• From frequent email downtimes to 100% uptime with Gmail

• Decreased security tickets with advanced phishing and malware protection

• Enables team members to participate in meetings and partake in office culture from anywhere

Working with Google Cloud partner DATA Technologies, Gulbene County devised a transition plan in 2021. It migrated users to Google Workspace in small batches, one department at a time, so they could be given targeted training and consultations as needed. These early adopters helped to bring colleagues on board at later waves of the migration. Following this migration plan, within three months, 80% of users had already migrated to Google Workspace.

"We provided training using Google Meet for people who weren’t familiar with Google Workspace yet, but many already used Gmail in their personal lives, making the transition easier," says Jānis Trejis, CEO, DATA Technologies. "Still, very soon, people noticed they could now do things at work with an ease that their old tools didn’t enable."

For example, collaboration between Gulbene Municipality institutions used to be stifled by siloed information systems. Employees in the administration office could collaborate between themselves with an internal file-sharing solution, but other institutions that were part of the county were excluded. "Some used their personal Gmail accounts to share files because they lacked a better way to do things. This resulted in management challenges such as shadow IT in our legacy system," explains Biezais. "Now, using Google Drive and Google Docs, they can work closer together in a much more comfortable way. An immediate benefit was the possibility of creating shared drives for individual institutions and departments, enabling employees easy access to important documents and templates instead of relying on email versioning, where version control was challenging, leading to errors and loss of data. Storing important files on Google Drive gives us peace of mind that we can recover missing or corrupted files if the endpoints break down. My team is also happier because the infrastructure is now secure, reliable, and easier to manage."

In 2022, statewide restrictions were still in place due to COVID-19, so remote work was going full speed ahead when the council finished its migration. Initially, the council worried about its work culture, which thrived with in-person gatherings. Gulbene County is big, and some employees used to drive half an hour just to participate in 10-minute meetings. "We wanted to keep relationships the same as when we shared an office," says Caunītis. "But what we’ve noticed is that this new way of working is flowing so seamlessly that, as we return to the office, some people are still opting to join meetings remotely using Google Meet to save time and money on commuting, and that works just as well."

With new solutions in place, the council is focused on making communication easy, secure, and efficient internally and externally. Great leaps in that direction were made when Gmail replaced the legacy email system. "Our previous legacy email system was unreliable. We had a lot of downtime, and it couldn’t keep up with our user demands. It often became overloaded and stopped working. With Gmail, we’re experiencing 100% uptime," explains Biezais.

An additional benefit is that less malicious software is coming through the council’s email services. "We used to get lots of tickets around suspicious emails, which have gone down considerably. This speaks to the advanced phishing and malware protection Gmail enables by default," he shares.

More recently, aside from email, employees have taken to Spaces using Google Chat, where they collaborate on long-term projects with their teams or other groups.

Soon after Gulbene Municipality selected Google Workspace as its work environment, the Latvian Ministry of Education and Science rolled out Google for Education, providing Chromebooks to education institutions across the country. "It was a great thing that we already had our Google Workspace environment up and running in the Gulbene Municipality. We simply added the Chromebooks to it and started using them from the get-go," says Biezais.

Currently, all 300 Gulbene County Council office workers are using Google Workspace every day to better serve their community. A separate Google Workspace domain was set up for the county’s educational institutions, with 800 active users and growing. "Google Workspace helps us communicate effectively not only internally, but also with the local population," says Caunītis. "This is crucial, especially in a crisis."