The Swedish Red Cross (SRC) provides humanitarian services through a network of staff and volunteers who rely on up-to-date messaging technology to coordinate projects and mobilize crisis response. However, its Lotus Notes e-mail service was only available to staff, and it did not provide the level of reliability or mobility that SRC needed to maximize organizational productivity. SRC chose Microsoft Online Services, gaining hosted communication and collaboration services that bring volunteers into the organization through Active Directory Domain Services. Now staff and volunteers can use the same tools to build more cohesive field operations with e-mail and instant messaging services that offer mobile access to information. SRC no longer pays SEK 250,000 (U.S.$35,000) annually for “push” e-mail services. Since launch, Web mail and instant messaging usage has increased by 50 percent.
Situation
Created in 1865, the Swedish Red Cross (SRC) is one of the Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement's oldest national societies. SRC is the biggest humanitarian voluntary organization in Sweden, with approximately 500 employees, 250,000 members, and 40,000 volunteers who contribute their spare time to improve conditions for other people.
 | Our staff and volunteers are using Microsoft Online Services to increase the efficacy of our humanitarian projects through reliable communications that build cohesive, productive field operations. |  |
| Joakim Pettersson-Winter
Chief Technology Officer, Swedish Red Cross | |
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SRC helps to develop community across the country through informal meeting places called “Mötesplats Kupan,” support visits to isolated people, and a crisis line staffed by trained volunteers. Its network of volunteers provide assistance to asylum seekers and refugees and coordinate disaster response and emergency services. SRC also operates the Local International Cooperation Program. This program enables local Red Cross branches in Sweden to support projects in other countries.
The mission of SRC is to improve the lives of vulnerable people by mobilizing the power of humanity. To accomplish this mission in today’s world, SRC relies on the power of technology. And it is the job of Joakim Pettersson-Winter, Chief Technology Officer at the Swedish Red Cross, to ensure that SRC’s IT infrastructure supports the organization’s mission. Given the distributed nature of SRC operations, providing reliable, user-friendly communication and collaboration technologies is one of his main concerns.
Pettersson-Winter and his nine colleagues in the IT department reevaluated the organization’s Lotus Notes 6.5 e-mail service and the dozens of Lotus Notes applications that had evolved over the years. The Lotus-Domino environment requires the Domino Director directory service; however, the rest of the organization’s IT infrastructure consists of Microsoft technologies. IT staff use Active Directory Domain Services to manage the identities and relationships that make up the Microsoft environment network.
“It was a wasteful use of IT resources to manage two directories as our users are registered on both Active Directory and Domino Director,” says Pettersson-Winter. “Of the two people who manage our infrastructure, one spent all his time maintaining the Lotus Notes platform hosted on eight Domino servers. About 25 percent of his time was directly related to managing e-mail.”
SRC prefers to use its funds toward accomplishing its mission, rather than supporting IT services. “We were spending SEK 250,000 [U.S.$35,000] annually on providing “push” e-mail to approximately 60 mobile phones, including mine,” says Pettersson-Winter. “But I still had to manually sync up my phone with my PC. We could think of better ways to spend our money than supporting an e-mail solution that didn’t have the functionality we wanted to provide our users.”
“Our employees frequently work out of the office, yet the Lotus Notes Web mail client wasn’t popular,” adds Jim Terneborg, Infrastructure Technician at the Swedish Red Cross. “There are about 1,200 volunteers who are heavily involved in the organization who would benefit from a reliable, standardized SRC-sanctioned e-mail service instead of making do with their own e-mail service providers.”
SRC decided to migrate from its Lotus Notes e-mail service. The IT staff took this decision as an opportunity to explore the cost benefits of outsourcing its e-mail service, with the requirement that it interoperate with its existing Microsoft IT environment. “We wanted to migrate from Lotus Notes to Microsoft Exchange Server 2007 e-mail messaging and collaboration software,” says Pettersson-Winter. “However, when we compared the idea of hosting Exchange with an on-premises deployment, we saw an opportunity to standardize on better e-mail services for employees and volunteers at significantly reduced costs.”
Solution
The Swedish Red Cross evaluated two hosting options for its Exchange Server–based e-mail solution: partnering with a Swedish partner to host Exchange Server 2007 or subscribing to Microsoft Business Productivity Online Standard Suite, which is a component of Microsoft Online Services. As part of the software-plus-services approach, Microsoft Online Services offer customers a hosted option for business-critical applications.
| Microsoft Online Services ... was the most cost-effective and reliable solution, and it offered cross-platform collaboration technologies that would be helpful to people in the field. | |
| Joakim Pettersson-Winter
Chief Technology Officer, Swedish Red Cross | |
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The Business Productivity Online Standard Suite consists of Microsoft Exchange Online, SharePoint Online, Office Live Meeting, and Office Communications Online. The Swedish hosting partner did not offer any synchronization with Active Directory and cost 40 percent more than the Microsoft Online Services option, which provided additional collaboration functionality and complete integration with Active Directory.
With Microsoft Online Services, SRC employees and volunteers can take advantage of a Microsoft Exchange–based communication solution that provides access to e-mail, calendars, and contacts from any Internet-connected personal computer, portable computer, or mobile phone for a monthly subscription fee. While SRC placed a high priority on upgrading its e-mail service, the organization saw great potential in Office Communications Online for its instant messaging capabilities and Live Meeting for its potential to reduce travel and hotel costs while enabling collaboration among staff and volunteers in different locations.
“Microsoft Online Services fulfilled our goal to standardize on Microsoft technology. It was the most cost-effective and reliable solution, and it offered cross-platform collaboration technologies that would be helpful to people in the field,” says Pettersson-Winter. “Now staff can access a rich Web mail client using their mobile phones running the Windows Mobile 6 operating system. And they can keep their data current on all devices using ActiveSync technology to synchronize information with their personal computers.”
In March 2009, SRC purchased 600 Microsoft Online Services seats for its employees and 150 seats of the Microsoft Business Productivity Online Deskless Worker Suite for its volunteers. Business Productivity Online Deskless Worker Suite includes Exchange Online Deskless Worker and SharePoint Online Deskless Worker, streamlined versions of Exchange Online and SharePoint Online, available at a lower cost per seat. SRC plans to use these seats for volunteer boards in regional offices and for shared mailboxes designated for disaster response or first aid teams. During 2010, SRC plans to deploy between 500 and 600 more deskless worker seats, with seats for the rest of the 1,200 volunteers being rolled out in the following year.
As the first organization outside of the United States to effect a global migration from an on-premises Lotus Notes environment to Microsoft Online Services, SRC turned to Microsoft for help. “We needed guidance on how to achieve a seamless migration,” says Terneborg. “Microsoft suggested we work with Bradata and use the migration tool from Quest Software.”
Both Quest Software and Bradata are Microsoft Gold Certified Partners. Quest was named a Microsoft 2009 Notes Transition Partner of the Year finalist. Bradata has performed many on-premises migrations using Quest Notes Migrator for Exchange®, but this was the first time it would use the tool to migrate Lotus Notes data to a hosted Exchange environment. Quest Software provided guidance to Bradata and the migration at SRC proceeded with minimum disruption to employees and volunteers.
“We felt we were in safe hands, since we knew that Quest works closely with Microsoft using new technologies,” says Pettersson-Winter. “And the people from Bradata are among the best I’ve worked with—they had in-depth knowledge of Notes Migrator for Exchange and Exchange in general.”
From March to June 2009, the companies conducted a pilot with the 10 people in the SRC IT department. During the pilot, it became apparent that the Lotus Notes-Domino Server application that SRC staff used for booking meeting rooms and catering services did not port directly into the Exchange Online environment. SRC and Bradata worked together to solve the problem.
“We used Exchange Web Services and re-architected our conference room booking application into the [Microsoft] .NET environment,” says Pettersson-Winter. “The new application looked and behaved like the old, except that it worked within the [Microsoft Office] Outlook interface.”
The actual migration of 700 Lotus Notes accounts to Microsoft Online Services using the Quest tool took place over one weekend in June. “The migration was above all our expectations, with no disruptions to users or messy clean up,” says Pettersson-Winter. “On Monday morning, everyone was able to communicate as if nothing had happened. I was really impressed.”
| Since we launched, Web mail and instant messaging usage has gone up by 50 percent. | |
| Jim Terneborg
Infrastructure Technician, Swedish Red Cross | |
|
SRC has also rolled out 600 seats of Office Communications Online, and employees are rapidly incorporating instant messaging into their daily communications. The IT department is also piloting Office Live Meeting for 20 employees. The organization is waiting until the release of Microsoft SharePoint Server 2010 before it migrates its remaining Lotus Notes applications to a Microsoft environment.
Benefits
The Swedish Red Cross is the first organization outside of the United States to have migrated from an on-premises Lotus Notes solution to Microsoft Online Services. SRC gained a hosted suite of communication and collaboration services that support its mission by offering both staff and volunteers interoperable, easy-to-use tools for staying in touch with colleagues across Sweden and in foreign countries.
The IT department benefits from a simpler way of consuming and managing technology. At the same time, IT staff members now provide tools that actually add value to the IT services that SRC delivers to the field. And SRC is saving money that it can now redirect toward its humanitarian efforts.
“Our staff and volunteers are using Microsoft Online Services to increase the efficacy of our humanitarian projects through reliable communications that build cohesive, productive field operations,” says Pettersson-Winter.
Reducing Costs
By deploying hosted communication services from Microsoft, SRC avoided the cost of upgrading its existing on-premises e-mail service. The costs that were avoided include software licenses for Lotus Notes and new hardware. SRC also avoided the ongoing management costs of an on-premises solution, including server administration and data backup costs. SRC is no longer paying SEK 250,000 (U.S.$35,000) annually for “push” e-mail for the 60 members of staff who use mobile smartphones and PDAs because that capability comes out of the box with Microsoft Online Services.
“We did a business case for the next five years,” says Pettersson-Winter. “We estimate that we will achieve a return on our investment in the Notes migration project within two years. Over the next five years, we estimate that we’ll be saving approximately 20 percent in overall costs.”
Improving Productivity
SRC employees are working more efficiently because Microsoft Online Services are not only more reliable but also provide e-mail and messaging services to more people within the organization. Staff members and volunteers can manage their e-mail, calendaring, and meeting schedules using the same SRC domain name, lending a more professional air to the organization’s communications. Staff can easily switch to instant messaging whether they are working in the office with their PC, or on the road with their portable computer or mobile phone. And thanks to the familiar interface of Microsoft productivity solutions, people are using them more readily.
“One of the biggest benefits for our employees both in Stockholm and the regional offices is the higher degree of availability for staff who have access to both e-mail and instant messaging to keep in touch with each other,” says Terneborg. “Since we launched, Web mail and instant messaging usage has gone up by 50 percent.”
However, it is the benefit of mobile access to e-mail that really makes an impact on employees’ productivity. Using Microsoft Online Services, employees are freed from the confines of the office to be more productive while on the road, in meetings, or training volunteers in the field. Those employees using mobile phones running Windows Mobile 6 can send and receive e-mail messages, share calendars, and make appointments, and then synchronize their schedules with their portable computer or desktop computer to stay organized on the road or in the office.
“Microsoft Online Services provide a robust Web mail client, push e-mail, and Active Sync capabilities to staff with mobile phones: two huge improvements in mobility,” says Pettersson-Winter. “For an organization like ours, running dispersed operations across the country, Online Services enable field communications that deliver immeasurable benefits. Going forward, every new phone we deploy to staff will be running Windows Mobile 6 to really take advantage of the mobility capabilities within Online Services.”
Simplifying IT Management
Today, the IT department at SRC has an interoperable suite of business productivity tools that it can deliver to the field with significantly less effort than its previous communication services. Because Microsoft hosts and manages the servers, SRC does not have to invest in the administrative support required to run solutions in-house. The IT staff member responsible for managing the Lotus Notes solution has freed up 25 percent of his time to focus on more strategic development projects. With Microsoft Online Services helping to ensure automatic product upgrade and security updates, the SRC IT team no longer has to worry that it is providing the latest, most reliable versions of its communication and collaboration software to the field. And because Microsoft Online Services are always up-to-date, everyone can take full advantage of the interoperable technologies without thinking about version compatibility among the products.
“We felt that Online Services are much more secure than what we could provide, or what was offered from the local Swedish hosting partner,” says Jim Terneborg.
Because Online Services interoperate with Active Directory and the Microsoft IT environment at SRC, IT staff can work with increased efficiency within a standardized IT infrastructure. More importantly, the IT team can now give SRC volunteers an identity on the network.
“Moving volunteers into Active Directory means that the SRC IT team now has a better understanding of the people who donate their time to work in the field: who they are, when they joined, and where they work,” says Pettersson-Winter. “We can use this information to deliver other services to them if we need to do so. Instead of different e-mail solutions for almost every volunteer out there, now we have a single platform and a single administrative portal to provision new users. For very little effort and cost, IT is using Online Services to improve communication and collaboration services so that our staff and volunteers can better achieve our mission.”
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