Some legacies are unexpected, even for the longest continuously running company in Western Australia. Committed to advancing commerce since their inception in 1890, WA’s Chamber of Commerce and Industry (CCIWA) have been integral to the business landscape since.
Offering resources and support ranging from employee relations, economic forecasting, and policy development through to accounting, taxation, and advisory services, over 2,000 WA businesses and community members depend on CCIWA every month.
But when creaking on-premise IT became a drag on their operations, CCIWA knew they needed help to futureproof their purpose. Working to untangle their IT legacy, Brennan lifted CCIWAs operations into the cloud, unified disparate systems, and built a self-managed IT system.
CCIWA are by no means unique. Many businesses grapple with legacy systems. But taking a bold leap into the future needn’t mean taking risky jumps today. Here are three key considerations to help bridge the gap.
Help your people help you.
CCIWAs relationship with legacy IT systems were costing the non-profit dearly, gumming up workflows, and holding their team back from nimbler ways of working.
Now on the other side of a 100% cloud transition, the new systems have reduced logged tickets by 70%, slashing IT issue resolution, and enabling remote working. Effective device management via Microsoft InTune means processes that took weeks are now done in minutes. Software updates that took months are now mere 30-minute tasks.
Having thought about how changed user experiences could benefit their team, CCIWA backed it up with solutions to unlock them. It’s worth thinking about what transformation would look like to your people. Solutions that shrink or even eliminate time spent on the unnecessary can have a profound impact on their experience and your output.
Security is more than safety.
Representing large business interests as well as serving a large State Government client means robust protection against cyber-attacks and data leaks are vital to CCIWA.
Zero trust architecture, deployed alongside Microsoft InTune, now allows simple integration with programs like Microsoft Defender and a cost-efficient connection to Azure Sentinel.
Real-time device visibility and remote-management capabilities, including tools to instantly wipe compromised devices and quickly redeploy new ones, is another huge business boon.
Internally, the new security measures allow the CCIWA team to perform their tasks with diligence. Externally, the upgrades are a viewed as robust compliance adherence, creating trust in their dealings with clients and government agencies.
In an era where security is no longer a luxury, it’s worth thinking beyond solutions that keep your organisation safe to those that elevate trust, or even create new opportunities.
Lean budgets can still yield creative solutions.
As inflation pinches, business leaders are tightening the purse strings. But running lean is nothing new for CCIWA. Slender budgets and rigorous financial scrutiny tend to be the norm for non-profits.
CCIWA knew every dollar invested in IT would need to have an outsized impact. With their cloud transformation removing technical distractions and streamlining workflows, the entire CCIWA team now have extra bandwidth to support their members. And with Brennan sharing their knowledge, CCIWA can now manage more processes in-house, providing an additional dividend.
But innovation doesn’t always demand deep pockets. The use of micro innovation – using tech to unlock incremental changes that create measurable wins – can stimulate organisational change in ways that are just as profound as big-ticket investments.
Futureproofing your purpose can feel like a bold leap into the unknown. But taking small, considered, measurable IT decisions in the present can shrink the risks, helping bridge the gap between where you are and where you want to be.
Supporting CCIWA at every step of their IT transformation journey was Australia’s leading MSP, Brennan.
Read the case study here
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