Case Study: The Strategics Group
View the Case Study in PDF format.
Download PDF Viewer
The Strategics Group Uses Mangomindsm to Create a Virtual Office for Consulting Partners
Mangomind’s secure shared workspace improves work flow efficiency for document
distribution and collaboration with mobile employees.
Challenge:
The Strategics Group needed a way in which their mobile consulting partners could more efficiently
access, organize and collaborate on project information.
Solution:
The Strategics Group improved productivity with Mangomind by effectively creating a secure, shared
workspace without having to implement costly physical infrastructure.
About The Strategics Group
The Strategics Group is a management consulting firm that helps companies increase profits by
offering new and better ways to manage people, processes and information. They work with clients
through four key improvement stages: Strategy Development, Process Improvement, Cultural
Integration of Technology, and Performance Management.
As a consulting firm that specializes in helping clients choose the right technologies for business,
The Strategics Group themselves felt the need to find and use the best automating technology available
to improve internal workflow processes. To leverage valuable time resources and knowledge assets
within their remote group, they needed a robust virtual work environment.
"We find Mangomind to be one of those simple and effective technologies that save us both time and
money," said Prem Sundaram, Consulting Partner of The Strategics Group. "As part of our virtual office
collaborative environment, we use Mangomind to effectively give us a shared, managed workspace, without
the physical IT infrastructure that is normally needed. Mangomind enables the formation of an
easy-to-use virtual office environment providing a focal point for our shared work, allowing us to
spend more time being effective, and not wasting time traveling in traffic intensive Southern California."
Secure Online Collaboration
The Strategics Group uses Mangomind to share the folders and document files which serve as the firm’s
knowledge in an online collaborative fashion. Creating and using a distributed knowledge base is essential
to the firm’s business. By allowing easy access to the information seamlessly from a mapped Windows
Internet Drive, Mangomind provides a powerful solution for their mobile consultants. File encryption is
also important, as the consultants frequently work on company- and client-sensitive information.
"Prior to implementing Mangomind, we were just sending emails to each other with each of our
documents attached, and expecting each of us to manage our files individually. Saving email attachments
from colleagues, and trying to locate them in different places on our own machines doesn’t make for
efficient work flow or coordination," Sundaram continued.
Efficient Tracking of Document Versions
Mangomind allows efficient use of the file sharing space and eliminates the problem of having different
versions of Microsoft Office documents to track and that ultimately accumulate and waste space.
"In the past, when we created a proposal, we would waste time and effort by sending emails to
each other and ensuring only one person worked on a document in order to track changes. Now we can
all work on a document at any time and see if another user has the file open. While this is normal
for people working on a LAN, with Mangomind we have a virtual LAN with the same efficiency," stated
Sundaram.
Offline Access to Documents and File Synchronization Improve Productivity
The Strategics Group finds that offline access to documents on their Mangomind Drive and automated
synchronization when partners reconnect to the Drive provide the assurance that everyone has access
to the most up-to-date files.
"Mangomind’s simple and powerful offline synchronizing capability means that we can work and
hold copies of files on our machines even when we are not connected to the Internet. This is
especially useful for us. Now we know that all the Partners have access to the same files and
folders and can access them offline - for instance when using a laptop at a client site," Sundaram noted.
"Further," he continued, "if any changes are made while offline, we know that the changes will be
synchronized with everyone else when we reconnect online - without any manual effort or file copying
needing to take place. Before, it was very difficult to know who had what version of a document and
how one person’s changes would be incorporated into the final document. Mangomind provides a huge
time and administrative savings for us."
Significant Time Savings
The Strategics Group believes that the time and administrative savings of sharing files, being able to
edit a single version of a file, reduced email clutter, and improved file synchronization have improved
their internal productivity and workflow processes.
"The improvement probably amounts to about half an hour per day, which is at least 5% of our time,
not to mention future savings from improved group file management and the time we will save in spending
less time looking for the right information which, for a consulting firm like ourselves, is very valuable,"
noted Sundaram.
|
