Ying Communications Improves Productivity by 60%, Optimizes Profitability with Clarizen
Overview
Ying Communications is an integrated marketing and PR agency serving multinational B2B companies in enterprise technology, energy and petrochemical sectors. Initially, the company employed project managers who managed a few projects independently, from start to finish. As the company grew, the number and complexity of projects increased correspondingly: each manager would be expected to handle a larger number of projects, while each project would have greater dependency on a larger number of resources, both internal and external. Ying Communications decided that it needed a new project management solution that would provide collaboration and resource management tools for handling large-scale projects. After a year and a half of using Clarizen, the company has enjoyed increased collaboration, productivity and profitability.
Ying Communication needs:
- A collaboration tool that would enable company resources to improve productivity, thus allowing the company to take on more robust projects and cultivate more business opportunities.
- The ability to create templates as project baselines for repeat project types, while leveraging acquired knowledge from previous projects.
- A SaaS platform that would provide access through the Internet from anywhere, at any time and help the company reach optimum efficiency in task completion.
Why Clarizen was chosen:
After a thorough search and comparison process, the company eliminated a wide range of solutions except for two: BaseCamp and Clarizen. Although BaseCamp was a close contender, Ying Communications felt that its functionality was considerably more limited than Clarizen. Especially in terms of Ying’s enterprise requirements which included tracking financials and providing project transparency to clients, Clarizen was the overwhelming winner.
Results:
- 60% Rise in Productivity
"Before Clarizen, on average 15 projects were assigned to each project manager. Today, the average number of projects per project manager has jumped to 24.”
– Allan Tan, Managing Director
- Financial Returns
"Thanks to Clarizen, we are better able to track the hours spent on each project task. Furthermore, Clarizen gives us the visibility to track and control each project, and has given us considerable control over a project’s profitability.”
– Allan Tan, Managing Director
- Improved Visibility for Directors
"Clarizen has become an invaluable resource in every aspect of our company’s life. In addition to providing a solution to day-to-day project management activities, Clarizen has also afforded the company’s Directors a robust management tool for reviewing our project pipeline, revenues and expenses."
– Allan Tan, Managing Director
The Story
Located in Singapore, Ying Communications provides services such as content development, internet marketing, multimedia, customized publications and public relations to B2B companies. The company currently employs 35 people and serves enterprise clients such as Cisco Systems, Shell Oil, Microsoft, andIBM. Most of Ying Communications projects revolve around creating, launching and managing marketing campaigns, and the company’s work is divided among teams including (but not limited to) client services, creative services, marketing and public relations. Within each team the employees have different functional roles.
Allan Tan is the Managing Director of Ying Communications, which he co-founded in 2001.
Previous to Clarizen, Ying Communications managed projects with Excel Spreadsheets and used a small application to track projects with SharePoint. The company handled small projects, with a few project managers assigned to implement one project each, using SharePoint to show a basic list of projects, their status and billings. However, as projects began to grow in size, scope and complexity, the limits of using SharePoint as a project management tool became readily apparent.
"We felt that SharePoint wasn’t really serving our growing project management needs. It didn’t allow for real collaboration among project team members, or provide useful tools like notifications when particular tasks were due,” says Allan.
Another issue that Tan and his team had to resolve was to address projects that have the same processes, but were configured every time from scratch.
"Many of the company’s projects are based on a repeatable set of processes and timelines. However, every time a new project was started, we felt like we were reinventing the wheel. We were growing as a company, and we needed something more robust to help us improve our productivity on all fronts,” says Tan.
A decision was made to search for a new project management solution that would address the company’s collaboration and productivity requirements. Tan began his search online, with the desire to find a SaaS solution that would provide full access to all the project team members, from any location and at any time.
"One way to differentiate one company from another is the level of efficiency in which it carries out its tasks. A key requirement for a new project management solution was that it had to always be accessible through the internet, from anywhere,” explains Tan.
After a thorough search, Tan narrowed down the options to NeoSys, Intervals, BaseCamp, and Clarizen. Although BaseCamp was the closest contender to Clarizen, Tan felt that its functionality is more limited than Clarizen.
"When it comes to serious enterprise requirements including tracking financials and providing tracking transparency to clients, Clarizen is the overwhelming winner,”, says Tan.
Implementation and adoption of Clarizen within the organization began with the project managers and gradually spread to the entire organization. From a management perspective, Clarizen has provided company leaders with considerable transparency of work flow and productivity.
"With Clarizen, it’s very clear to everyone what tasks need to be completed, when they need to be delivered, and how much time they need to spend working on each task. When the company started working with Clarizen, the management team immediately saw how it could be used as a tool for improving managerial processes and initiatives,”, says Tan.
Today, Ying Communications uses Clarizen’s template feature to manage projects that have similar work process, such as creating a new brochure for a client. Clarizen has also helped the project team members to take on more work, directly affecting how many projects each person manages at any given time. This has increased efficiency and productivity.
"Before Clarizen, on average 15 projects were assigned to each project manager. Today, the average number of projects per project manager has jumped to 24,” says Tan.
In terms of monetary benefits, Tan has expressed a great satisfaction for how Clarizen has helped to improve productivity and increase profitability.
"Since we started working with Clarizen, we have enjoyed a clear monetary benefit, thanks to the ability to manage a larger number of projects on a per person basis. We are also better able to track and control the profitability of each project, and since we can track resource costs and third party expenses,” says Tan.
Ying Communications uses Clarizen for time-tracking, resource management, basic budgeting and expenses associated with resources. “Clarizen has become a great tool for us to monitor, control and optimize profitability.”