Overview
UniSuper, a leading industry super fund in Australia, plays a pivotal role in managing over $80 billion in funds for more than 450,000 members in higher education. Their strategic investment in digital transformation, particularly in a cloud strategy, proved indispensable as the pandemic necessitated widespread remote work across the country.
Challenge
Forward thinking mindset to improve employee experience.
While UniSuper describes its members as the thinkers, creators and investigators who shape tomorrow, its IT leaders felt its own workplace was until recently, a traditional business environment.
"When I joined in 2017, UniSuper did not have a reliance on collaboration tools as much as other organisations,” says Anna Leibel, Chief Delivery and Information Officer at UniSuper. With 89% of staff working out of one building, the privilege of working in the space meant that they did not have a reliance on collaboration tools as much as other organisations.
"Prior to COVID, if someone was working from home, participating in meetings remotely was a challenge. We needed technology that would enable people to collaborate from anywhere," said Sam Cooper, Head of Platforms and Engineering at UniSuper, "We had the fundamental capabilities to work remotely. However; there were opportunities to improve the employee experience and provide a scalable solution that would allow employees to work remotely.”
Solution
Migration to the cloud and a new collaborations environment.
UniSuper embarked on its cloud migration in 2018. The team chose Microsoft Azure for its new cloud operating environment and Telstra Calling for Microsoft Office 365 for its new communications environment. Fortunately, the IT team had just completed its roll out when the coronavirus hit, and everyone had to switch to working from home.
The investment and decision to adopt cloud technologies proved its value to the organisation in a way that might have been harder to demonstrate under ordinary circumstances.
"This kind of transformation work is like doing a house renovation,” says Leibel. “It’s the plumbing and wiring. The stuff people can’t see but is a requisite for delivering a service to meet a critical business and customer need."
Readiness and start dates to work from home were the big questions asked by the Business Continuity team and the executives.
But there were added pressures. While grappling with the challenges of introducing the new cloud-based toolset to its workforce, made necessary by the pandemic, UniSuper also had to deal with changes to government rules on member’s gaining early access of funds from superannuation accounts. That meant the company had to be ready to rapidly deliver on such requests from its members.
The team built out a readiness plan and had everything ready to go within a few days. It felt great to provide a scalable solution so quickly to keep the business running – we really demonstrated what value IT could bring to the table...
Anna Leibel
Chief Delivery and Information Officer, UniSuper
The approach
Rapid implementation and Peace of Mind.
Telstra Purple helped UniSuper with its roll-out, from both a technical and a change-management perspective. It ensured the transformation delivered the agility promised, with preparation, piloting and a full implementation. With the technology in place, the coronavirus accelerated adoption of the platform.
The migration to Microsoft cloud technologies and Telstra Calling for Office 365 immediately delivered efficiency dividends.
Leibel says a big advantage of the partnership is that the internal IT team at UniSuper could focus more on giving the fund’s members the best possible experience. Telstra Purple helped reduce day-to-day operational concerns, like traditional phone systems and server storage.
The UniSuper team worked around the clock to make fast withdrawals possible for their members.
With such critical financial data to protect and manage, the decision to adopt a full Microsoft cloud suite was led by the desire for a single vendor system to reduce risk associated with handling data.
"One end-to-end provider and a single security-management system offers peace of mind,” Cooper says. “Seamless usability was absolutely front of mind for us without any friction for users. We’re here to enable the business, so we always make decisions with that in mind."
The pressing need for a seamless transformation was also a strong reason to partner with Telstra Purple.
"We just don’t need to have that IP in-house,” says Leibel. “It makes sense to partner with someone who has extensive experience in this area and we can focus on doing the things that matter to our members."
The impact
Technical expertise and change management.
"The tech is just the tech,” says Leibel. “It’s how people use it. It’s how the capability and functionality they’ve got access to can influence the service we provide members and employers; and how productive our employees can be by having access to it."
It has given UniSuper a readiness to scale and delivers the tools that enable greater collaboration for its employees.
Making cultural shifts was integral to ensuring a positive employee experience for both the enforced remote-work scenario alongside the new digital working environment.
"The longer you work remotely the more you have to be creative in the ways you engage people and maintain connection,” says Leibel. “Things like going to Teams meetings - and not really to talk about work. Just talking generally about how people are going."
UniSuper has seen an immediate uptake of the platform with it overtaking Outlook as the preferred collaboration tool within 6 months of it being rolled out.
Within weeks, the UniSuper team was seeing benefits from using Teams; reporting a reduction in email traffic and improvements to mobility and flexibility, due to the new features of the platform.
After the unexpected disruption in the midst of a digital transformation, Leibel sees the greatest measure of success. UniSuper never missed a beat through it all while looking after its members and employers – and its own people.
"Not only have we been able to keep the business operating seamlessly during a crisis, but we’ve met all our commitments for the FY20,” says Leibel. “Not just from an IT perspective, but from the whole organisation. That’s something we’ve been really proud of."
We now have a cloud-based telephony system which we can scale quickly. This is combined with our corporate chat and video conferencing tools to provide a platform where a people can truly collaborate... It’s given us far more resilience in our corporate telephony and reduced our costs.
Sam Cooper
Head of Platforms and Engineering, UniSuper.
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