Cello Zorg works with more than 1,600 people with learning difficulties across the Netherlands, providing support 24 hours a day to help them overcome limitations and enjoy independent lives. The company’s 2,700 staff operate at 80 locations, ranging in scale from single client situations to installations serving 350 people.

For Will de Laat, head of ICT at Cello, and his team, that means delivering flexibility is crucial. “We organise everything from communication tools to special applications and client software, on every type of device you can imagine,” he says. “We keep our scope as large as we can, to give people as much opportunity to talk with each other as possible.”

Uncovering €1 million savings

Dispersed organisations often struggle with maintaining group infrastructure across multiple locations while staying responsive to specific staff needs. For many European organisations, the imminent arrival of GDPR is prompting large-scale reviews of security and stability, which can prove complicated and costly. For Cello Zorg, a reliance on group accounts for up to 15 people fell short of the incoming regulations. In addition, their rigorous enforcement and the company’s review of its infrastructure revealed more than a need to make individuals accountable.

Will explains: “We had 164 servers in our maintenance equipment rooms at 2 sites, as well as VMs through a major cloud provider. We pushed everything to 45 VMs so that everybody could access our previous communications solution, and the whole setup became very expensive. We noticed major developments in SaaS solutions like Google Workspace and could see they offered flexibility, ease of access, and far better value for the money.”

Comparing Google Workspace with a leading cloud-based communications solution, Cello Zorg chose Google Workspace. “We analysed the ways that our staff were using their previous communications tools,” says Will, “We found that 96% of our colleagues were using less than 20% of the tools in the programs they used and that we paid for. The complexity and range of options were confusing for them. By contrast, Google Workspace is trimmed down to the options and items that people really use, which makes it so much more accessible than its competitors.”

Enabling a smooth transition

Cello Zorg has a two-year, phased roadmap for switching the entire organisation over to Google Workspace. To handle the areas where the company will employ a hybrid infrastructure, it collaborates with Google Workspace implementation partner Zzapps. “Zzapps helps us as we phase out our use of thin clients and replace them with Google Chromebooks, which have excellent sound and visuals,” says Will. “Likewise, Zzapps is helping to reorganise our printing infrastructure so that we can discontinue all of our old servers.”

“When I’m introducing people to Google Workspace, I put two screens up, one with Google Workspace, and the other with the equivalent tool on our previous solution,” says Will. “People say that there is a small difference, but no problem. Once they’re comfortable with that, then I show them a major difference, which is sharing documents. That’s when they really get excited.”