Project Overview
Transparity led Pearl & Dean’s Microsoft Teams and SharePoint adoption, improving collaboration and information management across the UK & Ireland group. Leveraging our Microsoft 365 consulting services and SharePoint consulting, we moved documents and communications to the cloud and established clear governance and training for sustained success.
Delivery included ~45 hours of onsite consultancy across 20 sessions with 50+ employees, configuration of 24 Teams and nearly 120 channels, and 20 hours of end-user training—ultimately driving 100% user adoption. Our adoption and change management approach ensured confident uptake and lasting productivity gains.
The Challenge
The group engaged with us to share their pain points, many of which are common to lots of modern organisations:
- Staff had difficulty accessing documents on the move or from home, with VPN causing a range of issues.
- The number of documents had grown exponentially, leading to lost documents, lots of time being spent trying to find things, duplicate documents and poor version control.
- Critical client and internal emails were being mixed with unimportant communications, with email overload impacting users.
- Staff didn’t have a collaborative platform to help them share content across the business.
- The teams knew that they could improve their business by working better together. This meant being able to share documents and communicate in a more efficient way.
The Solution
Transparity’s standard methodologies for Office 365 engagements and document management expertise enabled us to comprehensively consult, build and train.
The engagement began with a collaborative discovery phase, bringing together key stakeholders to explore the opportunities offered by Microsoft 365 through a series of “Microsoft Teams & SharePoint: The Art of the Possible” workshops. This was followed by detailed consultancy and requirements-gathering sessions with individual users and teams, enabling a thorough understanding of their specific needs and priorities. Working closely with identified Site Administrators and Champions, a governance framework was established to define usage standards, responsibilities, and a long-term approach for ongoing review and continuous improvement of the platform.
Once the requirements and governance structure were agreed, the solution was designed and built, supported by extensive User Acceptance Testing to ensure it met organisational needs. To drive successful adoption, face-to-face training sessions were delivered to all staff, providing a consistent level of knowledge and confidence across the organisation. This learning was then reinforced with a library of Microsoft Teams training videos, ensuring users could revisit guidance whenever needed and supporting sustained engagement with the new technologies.
The Impact
By migrating and restructuring legacy file shares into a secure, cloud-based platform, Pearl & Dean created a single source of truth for core business information, making it easier for employees to find, access and share the content they needed. Introducing Microsoft Teams as a dedicated collaboration and messaging platform reduced reliance on email, helping staff communicate more effectively, make decisions faster, and spend less time managing overflowing inboxes. The solution was delivered in a phased and scalable way, ensuring users were not overwhelmed by new functionality and enabling the business to realise value quickly while supporting future growth.
A strong focus on consultancy, change management and user training helped drive confidence and adoption across the organisation, ensuring employees were equipped to embrace new ways of working. With teams spread across the UK and Ireland, it was essential that all regions and business units were engaged throughout the project. This inclusive approach improved collaboration across the wider Group, encouraged greater participation in decision-making, and enabled the three organisations to work together more efficiently while maintaining consistency in processes and communication.
Additional Libraries with the use of added metadata were provided for the control of formal documents, such as contracts and policies, and added as Microsoft Teams Tabs for ease of navigation. This resulted in a much better ability to organise documents, vastly improved remote access, and reduced email clutter.
Benefits
Increased productivity and efficiency
Via cloud-based document management and streamlined collaboration.
Improved communication and employee engagement
Reducing reliance on email, enabling faster decision-making and more effective communication.
Stronger organisational alignment
Thanks to inclusive stakeholder engagement, helping teams across the UK and Ireland work together more consistently and effectively.
