Global consulting company goes

digital to improve collaboration and

enhance mobility
We dont need to innovate around
Office 365. Well leave that to Microsoft.
Our job is to adopt the technology as Mott MacDonald
quickly as we can and to stay focused on www.mottmac.com

using it to deliver value to our clients. 17,000 employees

United Kingdom
Darren Russell, Digital Transformation Director, Mott MacDonald Management, engineering,
development consultancy

Mott MacDonald consults on many of the worlds most challenging

and complex engineering projects, and with 17,000 employees working Company profile
with clients in 150 countries, it needed to maximize the information Mott MacDonald is a global management,
and knowledge sharing among staff. With guidance and resources engineering, and development company. It is
from Microsoft FastTrack, the company deployed Microsoft Office 365 one of the largest employee-owned companies

as its integrated digital solution that increases efficiency, improves in the world with 17,000 staff in 150 countries.

collaboration, and enhances mobility.

Partner profile
Content and Code
www.contentandcode.com

I was pleasantly
surprised when I
learned that Microsoft
FastTrack is not a
special offer of short-
term supportthat its
with us for the life of
our subscription. I find
the service invaluable.
Simon Denton, Business Architect,
Mott MacDonald
Seeking better collaboration and mobility
Mott MacDonald likes a challenge. The employee-owned consultancy provides
engineering, management, and development services for some of the most complex
projects around the globe. Over the past five years, it has won more than 400 awards
for its work in nearly a dozen different sectors, including international development,
environment, education, health, and transportation. Founded in 1889 and headquartered
in the United Kingdom, Mott MacDonald has 17,000 employees working in 150 countries
worldwide.
With a widely distributed staff of world-class experts in multiple disciplines, Mott
MacDonald faced a growing challenge of finding ways to help employees work smarter,
communicate and collaborate more effectively, and stay productive no matter where their
assignments might take them.
We are always striving to ensure we deliver the best services to our clients, with the
latest and most cutting-edge solutions. Were also focused on delivering exceptional
value to our clients, says Russell, a 24-year veteran of the company who spent 10 years
as IT director and is now the digital transformation director. Theres a real desire among
everyone at Mott MacDonald to provide our clients with something truly innovative.
Moving to an integrated platform
Mott MacDonald set out to transform its communication and collaboration infrastructure,
carefully considering its options. We looked at the Google platform among others,
Russell says, but we felt the integration wed get from Microsoft really gave its solutions
the edge.
Working with Content and Codea member of the Microsoft Partner Networkand
Microsoft FastTrack, Mott MacDonald developed a plan to implement and adopt
Microsoft Office 365, using Exchange Online, Yammer, and SharePoint Online to create an
integrated digital workplace. As part of this, the company would replace its Lotus Notes
based intranet with Compass, an easy-to-use portal that acts as a single point of access
to all of the company knowledge, including project information.
Mott MacDonald has taken a phased approach to implementation, dividing the project
into manageable pieces and working to get each one right before moving to the next.
We spend a lot of time up front getting the environment right, Russell says. If you do it
in an organized way, it doesnt need to take forever. I recommend relying on Microsoft
and your Microsoft partners to guide you, but if you can get the setup right, then you can
move forward with much more confidence.
Driving user adoption
The company also looked to the FastTrack Team for insights and resources that it
could use to help its employees fully understand their new capabilities and promote
user adoption.
We needed somewhere we could go to ask a serious question and get a clear answer,
says Simon Denton, the business architect responsible for Office 365 implementation at
Mott MacDonald. We wrongly discounted Microsoft FastTrack at first, because we had
used the service when we rolled out Exchange Online. We thought that was it, that we
had used up all of our FastTrack credits. I was pleasantly surprised when I learned that
FastTrack is not a special offer of short-term supportthat its with us for the life of our
subscription. I find the service invaluable.

I think thats one of
the main selling points
of Office 365. Yes,
youre going to save
money if you do it
right, but the real key
is that its going
to release your staff
to do what they do
best, do it better,
and get more done.
Simon Denton, Business Architect,
Mott MacDonald
The FastTrack Team helped Mott MacDonald with its adoption plan by providing both self-
service resources and expert advice. The FastTrack adoption methodology is really beneficial,
Denton says. It sets out quite clearly the steps we needed to go through to define principles
and scenarios. Once we did that, we knew adoption would come easily. We based our entire
adoption plan on the FastTrack documentation. It gave us a really good foundation.
For example, Mott MacDonald encouraged adoption of its new Yammer enterprise social
network with a 30 Days of Yammer campaign, which involved all of its staff and more than
doubled the number of active and engaged users. Employees started using it to break down
barriers within the organization much more quickly than anyone had expected.
We already consider Yammer so important that weve built it into our business process,
Denton says. When employees do something well on a project, they share it on Yammer.
Colleagues everywhere get easy exposure to all these success stories and best practices that
we wouldnt have known about before. And when they post about something that hasnt
gone well, we can learn from that experience, too. In a traditional network, those messages
often get filtered, blocked, or lost. Yammer takes them right to the top, and makes them
visible and useful.
Managing change
Even with all of the benefits it brings, adopting new technology can be disruptive for a
company and its employees, and Russell acknowledges that change management can be a
real challenge. Were pushing out a huge amount of new technology at the moment, plus
doing a lot of other new things, so the volume of change can be problematic at times.
Denton adds: The biggest obstacle in terms of change management is that taking the if
you build it, they will come approach no longer works. Were in a time now where we cant
just expect everyone to use what we provide. Weve got to put more effort into not only
launching a product, but also promoting, supporting, and fostering its adoption for the long
term. Employees want to understand how a new product is relevant to them and their work,
and how it will help them help their clients.
To assist with the transition, Mott MacDonald also has a strategy of developing a network of
technology champions by engaging the employees who are most interested and enthusiastic
about the new capabilities. The company makes sure the champions are well-trained and
sends them out into the business to coach and communicate with their colleagues.
Providing training and support
Mott MacDonald is taking a multifaceted approach to training employees to use the new
tools, using a blend of videos, webinars, online courses, email, drop-in workshops, and
other methods to appeal to different learning styles and to reach employees in multiple
time zones.
From a business perspective, the training scenarios have been really useful, Denton says. We
havent had to develop much training content. We use the FastTrack materials, put them up in
Compass, and speed employee adoption of the tools. Weve seen that many employees have
looked at the basic FastTrack content and within a couple of hours, theyre not only up and
running, theyve changed the way they work. I think thats one of the main selling points of
Office 365. Yes, youre going to save money if you do it right, but the real key is that its going
to release your staff to do what they do best, do it better, and get more done.
 Were doing a series of communication and education programs on different aspects of the
new environment, devoting one week to each component, Russell says. We try to immerse
employees in each subjectteam sites and OneDrive for Business one week, Microsoft
Delve the next, and so on. We also have the local IT staff at each of our locations hold clinics
to help employees learn the new technology, and we communicate through Compass, our
new intranet.

Sharing success stories

To help measure success, Mott MacDonald is conducting surveys to assess user
satisfaction with the new tools. The feedback gathered through those surveys will help it
to make informed decisions about next steps in the adoption process, but Denton says
one of the most valuable results of the surveys is the stories about how employees are
using the tools to work more effectively and provide better service to clients. We will use
those success stories to drive enthusiasm throughout the organization, he says.

Digital by default
Looking ahead to whats next for Mott MacDonald, Russell says it aims to be digital by
default in a few years, meaning that whenever a new problem arises, decision makers
consider how technology can help them solve it. Its critical that we keep moving forward,
making sure Mott MacDonald embraces new technology solutions as they become
available and promotes them throughout the organization, Russell says. He credits the
continuous innovation approach, in which Microsoft provides each new feature and
capability as it is ready, as fundamental to that effort.

We dont need to innovate around Office 365, Russell says. Well leave that to Microsoft.
Our job is to adopt the technology as quickly as we can and to stay focused on using it to
deliver value to our clients.

Software and services For more information

Microsoft Office 365
Microsoft SharePoint Online For more information about Microsoft products and services, call the Microsoft Sales
Skype for Business Online Information Center at (800) 426-9400. In Canada, call the Microsoft Canada Information Centre
Yammer at (877) 568-2495. Customers in the United States who are deaf or hard-of-hearing can reach
Microsoft server product portfolio Microsoft text telephone (TTY/TDD) services at (800) 892-5234. Outside the 50 United States
Microsoft SharePoint Server 2013 and Canada, please contact your local Microsoft subsidiary.
Microsoft FastTrack
To access information using the World Wide Web, go to:
www.microsoft.com

Microsoft Office 365

The new Office provides anywhere access to your familiar Office applicationsplus email,
calendar, video conferencing, and your most current documentson almost any device, from
PCs to smartphones to tablets.

For more information about Microsoft Office 365, go to:

www.office365.com

This case study is for informational purposes only. MICROSOFT MAKES NO WARRANTIES, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, IN THIS SUMMARY.
Document published April 2016