By making social care available to those who need it most, Team Olivia helps thousands of people across Sweden, Norway, and Denmark live a full life. Providing home care for the disabled and treating addiction, the company’s network of over 60 independent companies employ 11,000 people at more than 200 locations across three countries. By acquiring small businesses and incorporating them into its network, Team Olivia has grown fast, combining the energy of local enterprises with the resources of a multinational group.

Because each new acquisition came with its own communication solution and IT setup, Team Olivia’s growth presented specific challenges, as Adam Nerell, CIO at Team Olivia explains. “There was no easy way to find employees and email them. We had no intranet, either, so if we wanted to get information out we had to mail the head of each company and hope they would pin it to the fridge in the lunchroom.”

That’s why Team Olivia looked to create a unified, cost-effective communications platform that could help ensure compliance and pull the company together. “Our standard user is not computer savvy at all, so simplicity was an extremely important part of our decision,” says Adam. “Because Google Workspace has everything in one place, you just have one account and you’re signed in everywhere. That’s the kind of simplicity users really appreciate.”

Because Google Workspace delivers its applications through an internet browser, Team Olivia now creates work environments anywhere that there’s an internet connection, without installing hardware or licenses. That means Adam and his team can deploy their solution across the company at speed and manage compliance before GDPR comes into force in 2018. “Staying on top of personal data would have been virtually impossible without a solution like Google Workspace,” says Adam. “By moving data into Google Workspace and Google Drive, we can control it, protect it, and be ready for GDPR.”

“Online Partner’s experts have worked in-depth on data protection and compliance and they brought invaluable knowledge and experience to the table,” says Adam. “With Google Workspace our data is more secure than it would be on our own servers, and Online Partner made sure that the regulatory documents and contracts were in place. In Europe, the biggest misconception about Google Workspace is that it hinders compliance, but putting personal data in a highly secure and controlled environment like Google Workspace is one of the smartest things you could do right now to be prepared for GDPR.”

Keeping costs down with Chromebooks

Following Team Olivia’s migration to Google Workspace, the company began to adopt Chromebooks. “They're not just cheaper to buy,” Adam explains, “they’re also cheaper to maintain, so the overall cost of ownership is estimated to be down by 60%. More than that, you can’t put a price on the fact that Chromebooks just work. A Chromebook starts in five to seven seconds every time you turn it on. On the rare occasion something goes wrong, we just issue a new one, without waiting for a technician. We told every business that if they weren't happy with Chromebooks they could just switch back. No one has. I haven't heard a single complaint and that is indeed unusual.”

“In the past if a computer broke down we would have to get a new one and install it with all the apps and security certificates,” continues Adam. “It was a tedious process. Now, replacing someone’s Chromebook takes less than five minutes. The user just plugs it in and their computer is all there: every setting, every app. That means we don't have to send out technicians and it’s all compliant, because all our hardware is encrypted. It's magic!”