Change Management leads to mutual Understanding and increased Productivity among 25'000 Employees

Initial Situation and Solution Benefits Customer Statement

isolutions implemented an adoption and change management program on behalf of the Swiss Federal Railways (SBB). SBB migrated more than 25‘000 users to Office 365 (O365), with the focus from the outset being on the intelligent integration of the application teams. This is now the linchpin of the Microsoft-based productivity platform. Use of the new platform increased by 200%.

Swiss Federal Railways (SBB) transports more than 1.32 million passengers and 200’000 tons of goods each day. Over 32’500 passionate employees help to make SBB the backbone of public transport and work to achieve the joint vision regarding mobility of the future.

Initial Situation

SBB launched the «NEXT» program to upgrade the entire workplace used by its employees. As part of this project, a broad range of O365 applications was rolled out and the employees’ devices at work were replaced, enabling IT costs to be substantially reduced. In addition to reducing costs, SBB wanted to increase productivity. To achieve this goal, it was essential to cultivate acceptance of the new applications SBB’s management team correctly identified that a digitalization project is not just technological in nature – it also has a cultural and social component to it. Both aspects had to be addressed as part of a competent change project. Alongside the technical implementation, isolutions supported SBB with this change project and trained SBB’s top executives.

Solution

Increasing productivity within a company calls for an understanding of various aspects of the employees’ day-to-day work lives. This includes the culture, the types of technology used, and the physical space – in this case the working environment. isolutions’ trainers and the technical advisers worked together with SBB to set out a joint goal: to boost the employee experience – by improving the aspects set out above – while increasing productivity. It was important to establish communication and information channels to more than 25‘000 employees. To achieve this, the senior executives – 120 in total – initially underwent training, during which they familiarized themselves with the new work tools. The focus was primarily on the importance of combining leadership, culture and technology.

The following principles were taken into account

Top management had to be included in the process from the outset.
The knowledge had to be provided to SBB’s own trainers.
This trainers would then become champions, or ambassadors, within the company.
The technical implementation had to be as effective as possible.
The training had to be carried out using the applications with which the employees needed to familiarize themselves.

increase in use of Microsoft Teams

significant increase in productivity

people of the top management trained

Benefits

Employees can prepare their own work environments based on the self-service model.
Substantial savings compared to the previous hosting model.
The scope of services offered by the workplace was greatly expanded.
Intensive supporting measures led to a high rate of adoption.

Customer Statement

Lea Meyer

Management, Chief Communication Officer | SBB

«The training courses helped the team to understand the new options offered by Office 365. As an organization, we will now learn new things on an ongoing basis.»