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Efficiently Manage EOS® Goals & Rocks with Microsoft 365

We recently interviewed our client Karrie Schwartz, COO and EOS Integrator® at Parallel Technologies. Here’s what Karrie had to say about her company’s challenge, the CTC solution, and the results:

Challenge

Parallel Technologies manages its business following the EOS Model®.

Not familiar with EOS or the associated book Traction? We are big fans. Here is a link to learn more: eosworldwide.com

At Parallel Technologies, we previously managed long-term goals, 90-day Rocks, issues, to-do items, and associated discussions and files using a variety of applications and storage locations. The process was convoluted and inefficient.

We had been using Excel for years, but were having the following issues:

• A lack of good visibility of the information
• A lack of understanding of the status of our Rocks
• The process was time-consuming to manage and report on. I (Karrie, the EOS Integrator) had to reach out to everyone on the team individually in order to collect data.

Because of these limitations, we didn’t know if there were issues with completing our Rocks until the end of the quarter–when it was too late to make adjustments.

We needed a better solution for managing and reporting on our Goals and Rocks. We had looked at other third-party solutions, but didn’t feel they were worth the expense for the value they delivered, especially given the ongoing monthly subscription cost.

Solution:

While Jan was coaching me and looking for ways to increase my productivity, she learned about this time-consuming and inefficient process. Jan suggested that CTC build out a custom solution for us to help mitigate the problem–this is a service that CTC does for many clients.

We hired CTC Productivity to build a solution to manage EOS that met our exact needs for tracking our Goals and Rocks.

This solution would allow us to manage that same information using an integrated and comprehensive solution that lived fully within Microsoft 365. We were already paying for this toolset, so there would be no added ongoing cost. This was a big selling point for us.

With CTC’s help, we determined that the solution was to be scalable so we could expand the EOS solution in the future. This would allow us to manage meeting agendas, meeting information, scorecards, tasks, issues, opportunities, and more using only Microsoft 365. This would be a more robust solution that CTC could also build for us. Additionally, the scalability would include the option of extending the solution to more levels of the organization.

These are the goals we set for this project:

Project Goals:

• Organize EOS Goals and Rocks information in a coherent and efficient manner using Microsoft 365
• Develop a system that eliminates duplicate and siloed information
• Make EOS management information transparent to the appropriate employees, including information that should be communicated to a wider audience of employees
• Make live, up-to-date information available on all devices and on a single interface
• Reduce management’s time finding and maintaining pertinent information
• Eliminate as much navigational effort as possible

Results:

We are very happy with the solution CTC built for us, and we plan to scale the solution as we roll out EOS management to all levels of the organization. Here are some of the benefits we’ve seen since bringing CTC on, and their value to our team.

Benefits we’ve seen:

• Reduced preparation time for Annual, Quarterly, and Weekly Meetings
• Central location for all groups so everyone can be self-sufficient and see the status without the Integrator’s involvement
• No need to use VPN
• Access from anywhere, including from phones
• Better visibility keeps people on track
• Can easily adjust permissions when job responsibilities change
• Everyone can now see progress and are not dependent on the Integrator to share status
• Removed a lot of the excuses for why work was not being completed

Value:

• Reduced management stress
• Faster time to decisions
• Fewer errors and miscommunications
• Improved organizational performance due to better communication of strategy and resolution of issues
• More time and thought directed toward strategy due to less time spent searching for, and managing, information
• Better efficiency moving forward due to increased usage and knowledge of Microsoft 365

ROI:

One-time Cost: $3k

Ongoing Cost: $0

ROI Measurement: The time EOS Integrator spent annually collecting, managing, and reporting data.

Before: 66 hours/yr.

After: 6 hours/yr.

We recently interviewed our client Tim Horsch, President of Pioneer Sales Group. 

Here’s what Tim had to say about his company’s challenge, the CTC solution, and the results:    

Challenge 

One of our key resources, a 17-year veteran, was retiring from our company. We hired someone to learn her job and the current workflow. However, after 18 months on the job, she was still having issues following our systems. In addition to our hire’s individual struggles with our system, things kept falling through the cracks, even with veteran employees on our team. Team members did not have a good system for tracking follow-up work, so our customers periodically had to remind us that they still needed an answer on something. This was not acceptable, and we needed a way of being more proactive.  

Upon further reflection, we decided that we needed a new, more intuitive system. This was largely in part due to the productivity and customer service issues; however, it was also causing incredible frustration among our team members. Making matters worse, because of our employees’ frustrations with the systems and the issues that were arising, our team members assumed that they were not good at their jobs, which was negatively affecting morale.   

In addition, we were, at the time, using a hybrid technical solution that combined tools from Google and Microsoft. Every 3-6 months Microsoft or Google would run updates that caused the two systems to stop functioning together. This added to the team’s frustration and productivity struggles. We knew that unless we did something about it, we were just going to keep fighting this same battle with our technology. We decided that we needed to consolidate our toolset onto one platform.   

Because we had been growing increasingly concerned about security on the Google platform, and because Microsoft 365 came highly recommended by our peers, we opted to make the switch to Microsoft 365.   

We hoped to institute a more effective way of running the business so that new resources could be productive from day one, and we could spend less time and frustration in the training process and beyond. 

Solution: 

After making the decision to switch to Microsoft 365, we knew we needed to leverage experts to help us. We decided to bring in CTC Productivity to guide us in setting up the new system and helping us to solve our workflow issues.   

CTC Productivity’s technical team migrated the entire system from Google to Microsoft 365. Their business application experts identified a better process to manage follow-up and task tracking by leveraging the Microsoft suite of tools.   

Once the system was set up and optimized, CTC Productivity’s team recommended 1:1 training to supplement the group training. The goal here was to help with system adoption and provide a deeper understanding of the tools. This proved to be highly beneficial. It allowed individuals to ask questions about the new system and ensured that each person understood the tools fully and had the necessary confidence to follow the new workflow.   

We originally thought the entire process would take 3 months, but we ended up doing much more than originally planned. For example, we had been having issues with Verizon where live calls would be put on hold as incoming calls were coming in. Verizon could not solve the issue for us.  When we mentioned our frustration to the CTC team, they recommended we migrate to Microsoft 365 Business Voice, which is a cloud-based VoIP phone system. This was not part of the original scope of what we were planning to do, but it was a huge win for our team and saved us a lot of frustration and embarrassment with our customers.  

This new process and our work with CTC have provided tremendous value to our team. We didn’t realize how much we were in the dark ages, not taking advantage of the available technology. You don’t know what you don’t know until you dive in, and it was well worth it.  

Results:   

The overall investment was larger than we had anticipated as we didn’t account for some of the extra services and features, we could leverage. However, without a doubt, I would do it again. We are very happy with the results we have seen.  

Since rolling out the new system very few balls have dropped! We have happy customers that get their answers on the first call/email and don’t have to follow up with us to check on statuses. Plus, we now have an easy process for leaders to take over quotes when necessary.    

In terms of personnel, we recently onboarded two new people and without the new system, we would have been devastated. Our new technical environment is easy for new and existing employees to understand and follow, and our employees’ stress levels are much improved. We have seen an increase in job satisfaction since the switch.   

We used to frequently have issues getting on Teams calls, but there are now zero issues with our new technical environment.  

Microsoft’s VoIP solution, Business Voice, was also well worth the investment. Not only did it stop the call issues we were having, it costs less than Verizon and we don’t have to buy company phones for some of our employees.  We rely on chat, posts, and video meetings for communication.   

The security concerns we were having with Google also went away when we switched to Microsoft 365. Our Microsoft Secure Score went from 29 to 65. From what I understand, for a company like ours without strict compliance needs, the goal is to reach a score of 60-70. This score is important as it can affect cybersecurity insurance costs and peace of mind.  

We are thrilled with the results we have seen since bringing CTC on to help us streamline our workflow. We plan to bring CTC back for more training in the future to help us continue to leverage Microsoft 365’s suite of tools. 

Project Cost, Timeline, & ROI  

One-Time Project cost $9k

Ongoing cost $0

Project timeline 3 mos

ROI:  Without the new system in place, we would have had to onboard an additional inside sales rep. That would have been an added cost of $60k – $ 100k annually. 

We recently interviewed our client Adam Frericks, Vice President of States Manufacturing. 

Here’s what Adam had to say about his company’s challenge, the CTC solution, and the results:  

Challenge 

Our workflow from sales through engineering was highly inefficient. We had no clear record of what our sales team had committed to customers, we had inefficient tools to do resource planning for our engineering team, and we could not quickly find pertinent information in our tracking system. The project status was also very scattered–we had to look at individual file folders and email inboxes to determine a project’s status, rather than having everything centrally located. We typically have 6 people involved in every project, which also adds a layer of complexity.  

When there was a scope change, our existing process made it extremely difficult to assess and estimate. We had good visibility of individual projects, but there was no supervisor’s portal where we could see all projects together and how to schedule next steps.  

In addition, our ERP offered insufficient reporting, as well as the inability to manipulate data. We needed a project tracking tool and handoff mechanism that was simpler to use, had stronger visibility for the individual steps of each project, afforded us the ability to manipulate all of our data, and that we could easily train our staff to use. We determined that we needed a better system with more efficient tools.  

Solution: 

Upon evaluation, we realized we needed help. You can’t develop the right solution until you uncover the underlying problems, so we decided we needed an expert to dig in and identify the root problems before we could find the solution. We didn’t even know for sure what our pain points were, but we did know something wasn’t working.  

We originally felt we needed help from an expert in our industry, but early on we found that this was actually not important. What we learned we needed was an expert in process improvement and Microsoft 365, so we turned to CTC Productivity. We had a history with the company and had seen value in their services in the past.  

Working with CTC was pivotal to our success. They helped us: 

• Have a fresh perspective. It was critical to bring in outside resources. They would share new ideas and we would try to break them. This was a highly effective and even enjoyable process. 
• Lay out a vision and a plan for how to get there. Often you don’t know what you don’t know until someone presents a new approach for you to consider. 
• Understand how to fully leverage the power of Microsoft 365 with better task management, handoffs between teams, and reporting. 
• Leverage our existing Microsoft tools to keep ongoing costs down as there was no additional upfront or ongoing system cost. 
• Understand SharePoint. We did not have the experience to know what was possible or how to build it out. CTC demonstrated their expertise in this area. 
• By leading the project. No one on our team had time to lead, nor the type of skills necessary. We had project management experience, of course, but not for this type of project. We also would have had to sacrifice a resource to lead the project and we didn’t have the capacity to do so. 
• Reduce the number of emails for communication.  SharePoint allows for better, more streamlined communication between team members. 
• Train our internal resources to be able to manage the tool long-term. We didn’t even think to ask for this at the start of the project and were thankful that CTC suggested it as a smart, long-term strategy to keep costs down. 
• Understand the importance of streamlining the workflow before building the solution. This was critical to the success of the new tools.  
• Identify that we didn’t have all the right roles defined. No other vendors did it this way. This was key. 
• Clarify the roles and responsibilities of our team members. Drafting roles and responsibilities helped us explain to others how they would fit into the long-term solution when we pitched it to the rest of the company. The roadmap of responsibilities was key to see the gaps in our processes. Historically we would assign tasks to a department, but didn’t get as granular as specifying an individual or role within that department, which wasn’t thorough enough to ensure that the workflow was running smoothly. 

Results:   

Managing this process is much easier with our enhanced visibility to staff and department workloads. We can easily see our resource planning, and our schedule is now based on availability and capacity, rather than gut instinct. With two clicks of the mouse, we can see everyone’s availability and how far out they are scheduled.  

 Our Engineers like the new process and software, and they feel empowered to schedule their own time accordingly and have a more accurate schedule. We are more confident that we can meet our deadlines using factual, accurate data to plan, and we now have a proactive versus reactive discussion if our staff feel they can’t meet a deadline.  

 In addition to our management view of availability and in-process projects, our employees now have individual views of their own active projects and tasks as well. This allows them to not feel overwhelmed by data and they now know exactly where they need to focus their time and energy. Our Engineers have their own active project list which alerts them when it is their turn in the process.  

 We are thrilled with the streamlined project management that comes with using Microsoft 365. We are able to easily see which projects still need a kickoff meeting, we have a tool and quality data for forecasting and future project planning, and we can capture timestamps to understand the length of submittals/projects and use this information for future planning and forecasting. It has also made engineering deliverables and dates more transparent to the other groups (sales and operations). Now everyone knows when we are meeting and the status of various projects. Production can plan more accurately and sales can see each project status and keep customers updated. This has put a stop to constant interruptions, as we are no longer constantly asking each other for the status of projects.  

 As a fast-paced organization, we appreciate the transparency and improved communication that comes with having one central place to find information. The simplified process has reduced the amount of finger-pointing between departments and has saved time and energy, while simultaneously reducing confusion.  

 Our new solution allows our lead engineers to more effectively manage their areas of responsibility. They have the information they need to answer day-to-day questions versus having questions being raised to management. The enhanced calendar view and reporting have also made a huge impact on the efficiency of our team across the board. 

 When we decided to work with CTC Productivity, we didn’t realize we would get a system that is so sophisticated. They shared their knowledge of process improvement, which was a great learning opportunity for all of our team members. We now feel confident that we will know what to do when having process issues in other areas. We saw great value in defining the high-level workflow before building out our processes, as each department had a different opinion about the process. Defining everything from the start ensured that everyone was on the same page.  

 We were pleasantly surprised at how quickly we saw results from the changes CTC made. For example, within one hour of working with our CTC lead, we had completely revamped our Excel quoting tool. With the average annual compensation for engineers being around $100k, leveraging their time more efficiently is completely priceless. 

Project Cost, Timeline, & ROI 

Onetime Project Cost: $58k 

Ongoing cost: $0 

Timeline: 4 mos to fully operational system & trained staff 

ROI: Sales gained an average of 54 days/yr that they can now spend on selling rather than chasing down the status of a project for a customer. This is simply one easily calculated example of the many ways this process improvement has impacted the efficiency at States Manufacturing.