The Effect
Having a dependable and completely scalable infrastructure has paid dividends to Monaghans as it has continued to expand. The demands of a dynamic workforce and prestige clients have been more than comfortably catered for with the solutions presented.
Naturally all staff have email accounts and managed access to the internet. User accounts are managed and privileges are set according to staff grade allowing or disallowing access to certain areas of the systems.
Desktop workstations have been 'locked down' to prevent tampering from the users, which has saved a significant amount of time in support.
The most notable effect has been through the use of the highly customised web based information system. Projects can be managed from anywhere (in or out of the office), timesheets can be updated from anywhere and staff always have access to useful and up to date information.
The Savings
An estimated £150,000 over a 3 year period in licence fees alone has been saved by Monaghans by using Open Source Software on their servers across the organisation.
Other considerable sums have been saved through the automation of previously manual tasks via the web based information system.
In their words...
"We were always a bit sceptical about how IT could help us in our day to day business, but even myself - who could be considered a non IT person - cannot imagine what our business would be like without it. An important factor for us is the ability to remain flexible as our clients demands change frequently and with each client we have. This has to be matched by our internal business processes and hence our supporting IT. I am completely satisfied that we are achieving our objectives, even though they are constantly changing and of course the huge cost savings have been a great bonus."
Peter Beard, Director, Monaghans Ltd |
