Problem
Before ScopeStack, Connection used what Senior Data Center Practice Manager Heather Eakin describes as a “pretty painful mail merge situation.”
Connection’s team of 20 SOW authors relied on Microsoft Access, Word, and Excel to generate statements of work. Eakin had a template for each sales sub and contract type. That would be challenging to manage for any VAR or MSP, but it was particularly inefficient for a provider as large as Connection.
The company’s focus on providing customer-centric solutions tailored to meet the unique needs of small- to medium-sized businesses, enterprise, and public sector markets required a library of over 100 templates! Updating templates was a time-consuming process, and copying and pasting information from one document to another could lead to errors.
“An engineer would have to create a separate document each time,” Eakin said. “Collaborating in Word with template inputs from several engineers would take three to five hours.”
Connection’s engineers had to pull a service offering from a Word Doc every time it was used, and that could create inconsistent language and pricing differences. If someone pulled the wrong language the team would have to spend time correcting the document. That was especially hard to deal with if the person who originally wrote the SOW had left the company.
Those issues were rare, but even when everything was done perfectly, the process was inefficient. Language had to be copied from one document, pasted into another, reformatted, and proofread.
Solution
Connection decided to use ScopeStack so their team could deliver consistent statements of work with a high level of accuracy more efficiently. The platform gives their SOW authors a foundation to start from and they can edit it in the platform without the risk of introducing errors from cutting and pasting.
“Now, I just choose a sales sub and contract type, and ScopeStack pulls in the appropriate language,” Eakin said. “It’s easier to make changes and we’re more agile when we need to update language.”
Results
Once Connection added its service catalog to ScopeStack, the team’s efficiency increased dramatically. What used to take half a day now takes less than half an hour.
“We’re able to collaborate in ScopeStack and get a SOW out in 15 to 20 minutes,” Eakin said.
In addition to increased efficiency, Connection has been happy with ScopeStack’s ability to meet emerging needs.
“The ScopeStack team has been really responsive,” Eakin said. “If they couldn’t do something, they were able to get it developed.”