Overview.

Denma Social Enterprises provides social services and supported accommodation to vulnerable young people in and around Aylesbury. They have 20 case workers who work across two assisted living accommodations. As the business has grown, centralised file storage and security have become crucial. Denma reached out to Atomyc to help them modernise key parts of their system to provide better access to files for case workers, reduce and centralise their licensing costs and improve security.

Challenges.

• Files were stored on a OneDrive personal account on the central services computer. This meant file sharing with case workers was done over email. Making centralised file management and data security difficult.
• Caseworkers all use Microsoft 365 Personal to license Microsoft Office on their devices. This was difficult to manage and not cost-effective.

Solution.

Licensing

To solve these problems, we recommended a simple and cost-effective licensing structure.

• Microsoft 365 Business Standard for the central services computer.
• Microsoft 365 F1 for the caseworkers

By giving the central services computer a Business Standard license, we provided the user of this device with everything they needed to work with, including a copy of Microsoft Office. Business Standard comes with a SharePoint license, allowing us to create a Team site to store files that the case workers can access.

F1 licenses are perfect for the case workers. Costing only £1.85 per user per month, including email, file storage, office online and security, it’s a highly cost-effective and feature-rich license. Often underused by businesses. By using Office Online, which is included in the F1 license, Denma can move away from Microsoft 365 Personal, saving significant money each year.

Data Migration

Migrating the data from OneDrive Personal to SharePoint Online is a manual task. Unfortunately, the SharePoint migration tool cannot be used with OneDrive Personal. The SharePoint migration tool is how we would normally migrate data from an on-premise server to the Cloud. In this instance, basic scripts were used to move the data and check its integrity.

Data Access

Once the data was migrated to SharePoint Online, the case workers could access the newly created Team site through OneDrive online, Teams or by installing OneDrive locally. We created documentation that the case workers could refer to explaining how to access the system in whichever way suits them.

Project Approach.

Framework

We use the PRINCE2 approach for all our projects. This ensures that projects are structured correctly and have strong stakeholder alignment. We focus heavily on planning, preparation and user adoption to decrease the likelihood of unknowns on go-live day.

Project Plan

Our projects always follow the same stages – initiation, design, delivery and closure. Sign-off is required before we move from one stage to another. A project plan is created detailing the project management team, communication plan, quality management, risk management, key dates, important details and impact. Sign-off on this plan is required before moving to the delivery stage. This ensures there is strong stakeholder alignment before the project commences.

User Adoption

User adoption is key to the success of any project. All affected users receive easy-to-understand documentation explaining what is happening, why, when and how it will impact them.

To bolster the written user adoption material, all projects have the option of a video briefing. During the video briefing, we run through the project plan with the users and it is also a great opportunity to ask any questions. We believe in working closely with stakeholders and impacted users to deliver a smooth project.

Feedback and Continuous Improvement

Built into our process is a system of logging issues and collecting feedback. Any issues encountered are stored in the projects ‘issue register’. These are reviewed, and solutions are built into future projects to prevent the issue from occurring again.

At the end of each project, we seek transparent feedback from stakeholders, enabling us to continuously improve.

Conclusion.

The migration was completed successfully in the agreed-upon time scales with no significant challenges. Denma now has a central location to store files, central licensing management, cost savings on their licensing, and additional security benefits contained in the F1 license.

Feedback.

How satisfied were you with the overall quality and frequency of communication? – Very Satisfied

How satisfied were you with the overall responsiveness to queries during this project? – Very Satisfied

How satisfied were you that stakeholders and users understood and were prepared for the project? – Very Satisfied

Additional feedback – Always very helpful and good response time to queries.

How satisfied were you with the overall technical expertise of the project manager and engineers involved in this project? – Very Satisfied

Additional feedback – very helpful and knowledgeable.

Was the business interruption inline with your expectations? – Yes

Were the project objectives met to your satisfaction? – Very Satisfied

What did you like most about our service? – Very responsive to queries.

What areas do you think we could improve on? – None.

Do you think our services are 5-star? – Yes

Paul Jennings- Denma Social Entreprises