Background
WML Coast was established in South Africa in 2005 and is affiliated to the WML Consulting Engineering Group based in Namibia. The WML group in Namibia has a long history and been operational since the 1980’s. In South Africa, the WML group primarily focuses on port, coastal, civil, and structural engineering consulting services.
WML prides itself as being highly focused, innovative, and effective in providing solutions to unique and complex problems. They have helped transform the African continent by contributing to a broad range of projects across a range of sectors. Their work has impacted positively in countries like Guinea, Kenya, DRC, Zanzibar, Cameroon, Angola, Mozambique, Namibia, and South Africa to mention a few. They provide solutions to private industry and government.
WML has many clients, projects, project teams as well as people outside of their company that they interact and correspond with daily, and this equates to a lot of information. For the past several months WML has been using Mail Manager to better manage this information. Chad Alexander, an Engineer for WML, said: “I have at least 10% more time to add value to projects everyday thanks to Mail Managers filing prompts which has eliminated the tedious process of filing emails manually, which has always been very monotonous and time consuming.”
The Problem
As has generally always been the case at many engineering consultancies (and companies), the obligation to file and backup emails to project folders was the responsibility of the employees. In this scenario one major problem is that each employee performs this task differently, and some will get it wrong, or forgo it altogether. Some projects even required emails to be printed, filed, and archived to mitigate the above mentioned.
Furthermore, when assessing compensation events, and the correspondence leading up to such events, missing emails and cumbersome email search capabilities lead to numerous lost hours spent searching for key correspondence at a “mail-by-mail” rate.
WML was invited to a Mail Manager demonstration by Agile Business Technology and immediately saw the potential in adopting the system for their email management. Within the first few days of usage, Mail Manager was already saving time and improving efficiencies. Filed emails could be searched exceptionally quickly via multiple search field entries simultaneously from the centralised repository. WML had never used an email management system before. According to Chad, the incorporation of Mail Manager was a game changer. Mail Managers prompt to file emails immediately after sending or reading them, as well as the powerful search function, has rendered a net positive effect to the bottom line of the business.
WML Today
The ability to search for mails at such a fast rate, in such detail, has proven to be invaluable. Furthermore, the “Social Map” feature which shows graphically who has been corresponding within a project, quickly brings newcomers up to speed regarding who’s who and their relationships.
““Now, senselessly copying others into emails is no longer necessary, as filed emails can be viewed by other project incumbents within the company. “”
Three key benefits of Mail Manager:
- User friendly, fast, and tailored search function
- Time saved can be spent improving our service to our clients and adding value to their projects
- The risk of losing sensitive information has been reduced to virtually zero
Agile have been working closely with Mail Manager to help Architects and Engineers across Africa to save time and manage their email correspondence in a consistent manner.
Contact us to learn more.