Case Study: How Cloud Coach replaced spreadsheets, ServiceNow, Sharepoint, MS Project and Outlook at Wellstar

Cloud Coach was introduced to Wellstar Health Systems Enterprise Project Management Office (EPMO) by Salesforce in late 2019. The EPMO is a large business function representing the organization at a strategic level in collaboration with Wellstar’s executive team and all functional area leaders within the organization.

The goal of this centralized office is to manage the demand and prioritization of all proposed capital initiatives within the organization while also providing company-wide guidance, governance, standardized processes, and project management best practices to all initiatives in flight. For this, organizations leverage Project Portfolio Management tools such as Cloud Coach.

Wellstar’s Business Challenge

Being nationally ranked and the largest Healthcare organization in Georgia, the main challenge for the EPMO was not necessarily a lack of vision and best practices. The challenge was that their current technology was holding them back rather than enabling them to execute on these processes. The cause of this challenge is something many EPMO, PMOs, and business groups face today.

The Problem

A supplemental PPM solution within an IT-centric platform being forced onto a business user group despite their contrasting needs, tendencies, and preferences.

In this specific instance, ServiceNow.

Key Challenges (w/ ServiceNow):

Poor adoption for business users due to a complex UI and system process designed for IT users within an ITSM environment; rather than PPM
Inability to configure the system or create reports with EPMO resources. In an always-changing environment such as healthcare, the ability to quickly adapt visibility, processes, and data capture was a must-have.
Poor visibility for stakeholders impacted by initiatives due to limited external portal functionality.

The Solution

Cloud Coach, a fully native Salesforce solution.

Partnering with Salesforce enables Cloud Coach to focus all product development into the usability and effectiveness of the solution, as it pertains to PPM. In addition, not compromising on the configurable, secure, and reliable nature of the Salesforce platform was just as important.

While IT-focused solutions like ServiceNow have “features” to address these needs for IT-related projects, Cloud Coach serves as the only Salesforce native solution with full PPM capabilities.

Key solutions:

Easy to use UI, with B2C design principles inherent with the Salesforce platform, extended with Cloud Coach
Dynamic forms for Idea capture are available across the organizations. The ability to make these forms dynamic(using Salesforce Flows) ensure no stakeholder is overburdened with unnecessary lines of questioning and an overall negative initial experience working with the EPMO
Declarative configurations and enablement of Wellstar internal teams of core Salesforce (Admin certifications, Trailheads, Cloud Coach Training)

The Results

One place, one systemto manage all incoming proposed initiatives, request and confirm approvals from functional area leaders, execute projects and tasks, and report on portfolios. Cloud Coach has effectively replaced much of what previously lived in a combination of spreadsheets, ServiceNow, Sharepoint, MS Project, and Outlook.

As important as it is that the efficiency of all these procedures has improved, what might be of most value is the increased visibility and communication with those interacting with the EPMO across the organization. As with any customer-facing solution such as Salesforce CRM, it is just as important for the EPMO to ensure every touchpoint with a Wellstar employee is painless and transparent. More willingness to interact with the EPMO means more ideas getting submitted from all roles and perspectives across the organization. It means more departments can share insight and feedback when needed. It means executives can set expectations and parameters that keep all initiatives on track within a higher-level strategy. In summary, org-wide innovation is now supported with a best-of-breed system.

Key Results:

Increased transparency and trust between EPMO and other stakeholder groups
Accelerated delivery and savings per user due to having one tool for planning, project execution, time tracking, and more.
Significant savings in development costs via internal IT or report building via Deloitte

Previous technology replaced by Salesforce

ServiceNow, Sharepoint, MS Project

AUTHOR

Cloud Coach

Cloud Coach specializes in enterprise-class project, PSA & PPM software built for businesses that want to make strategic investments in their success.

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