SCALE IT

Xurrent Provides SCALE IT with Complete Visibility and Control of Service Cost and Quality

CLEAR INSIGHT IN COST & QUALITY

SUPER FAST IMPLEMENTATION

END-TO-END TRANSPARENT WORKFLOW

We quickly realized that with Xurrent, we had the best tool on the market; very complete, fast to implement, easy to use, and with flexible licensing. Xurrent has everything you could possibly want built in the tool, and is ready to use. But you only use and pay for what you need.

Nico Dreef, CEO of SCALE IT

After a super fast implementation of Xurrent, the entire workflow is now transparent across the whole chain

Setting up, improving, or outsourcing IT management is the core business of managed service provider SCALE IT. They are always on top of new developments in the field of IT innovation, thinking about what this means for their customers and helping them make their IT service organization ready for the future. SCALE IT aims to create organizations where people can work pleasantly everywhere, and above all, to make IT work for their customers and ensure that IT generates money instead of costs.

SCALE IT is a rapidly growing startup focused on small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). They believe that the IT environment in organizations should simply work. Every day. And from anywhere. To that end, they offer the SCALE IT Workspace: a flexible digital workspace that is secure, scalable, always up to date, and fully managed. So that customers never have to worry about their IT environment again.

Time to switch to a future-proof solution

Right from the start, SCALE IT was using TOPdesk to manage their services, but soon enough they felt it was time to switch to a more comprehensive and future-proof solution for themselves and their customers. 

The main reason to switch was to get more insight into hours worked and productivity; how much time do you actually spend on a customer and real-time customer reports? Just basic things that were not well-arranged in the TOPdesk solution. Even obtaining a little insight would take far too much time. 

Nico Dreef, CEO of SCALE IT, explains: “Understanding the true cost and quality of our services is what we were looking for. Writing hours, justifying hours, being able to attribute hours to customers and services, and in particular, insight into the entire ticket handling. What do we spend on a customer, and especially how much time? We just didn’t have that information.” 

The team looked at several options, including TOPdesk and ServiceNow, but when they came across Xurrent and saw what it could do for them, they were sold. “As we all know, ServiceNow is pretty expensive, and from experience at a previous employer I learned it is also quite complex and labor-intensive.”

Ease of implementation was another reason to select Xurrent. The team had heard about the fast implementation from other Xurrent customers, so they were confident this was going to work.
Halfway through the implementation process, the team at SCALE IT heard that one of their biggest data suppliers has also chosen to switch to Xurrent. This was another confirmation that they had chosen the right solution.

Nico Dreef

CEO at SCALE IT

“Everyone can see everything now. That’s the essence of 4me. I value the ability to make the entire workflow transparent throughout the whole chain from customer to end service provider. We are so impressed with the 4me platform that we have also included the 4me service portal in our service portfolio to serve our customers better.”

Implementation

The implementation was done in collaboration with Xurrent partner Bright Octopus. The whole process went very smoothly and according to plan. Xurrent was implemented within two months. Nico: “The collaboration was great, very interactive. They listened to what we needed, asked the right questions, came up with good solutions, and challenged us where necessary. That was a big plus.”

Two workshops were organized beforehand to see how the organization was doing. Bright Octopus and Xurrent emphasized that this was also a good moment to organize things slightly differently and smarter. Together, they had a good look at the service catalog. That is the essence of Xurrent. What do you offer, and what services do you need to provide? This is now all specified in 4me, and SCALE IT has even informed sales that they can only sell those services that are specified in Xurrent.

“What helped was that the consultants at Bright Octopus were both former managers at managed service providers, so they were able to sit on the chair on the other side as well. For example, they asked if we had ever thought about a separate administrative unit. They advised us to create a separate unit, giving us much more control over our administration. Together we made some changes to the organization that led to real improvements.”

Training

Some of the training was done during the workshops that were organized beforehand. The Xurrent CBT training portal and environment were also used to train things that were of critical importance for SCALE IT. After that, small groups were trained in their own environment as it is all about their way of working. This went well as it quickly became very tangible.

Scope

• Request Fulfillment
• Incident Management
• Knowledge Management
• Configuration and Asset Management
• Service Level Management
• Change Management
• Project Management
• Time Tracking
• Financial Management
• Risk Management

The scope was already expanded during the implementation. Knowledge management, for example, was not actually planned, but Bright Octopus showed it, and SCALE IT started working on it. This works very well. The same goes for resource planning and management. This was also already deployed so that staff had experience with it before the go-live. In the end, time writing was also included from the start, while it was actually planned for phase 2.

Integrations

So far, SSO and Active Directory were integrations that were included as part of the implementation. In the near future, SCALE IT is planning an integration with one of its cloud and data center providers.

Go Live

The go-live was a success. What helped is that SCALE IT involved some of the key users in the implementation project group, which worked really well. They knew what to expect and were able to give constructive input during the implementation process.

Nico: “People clearly like working with the tool. If there were any complaints, you would hear some of them right away; they tend to be very outspoken. But in this case, no news was good news.

“They all just started working with the new tool and we only got positive feedback about the ease of use, the design the communication to the customer via email. It all looks great.”

“The collaboration between Bright Octopus, Xurrent and SCALE IT also went well; the whole process was completely transparent. Any questions went via Bright Octopus to Xurrent with everything visible for all parties. We also had Xurrent developers giving explanations in the tickets, about features, requests, and such. That route was set up fairly quickly, so the chain is running smoothly.”

All new customers and most of the existing customers now work in Xurrent. At the moment, everything is focused on IT, but SCALE IT would like to roll out Xurrent to other departments like HR and facility management in the near future.

Results

Nico: “Everyone can see everything now. That’s the essence of Xurrent. A ticket with the same number across different domains, customers, suppliers. And with the push of a button, you have your service level report. This is service delivery the way SCALE IT likes it.”

“Time writing works perfectly, and I am a big fan of the app; it is very accessible and it’s easy to add attachments. I use it for everything now; there’s no need to go to the service desk anymore. In fact, the whole ticketing process is very accessible and easy to use. Everything is just right. Much better than before. It is all very intuitive. And on top of that, the look and feel, which was perceived to be a bit simple at the demo stage, really worked out very well.”

In terms of metrics, the situation can’t be compared to before. At SCALE IT, Xurrent is now used for everything really. On top of that they now have finally metrics, whereas before, they didn’t.

“I value the ability to make the entire workflow transparent throughout the whole chain from customer to end service provider. We are so impressed with the Xurrent platform that we have also included the Xurrent portal in our service portfolio to serve our customers better. It is now an integral part of our service.”

“Xurrent in combination with its partner Bright Octopus worked perfectly. It was a productive way of working together; we received good advice based on questions, answers, and interpretations. At times we were also challenged, and the result is an excellent product that gives us all the insight we need.”