Goals

Much of the work carried out by the the Scottish Agricultural College (SAC) is carried out in partnership with other organisations, such as Scottish universities and government departments. As the number of these joint projects gradually grew, SAC decided to adopt Microsoft Office SharePoint Server to help it address the challenges associated with sharing information and documents. It didn’t simply want a company to come in and install this Microsoft solution. Rather, it wanted to work alongside consultants with practical knowledge and learn from their prior experience.

Charteris' Role

Charteris helped SAC to define its business goals and technical requirements. The consultants then worked alongside SAC’s IT team to set up all of the different elements of the new platform, including a Microsoft Internet Security and Acceleration (ISA) server to ensure the security and optimum performance of the solution. During the project, SAC’s Web Team Leader shadowed the lead consultant from Charteris so that he could learn from him. A large projector was set up in the project room, so that the Charteris consultants could explain to SAC employees what they were doing while they were configuring the solution.

Results

The project went live within the expected timescale and within the agreed budget. At the same time, key employees developed a much deeper understanding of the Microsoft solution. Using SharePoint, SAC is now able to improve the way that its students, researchers and business teams collaborate with third party organisations. SAC’s initial projects with SharePoint have been very successful and, as a result, the organisation is planning a significant number of new uses of SharePoint for the future.

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