what we were doing. We had gone through a major growth spurt that had We saw an opportunity to get our people more resulted in opening many new stores. With growth involved and improve decision making. came process changes, which made it even more -Steve Norman important for us to have a strong communications system so that everyone was being kept up to date. -Nick Shelton

The business focus had also shifted to customer experience via improved product value, range and quality but how we communicated hadn’t kept up. -Steve Norman

We’ve experienced a significant amount of growth, and it was important for us to share the wonderful things about our business and immerse our new team members in our culture. We needed to adopt a more efficient and effective way of communicating with our team, and empower them to communicate what they are experiencing to us. NICK SHELTON General Manager of People, Amart.

What was your old approach and how was that problematic? We needed to communicate simultaneously with teams across the country but we were relying on emails, newsletters and cascading information from senior leaders to managers and the frontline. Sometimes the message was being diluted and the team members who are the receivers of that information were not always clear about what are we trying to achieve. -Nick Shelton

Key Info sharing Insight priorities Your project needs people at its heart to Company announcements, information achieve its full potential. about new processes and products.

Understanding what matters most to our team.

The Project Getting started is sometimes the hardest part. Tell us how you launched this transformation? We began our digital transformation in 2011 when we made a move to more secure and resilient cloud computing. Late last year we transitioned to a purpose-built facility equipped with state-of-the-art technology including Surface Hubs. Now we needed a frontline transformation and started to look at how to do that through our existing technology.

Tell us about getting your transformation off the ground? We decided to bring in a consultant, Adopt & Embrace, who helped us better understand our culture, environment, challenges and needs. They designed a strategy to address the collaboration and communication issues we were experiencing. The solution revolved around a combination of Microsoft 365, Yammer and Teams.

How did you encourage people to use the new technology? Before the launch, we recruited ‘Yammer champions’ from each division, including our Buying team, to share their behind-the-scenes content and help build our Yammer feed. We knew we were on the right track when a handful of our retail store teams piloted the platform - the uptake was instant, the engagement was organic, and our leaders could see the endless opportunities. The adoption program included launch events, workshops and lots of online resources to help team get familiar with the technology.

What concerns were there before you got started? There was initially some nervousness among senior leadership about the level of transparency being introduced but we’ve made a conscious effort not to overregulate the platform and that transparency has turned out to be a real strength.

Hot Tip Change management is a process with no defined end. Create an always-on learning culture with ongoing training and development.

Key Insight Technology represented 10 per cent of what Amart wanted to achieve. The other 90 per cent was culture. This is where a change management partner can play an important role.

What’s happening now?

Hot Tip When embracing new forms of communication like social platforms resist the temptation to overregulate behaviour. Allow flexibility and freedom for adoption to happen organically.

Key Insight Yammer has completely changed how Amart’s trade buyers feel about the buying process. They can receive instantaneous feedback and endorsement.

You’ve now completed the launch. Tell us about some of the benefits? Our Buying team get immediate feedback from team members based on customer conversations about specific products and service levels. This might be about product design or quality. This has already prompted improvements in range selection, packaging and labelling. The Property team are highly mobile and need to regularly discuss building new stores or renovating existing locations. They’ve picked up Microsoft Teams without formal training and are actively using it to make sure projects are on track without sending one hundred emails a day. They’re also using Yammer to share exciting developments with the wider team. Yammer has impacted our team’s morale. The most recent National Engagement Survey showed the highest annual increase in employee engagement that Amart has ever experienced.

Tell us about a scenario the system helped with? A Yammer post about a potential product instantly generated feedback from about 30 sales team members. This gave us an additional level of insight when making decisions on whether to go ahead and start stocking that product. Amart has also started using Yammer to help with training. Our Buying team uploads raw footage from the factory floor where products are being built so that our sales teams see what goes into making them. This gives them more confidence when they are helping our customers purchase products.

How would you sum up the impact on your workplace? It has amplified the culture we already had in place. Employee engagement and product decisions have improved dramatically. This ensures Amart is selling products that customers want in their homes.

With Yammer, our store teams can influence our decision making through their endorsement and by reinforcing what our customers want. That helps us make better decisions. NICK SHELTON General Manager of People, Amart.

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How can we help you?

Whether you’re saving lives or making houses feel like homes, Microsoft’s goal is to help you create happier, more productive and secure workplaces. We offer a range programs to support your workplace transformation projects. Check out our Ten Vital Tips for Workplace Transformation and contact your Microsoft account team or Microsoft partner to access and learn more.

Microsoft Resources Microsoft is focused on empowering every individual and every organisation to achieve more through digital transformation. It does this by offering you technology that you can use to empower employees, engage customers, optimise operations and transform your products. Here are some ways in which we can help.

Join us for a Customer Immersion Experience

Microsoft Australia offers a customer immersion experience to organisations that want a hands-on session to test drive the latest Microsoft productivity, security and other business tools. A trained facilitator guides you through applying them to real scenarios within your business and we will share examples of how other businesses are using our tools to drive workplace transformation. You can book a CIE at our offices through your Microsoft contact or Microsoft partner.

Leverage Microsoft FastTrack to roll out Microsoft technology

Microsoft customers with eligible subscriptions to Microsoft 365, Azure or Dynamics 365 can use FastTrack to help deploy new cloud solutions. Section This includes access to online tools and engineering expertise. There’s no additional cost for this service during the life of your subscription. Speak to your Microsoft contact or Microsoft partner about accessing these resources.

Engage with Microsoft deployment and adoption partners

Learn more and engage with a network of Microsoft partners such as Modern Workplace Alliance and Cloud Collective.

MODERN WORKPLACE ALLIANCE: A highly skilled alliance of five specialist partners - Insync, Engage2, Versor, XR Elements and Adopt & Embrace offering a complete Modern Workplace transformation – stemming technology, people and process. Speak to your Microsoft contact or Microsoft partner about accessing these resources.

CLOUD COLLECTIVE: The Cloud Collective comprises three Microsoft partners, Antares Solutions, Modality Systems and Quorum working as one organisation. Supported by Microsoft, the Cloud Collective aims to continue the dynamic paths of its individual companies as one entity and grow and adapt to the evolving mid-market demands of organisations.