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04445Microsoft Office 2010Partner Solution Case StudyIT Services Firm Gains Collaborative Power with Microsoft Office 2010OverviewCountry or Region: United StatesIndustry: IT servicesPartner ProfileFounded in 1995, Jamison West Consulting Services (JWCS) is an IT services firm that offers managed IT services, back-up design, disaster recovery, and communication and network planning for small businesses. It has 10 employees.Business SituationJWCS needed a solution that would provide improved collaboration and communication capabilities, greater accessibility, faster computing, and higher efficiency, and that would give employee output a more professional appearance.SolutionJWCS deployed Microsoft Office 2010 to take advantage of e-mail management, collaboration, and presentation capabilities.BenefitsImproved internal collaborationHeightened client communicationEasy-to-teach technology“Without a doubt, Office 2010 has changed the way we do business. We’re boosting efficiency and productivity and saving time. Simply put, it’s opening up new opportunities for growth.”Jamison West, Founder and CEO, JWCS With 15 years of experience in the IT field and a small staff of 10, Microsoft Gold Certified Partner Jamison West Consulting Services (JWCS) offers a range of technical set-up and support services to more than 70 businesses in the Seattle area. JWCS relies on efficient task management to provide premier IT management services to its clients. Despite a driven, proactive approach, JWCS experienced daily slowdowns due to the inefficiency of its productivity software. The company sought a way to streamline computing tasks, improve the speed of frequently used applications, and simplify communication with clients. With the Microsoft Office 2010 suites, JWCS has seen a marked improvement in computing speed and efficiency. Employees have been able to streamline presentations to clients, simplify access to e-mail and voice mail, and facilitate internal accounting and record keeping. “Proposals used to take a full day of work because we had to merge and manage documents carefully to ensure that we included data from each user. Co-authoring with Microsoft OneNote and SharePoint cuts the process in half.” Jamison West, Founder and CEO, JWCSSituationFounded in 1995, Jamison West Consulting Services (JWCS) is a fast-paced, efficient company that prides itself on delivering the highest caliber of proactive IT planning and support. Comprised of only 10 employees, the company offers a variety of services related to disaster prevention, backup systems, and network set up. JWCS provides comprehensive planning and computer support to roughly 70 small and mid-sized businesses in Seattle and the surrounding areas. With a focus on IT services, keeping its own systems up to speed is crucial to JWCS's business. Despite its driven, proactive approach, JWCS experienced daily slowdowns due to the inefficiency of its productivity software. Employees spent a lot of time communicating with clients and prospects, so JWCS sought an organized and efficient system for sorting e-mail and voice mail. At the same time, the company wanted to increase the overall speed of its computer applications to simplify data access and connectivity.SolutionTo discover how it could improve the efficiency of internal collaboration and client communications, JWCS joined an early adopter program for Microsoft Office 2010. In November 2009, JWCS began taking advantage of capabilities in Microsoft Excel 2010, OneNote 2010, Outlook 2010, PowerPoint 2010, and Microsoft SharePoint Server 2010.BenefitsWith the Microsoft Office 2010 suites, JWCS has been able to solve many of its computing challenges. Flexible and intuitive features of Office 2010—including Microsoft PowerPoint, Excel, and Outlook—have significantly improved the end user experience by streamlining frequent tasks and boosting responsiveness.“Without a doubt, Office 2010 has changed the way we do business," says Jamison West, Founder and CEO of JWCS. "We’re boosting efficiency and productivity and saving time. Simply put, it’s opening up new opportunities for growth."Improving Internal CollaborationWith Office 2010 applications such as the Microsoft OneNote 2010 note-taking program and the Excel 2010 spreadsheet software, JWCS employees report that interoffice communication is easier and collaboration is quicker.“Proposals used to take a full day of work because we had to merge and manage documents carefully to ensure that we included data from each user,“ says West. “Co-authoring with Microsoft OneNote and SharePoint cuts the process in half.”* These features facilitate document sharing and editing between multiple users and help streamline collaboration.JWCS employees have also raved about the new functionality in Excel 2010, such as the Sparklines and Slicer features, which they can use to process company records more easily. Employees now seamlessly track time, rates, and other payroll information in a more intuitive spreadsheet format instead of the complicated dashboards and PivotTable views they used to use. And the new software makes it simple for employees and contractors to view only the information they need to accomplish daily tasks.“This system sells itself, and our customers are increasingly asking us to deploy it for them. Streamlining our clients across a single set of applications makes our jobs easier and our clients happier.”Jamison West, Founder and CEO, JWCS“Slicer has made PivotTables more user-friendly,” notes West. “Now we can just present engineers with a dashboard that has a simple menu where they click on their name to retrieve the data they need."Enhancements to Excel have also allowed West to access spreadsheet data in new ways, dramatically simplifying tracking and use of information. "We’re flat out getting better data, and we can understand it on a whole new level,” says West. “Sparklines and Slicer give us an in-house tool to analyze client and project profitability, saving hours each week.”Heightened Client CommunicationsIn addition to fostering a more efficient exchange of ideas internally, Office 2010 has dramatically improved employees’ ability to keep in touch with clients. For example, the Microsoft Outlook 2010 messaging and collaboration client introduces a feature called Quick Steps, which expedites the routine filing and processing of e-mail messages and saves JWCS staff a lot of time.“With the new Outlook, it takes less than half the time to work through e-mail," says West. "I've got it down to 6 or 7 Quick Steps that I use for about 80 percent of the e-mail I get. The new Outlook features are what's really exciting people."Another feature employees have enjoyed is Conversation View, which groups e-mail threads for quick and easy reference. “With Outlook 2010 and Exchange Server 2010, I don’t need to go back in time,” says Silas Smith, IT Technician at JWCS. “Conversation View makes it easy for me to see the last message on any given subject, so I can respond to clients faster."Easy-to-Teach TechnologyA large part of JWCS's business focuses on training and implementing technology solutions with their clients, many of whom do not have a lot of technical knowledge. Office 2010 has made it possible to get clients up to speed more quickly by facilitating remote presentations and making it easier to connect with other businesses.The Microsoft PowerPoint 2010 presentation graphics program, in particular, has been very useful in client communications. With one click, JWCS employees and their clients find it easy to open and run a PowerPoint presentation containing audio and video components.“I think there are a lot more ways we could interact with our clients using the PowerPoint Broadcast Slide Show,” says West. “It's a reasonably priced tool that is also very simple, so they can just click on a link without thinking too much.”West adds, "Using video in PowerPoint was very effective. It really created the ‘wow’ factor during our open house demos."What's more, the host of benefits offered by Office 2010 can be easily marketed to JWCS' clients for their own use. “This system sells itself, and our customers are increasingly asking us to deploy it for them,” notes West. “Streamlining our clients across a single set of applications makes our jobs easier and our clients happier.” A true win-win situation all around.Software and ServicesMicrosoft OfficeMicrosoft Excel 2010Microsoft OneNote 2010Microsoft Outlook 2010Microsoft PowerPoint 2010Microsoft Word 2010Microsoft Server Product PortfolioMicrosoft SharePoint Server 2010* Co-authoring capabilities require either Microsoft SharePoint Foundation Services or a free Windows Live account.This case study is for informational purposes only. MICROSOFT MAKES NO WARRANTIES, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, IN THIS SUMMARY.Document published March 2010For More InformationFor more information about Microsoft products and services, call the Microsoft Sales Information Center at (800) 426-9400. In Canada, call the Microsoft Canada Information Centre at (877) 568-2495. Customers in the United States and Canada who are deaf or hard-of-hearing can reach Microsoft text telephone (TTY/TDD) services at (800) 892-5234. Outside the 50 United States and Canada, please contact your local Microsoft subsidiary. To access information using the World Wide Web, go to:For more information about JWCS products and services, visit the Web site at: Microsoft Office 2010Microsoft Office 2010 gives your people powerful, timesaving tools to do their best work from more places. With new capabilities and insightful updates to Excel, PowerPoint, Word, and Outlook, Office 2010 offers the complete package—with familiar, intuitive tools. Now you can express ideas, solve problems, connect with people, and create amazing results—in the office, at home, or on the go.For more information about Microsoft Office, go to: ................
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