Round the clock with workactive
Corinne Williams of Nationwide speaks to Pam Beaty about the
work extranet.
When work was launched, we were a new start-up
with everything to prove. But if you start from scratch you also have
a clean sheet of paper. We were free to buy the best technology we
could afford and we could do what we wanted with it. Many larger companies,
shackled by the limitations of legacy systems, would envy us that freedom.
From the very beginning, we wanted to create an online account management
system to improve communication with our clients. Nothing can replace
the human touch in our relationships with clients; but if technology
can deliver key information and transactional efficiency at a keystroke,
everyone has more time to deal with the important stuff. And how many
client/agency relationships have been ruined by poor communication?
Nothing on the market was quite right for our purposes, so we decided
to build our own system. workactive is a web-enabled
database system that gives clients 24/7 access to the key business
and management information on their account. Access to the site is
password-protected and SSL encryption is available for the handling
of sensitive information. The system has been built with MS SQL Server
but, because we have developed the system in-house, we have complete
freedom to change and customise its functionality for individual clients.
It's also incredibly easy to use. A graphical interface means any approved
user can add content without advanced programming skills.
The basic design includes EDI connections to Adserve (our finance
application) so users can access activity information in virtually
any form that is convenient: these range from a searchable list of
bookings past and present, to a calendar-based clash diary. PDF files
of proofs and final work can be attached to job records and we can
also sort jobs by region, media or any other significant criteria.
Our clients are helping us to refine the system and develop new functions.
For example, workactive can now provide market intelligence
bulletins (updated daily) from diversity data to new about companies
who are hiring or firing. In one case we are linking up with an employer's
PeopleSoft system, so that we can correlate recruitment performance
with attrition figures. This is a new insight: we've gone beyond "Did
we fill the job?" to "Are we recruiting the right people?"
When we introduce work active to clients for the first time, they
are invariably surprised by the low cost of the system. Even in its
most basic, untuned form, workactive delivers tremendous
functionality. But the same people who start by saying, "It's too good
to be true" usually end up wondering how they ever did without it.
As Head of Recruitment at Nationwide Building Society, Corinne
Williams works between two UK offices - Swindon and Northampton. "I've
found that workactive keeps me in touch with what
my teams are doing. It doesn't matter where I am or what I'm doing,
I never lose sight of the big picture. And because it's available
around the clock, I can catch up whenever it's convenient to me.
It's reassuring to know that you could log in at midnight if necessary,
and still be able to see what was going on."
"We're a volume advertiser, and in the past there's always been
that worry that you might tip up in the same newspaper with ads
from different parts of the business. It's not cost-effective and
it doesn't look good. workactive allows us to
pick up clashes before they happen, and perhaps plan a more strategic
approach."
"Another thing I didn't foresee was the way it speeds up decision-making.
It stands to reason that if you're producing genuinely innovative
or challenging recruitment communications, you will need to get
approval from a range of stake-holders. With workactive,
we can put ideas in front of people, instantly and simultaneously,
whereas in the old days we might have had to set up a whole series
of meetings. If sharing ideas is easy, you can have more ideas.
And because consultation is easier, we do it more, and people feel
more involved in what we are doing. And guess what? More ideas get
through."
"Finally I should say that no-one has ever accused me of being
a computer expert. If I can use workactive, anyone
can!"
