Job agency giant headhunts Axios for IT Service Management

It is hard work being one of the world’s top employment organizations, but award-winning IT ServiceManagement (ITSM) software is making the job easier.

The solution is helping manage the IT infrastructure and giving a competitive edge to Amsterdam-basedRandstad, which employs more than 200,000 people each day in the fast moving business of temporary andcontract staffing.

When you talk to senior managers of I-bridge, the in-house organization which provides IT services toRandstad’s 22 companies and 700 branches in the Netherlands, you hear a great deal about control, trust andprofessionalism. They are qualities which they believe have been provided by their ITSM solution - assyst byAxios Systems.

“Our ITSM system gives me a grip on the whole situation. I trust it, and increasingly so do our otherdepartments.” Service Department Manager Dick van der Valk summed up.

“Our business is basically matching people who want jobs with employers who have jobs that suit them. Wehave found that assyst and Randstad are a very good match.”

assyst was already installed at Randstad when van der Valk took up his new role following a switch frommarketing to IT, but he quickly decided to make the most of it. “It gave us a secure feeling about how toorganize our own department,” he said. “I felt it was a good product and we built on it.”

“The main problem we solve is getting the information we need to run a service department,” van der Valkcommented. “For me it’s very important to know the kinds of problems we have so we can follow them up.How often does a particular problem happen? Where are my assets? Thanks to assyst we know whereeverything is.”

The Problems

Put simply, the main tasks of Randstad’s computers are to process workers’ timesheets and send the appropriatebills to its customers.

Although standardization and greater automation are bringing downthe cost of computing by 10-15% a year, IT is more crucial thanever to the organization’s success.

In the Netherlands alone, 100,000 temporary workersneed to be paid every week. Their wages andcorresponding bills sent to Randstad’s clients need to beaccurate.

“Invoices have an in-built dissatisfaction factor,” van derValk observed. “I’ve never been told: “That’s a beautifulbill you sent me”! They must be fast and reliable. We payour temporary workers in advance so have to get themoney back from the companies. The timing is veryimportant.”

Faced with the challenge of handling ICT services for asuccessful, growing organization, I-bridge set up a ServiceDesk, but then found its paper-based system was losingtrack of incidents and could not cope with an assetsregister which now consists of some 40,000 physicalitems.

“We had a lot of assets, but we didn’t know exactly wherethey were,” recalled Peter Smith, team leader of assystapplications management and desk site support.

Discover how theworld’s largestemploymentagency used BestPractice based ITServiceManagement tobuild a customerdrivenConsolidatedService Desk

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O v e rt h e s o l u t i o n w a s assyst >

At first, however, her positive assessment was not shared by manyof her colleagues. I-bridge ICT managers admit it was hard toconvince others of the advantages and there was initially stiffinternal opposition, notably from technical and financial staff.

Now, however, assyst is being used to maintain discipline in theorganization - for everyone’s benefit. Staff, who once had to bepersuaded to put information into assyst, now trust it becausethey see advantages for themselves.

Van der Valk said his first priorities were to keep his customershappy and then to instill disciplines among his own teams to usethe tool.

“We’ve come from a technical ICT department where people werereally only interested in boxes,” Smith said. “Their motto was ‘I’mfixing this. Leave me alone!’ We had to make a big turnaround tobeing a service department with the direction shifted towards thecustomer. That’s a 180 degree turn.”

The technical department, previously accustomed to ordering its own equipment, now needs to doso through assyst. All equipment must pass through the warehouses from where it cannot bereleased without being logged in the system.

Finance staff had their own tools and databases. “We stopped all that and now they all trustassyst,” van der Valk said.

One of the most striking examples of the benefits of sound Asset Management was recovery of morethan 600 PCs. To prepare for the Service Department’s ‘User Pays’ policy, van der Valk sent alloperating companies a schedule of equipment audited as being on their premises, advising theywould be charged monthly for future support of each unit. The PCs which returned - representingabout 10% of the total - were re-used elsewhere, achieving a substantial saving because newmachines did not need to be purchased.

“Only a good system like assyst could have given us the information needed to get 600 computersback,” van der Valk stated. “Now we know where all our computers are and what is on each ofthem, matching hardware and software.” The machines are being linked to core applications,showing which staff could be affected if a system goes down.

The tool also helps ensure proper software licenses are paid and keep track of tenders issued by largeorganizations for contract staffing. Management also plans to use it to help negotiate with suppliersand monitor Service Level Agreements, and record problems incurred by a team of 30 working ondevelopment of new core business applications.

Crystal reports are generated and distributed to operating companies’ senior managers.

The Future

“Randstad’s marketing strategy is very good, but when all is said and done it just delivers the sametemporary workers as its rivals could have done.” van der Valk said. “We’re in a very competitivemarket with low profit margins so we need to be efficient and flexible in order to prosper.”

The organization has embarked on a major centralization program, with branches using InternetExplorer to access core applications - a thin client system which managers say will give staff all theinformation they require when and where they want it. Sharing the database will also allow bettermatching of a branch to an employee who lives closer to it. Payments to staff are being outsourced.The central IBM AS/400 system is being phased over to Oracle.

Benefits

Increased confidence inIT Systems and ServiceManagement

Improved IT team moraleand staff retention

Improved efficiency andeffectiveness of IT ServiceProvision

Rapid Return onInvestment throughAsset discovery

Improved ManagementInformation

case study :Randstad

“We needed to conform to theIT Infrastructure Library (ITIL).

Our staff were not generallyacquainted with the ITIL

methodology at the time, butintroducing a solution like

assyst allowed us to educatethem as we went along.”

Peter SmithTeam Leader

assyst Applications Management

“We needed to conform to the IT Infrastructure Library (ITIL). Our staff werenot generally acquainted with the ITIL methodology at the time, but introducinga solution like assyst allowed us to educate them as we went along.”

Another major problem was the lack of Change Management.

Smith, formerly Change Manager, described the situation before the setting up ofI-bridge as “a bit chaotic. People were changing things on production machinesand no one knew about it. So if something went wrong, you wouldn’t knowwhere to look. To get a grasp of this we also introduced Change Management viaassyst, focusing on the core infrastructure.”

The Solution

The out-of-the-box assyst solution was selected because it had been designedfrom inception around ITIL, enabled integration of knowledge bases andmeasurement of the Service Desk’s performance, allowed Desk staff to be awareof problems before the customer rang, and opened up the potential forsubstantial time savings.

It mainly provides Asset and Configuration, Change, Incident, Problem andService Level Management.

The solution - voted number 1 in the Netherlands and Axios’ home base of theUK - was initially installed in the individual operating companies which had theirown databases and Help Desks. This was achieved by employing assyst’sCustomer Service Groups facility which enables databases to be partitioned. Nowit serves the central I-bridge Desk which looks after the entire Netherlandsinfrastructure, including more than 1,000 staff in the two Amsterdam head officebuildings. A separate Help Desk in the Legal Department uses assyst to monitorissues relating to employment law.

Staff used Web applications to fill in forms showing what equipment was on theirpremises - the first step towards Configuration and Asset Management on whichthe organization now relies.

Turnover of staff in branches means a particularly high number of problemsrelated to new users, printers, lost passwords and core applications. Randstad usesmore than 300 different software applications, largely because of the network ofoperating companies, although this is currently being rationalized.

Staff on the main Service Desk handle 1,500 incidents a week, taking calls fromemployees throughout the Netherlands. Around half the incidents are fixed firsttime with the remainder referred to second and third line support teamsspecializing in areas like networks, applications, desk site support anddevelopment. Hardware maintenance for outlying branches is handled by sub-contractors. Calls can be routed to suppliers via assyst.

The Benefits

I-bridge managers agree that standardizing on one good ITSM solution brings ahost of benefits.

“In the first place I like assyst because of its functionality,” said SeniorApplications Manager Erica Fliers, who led the project team which took theoriginal decision to purchase assyst.

A x i o s S y s t e m s - t h e l e a d i n g g l o b a l H e l p D e s k & I T S e r v i c e M a n a g e m e n t s o l u t i o n s p r o v i d e r

“Only a good system like assyst could have given us the information needed to get 600 computers back . . .

Now we know where all our computers are and what is on each of them, matching hardware and software.”

m o r e >

Dick van der ValkIT Service Department ManagerRandstad

Asset & ConfigurationManagement

Change Management

Incident Management

Problem Management

Service Level Management

assyst for:

“The assyst solution has acted as the key enabler forsustained annual six figure financial savings by the abilityto track assets, their specification and suitability for re-use.”

case study :Randstad

B e n e f i t s & T h e F u t u r e

“assyst was the first choice of all of the stakeholders - aunanimous decision."

“ICT now is no longer just a supporting asset in the business,” Smith said. “We are moving towardsusing ICT to actually carry out the business.” For instance, staff can now use Web applications toproduce their own timesheets and submit CVs. ICT is giving Randstad a competitive edge.

“The way we deal with our customers and our own administration methods are changing and are a lotbetter, and that is due to a system like assyst because we can extract from it the information we need,”van der Valk said.

“We don’t use assyst to the limits yet but are taking a good look at what is inside and using it to helpbuild up our organization. This makes my job a lot easier. I can say ‘Can we do that in assyst and, if so,how?’ That makes life simple because we don’t have any other tools and I’m not prepared to look intoany other tools. I trust the assyst structure.”

“The more my team know about the tool, the more they appreciate it,” Smith added. “It is helping a lot.They can see what they are getting out of it. Acceptance is growing - and with it a new professionalism.”

The Company

Randstad Holding nv (www.randstadholding.com) is one of the world's largest temporary and contractstaffing organizations. It is the market leader in the Netherlands, Belgium, Germany and the south east ofthe United States. It is also active in Canada, Denmark, France, Italy, Luxembourg, Portugal, Spain(where it has the second biggest market share), Switzerland and the United Kingdom.

In 2003 the group generated revenues of Û5.3 billion ($6.5 trillion US Dollars), employing an average ofmore than 206,000 people each day. Set up in 1960 by Frits Goldschmeding in a one-roomed office inAmsterdam, it now has 1,600 branches and 642 in-house locations at customer sites in Europe and NorthAmerica.

It is divided into three segments: mass customized staffing (Randstad, Tempo-Team and other groupcompanies), large scale staffing (Capac and Randstad Inhouse Services) and professionals staffing(Yacht).

Mass customized staffing offers a total package, including general administrative, industrial, productionand secretarial staffing services as well as tailor-made concepts for specific sectors. In-house services offerclients direct access to flexible personnel management. Professionals staffing under the Yacht brandconcentrates on highly qualified professionals in finance, management and information technology.

Some 40% of total revenues are generated in the Netherlands where it has some 700 branches but thecompany plans to reduce this proportion to 30%.

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