Scymaris Maximizes PPM Benefits with Sciforma Managed Services

COMPANY OVERVIEW

Scymaris offers high-quality and cost-effective ecotoxicology, environmental fate, and analytical chemistry services to the global agrochemical, pharmaceutical, industrial chemicals & biocides industries. Their extensive, state-of-the-art laboratory campus is unique in the ability to access clean freshwater and seawater on a continuous basis directly.

• Sector: Environmental Risk Assessment
• Headquarters: Brixham (United Kingdom)
• Website: www.scymaris.com

HISTORY

Like most project-oriented businesses out there, Scymaris eventually bumped up against the limitations of spreadsheet based project management. They felt the need for support from a professional PPM system providing visibility of the end-to-end delivery process.

On top of these comparatively common needs in terms of project management, the firm needed a robust system to tackle the specific challenges tied to their unconventional PPM model and structure. Specifically, the ever-changing nature of their studies drove the need for a flexible, detail orientated system that enabled them to keep on top of daily changes to delivery schedules. Hence the need for an advanced scheduling system.

Selected and implemented back in 2021, the system quickly became largely used for planning and scheduling activities. However, the Scymaris team still saw room for improvement in project management processes and outcomes.

NEED ANY ASSISTANCE?

Requirements included:

• The optimisation of study tracking, management, and reporting using their existing processes
• System customisations to enable more granular billing vs budget management (monthly, YTD, yearly, at both total company level and by department)
• Customisations to the login profiles and groups
• Integration options for improved reporting

With limited resources and a lot on their plate, Scymaris didn’t have the time to explore all the capabilities of such a full-stack solution and find out how to bend it to their specific needs. Then, what do you do? Outsource – ideally with the best expert.

One of the first firms to adopt Sciforma’s Managed Services Offering, Scymaris worked with an engagement manager to evaluate their current usage and associated processes, review and recommend best practices, jointly agree on an improvement plan, and deliver incremental improvements.

Scymaris was looking to leverage the expertise of someone boasting both a keen understanding of the the tool’s platform and the ability to understand Scymaris’ unique business goals and targets.

The idea was almost to have an extension of Scymaris within Sciforma. Without the MSO, we probably would’ve just been limited in what we know how to do, without the time to really grow our tool knowledge and stretch our use of the platform.

Anna Collinge, Head of PMO

MISSION ACCOMPLISHED

Verdict?

“We absolutely elevated our position and output! ”

–Anna Collinge.

The PMO had set out to achieve a roadmap of some twenty items with the MSO: Creation of new custom reporting fields, restructuring of financial input management, Power BI integration, improvements in the consultant configuration work process, customisation of colour palettes, and much more.

Thanks to Sciforma’s help with configuration, troubleshooting and more, “We absolutely achieved these goals!”

For Scymaris, key benefits include:

• Significant time saved
• Increased forecasting and finance reporting accuracy
• User empowerment and continuous improvement
• The ability to level up on the use of the platform to achieve better outcomes for the business

KEY ACHIEVEMENTS:
FOCUS ON THE POWER BI INTEGRATION

As a key part of the MSO engagement, Scymaris successfully integrated the system with Power BI – a popular interactive data visualization software product.

The MSO integration engagement included:

• Creation of Power BI dashboards reporting on financial metrics
• Implementation of an automated process to auto-refresh the data
• Engagement with Power BI technical teams to deliver the integration as a secure service
• Consolidation of a technical knowledge base regarding the integration – and everything system-related – to empower Scymaris.

“The MSO team really understood our business requirements!”

A “READY-TO-GO” EXPERT

As a comparatively small company, Scymaris needed a flexible MSO. Instead of an ad-hoc draw-down which would have meant that Scymaris needed to schedule all the activities piecemeal and in advance, the MSO afforded the opportunity to engage on an on-going basis in order to meet needs and requirements as they arose. This meant quicker turnaround times and a more agile approach to achieving results.

What’s more, the dedicated MSO team acted as the voice of the customer within Sciforma

NEXT STEPS

Scymaris just switched on time sheets after running a pilot and is planning to roll out the functionality across the business.

Anna Collinge is also looking to drive better capacity management, with a focus on differentiating productive vs non-productive, billable vs non-billable times.

“The relationship that we had through the MSO enabled me to feel like our consultant completely had our back. He really got us, and he was a massive advocate for us. The fact that we knew we had someone we could rely on was what probably stood out as the biggest win at the end of the day.”