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Sokkia Co., Ltd.

Both information sharing and application efficiency are equally essential elements in furthering corporate activities. Sokkia Co., Ltd., a major manufacturer of surveying instruments, uses Lotus Notes to share information among staff members, and uses Groupmax workflow facility to computerize the circulation and handling of documents that require approval by more than one person. Implementing Groupmax and Notes has realized a drastic rationalization of applications.

Constructing a new system using Groupmax and Notes

"We needed a new corporation-wide system that also included our top company officials. So, in that sense we required an extensive workflow facility," says Hiroshi Okamoto, then manager of the Information System Department.

Sokkia Co., Ltd. began discussing introducing a new application system in early 1997. They required a messaging facility for exchanging and sharing information, and a workflow facility for rationalizing the circulation and approval of documents that require approval by more than one person.

Sokkia was already using cc:Mail by Lotus to exchange information with overseas subsidiaries, so they introduced Lotus Notes as their e-mail system. But, Sokkia deliberately chose not to construct a workflow system using Notes, and decided instead to adopt the Hitachi Groupmax groupware. About the details of introducing Groupmax, Mr. Okamoto had the following to say:

"Especially in a workflow system where functions and operations must be carefully adjusted to suit the user's business, foreign products did not satisfy all our demands. No matter how excellent the product, there was always something lacking. But since Groupmax was created based on research on how Japanese do business, we did not need to change our style of work or our applications to suit the software specifications. This point sold us on Groupmax."

Katsuo Harada, on the staff of the Information System Group in the Legal Affairs and Information Department, also adds, "At the time, I saw some other products which offered workflow facilities, but I evaluated Groupmax highly because its interface had the best performance." In the case of handling documents that require approval by more than one person, not all our prospective system users were familiar with computers. Rather, the higher a manager's position, the more he or she tends to avoid difficult computer operations. In this respect, the good interface of Groupmax was rated highly.

Constructing a highly flexible workflow system quickly

Sokkia started previewing products in April, and decided to introduce Groupmax and Notes in July. The first system started running by November. Sokkia constructed their system in just three short months. In Groupmax, users can describe a workflow by easy mouse operations. It was this higher than average flexibility that enabled the company to construct the system and get it running rapidly.

Moreover, Groupmax can be linked with, and is highly compatible with, Notes, Microsoft Exchange, and so on. Sokkia also linked them. Once documents that require approval by more than one person are created then approved in the Groupmax system, they are stored in the Notes database for effective use later.

Kazuhiro Fudou, on the staff of the Information System Group in the Legal Affairs and Information Department, looks back on the system construction work as follows:

"When we actually coded our workflows, we became aware of how many unexpected exceptions there are in processing. This made defining business processes that would cover all possibilities more and more complicated. But, with Groupmax we can modify these definitions visually, thus drastically reducing the modification workload."

He also noted that Hitachi's technical support in the basic design stage helped shorten the construction phase. This indicates that not only are the facilities and performance of the product good, but also that Hitachi's technical support system is in place to assist you in introducing and administering Groupmax when constructing a new system. This is an important point for you to consider when previewing workflow systems.

What have been the real benefits of introducing a workflow system? In many cases where corporate-wide systems are introduced that include the top company officials, system use is sometimes lower than expected. But, in Sokkia's case, Mr. Harada said that the positive results of introducing the Groupmax system were even greater than they expected.

"It previously took about four weeks to handle a document that required approval by more than one person: from drafting to approval. Now, all the processing is finished in about two weeks. In addition, we've solved problems such as users not knowing where a form is stalled in the system."

The workflow for running applications made it clear where bottlenecks tend to occur.
They were concerned about users' reactions to the new system, but most users also regard this system favorably. There has even been constructive criticism on how to connect the system to the sales offices. About users' reactions, Hideyuki Tani, also of the Information System Group in the Legal Affairs and Information Department, commented, "Now users have almost no hesitation in using Groupmax to process documents that require approval by more than one person. We were surprised at how firmly and naturally Groupmax procedures took hold. Paper documents that require approval by more than one person are still partially used; but the ratio of such paper documents to computerized online processing is very low thanks to the workflow system."

He said that introducing the workflow system has been very effective not only for increasing application efficiency, but in other aspects also. Mr. Okamoto explains, "To realize business process reengineering, you have to know exactly what problems you have in your applications first. Introducing the Groupmax workflow system helped us clarify where to improve our applications, in addition to just making applications more efficient. We benefited from this."

Studying ways to apply workflows to other fields-and take fuller advantage of system merits

The more workflow programs are applied to a broader variety of fields, and the more the user community expands, the greater the synergistic effects. As workflow systems are used in various applications and are linked with each other organically, the benefits of the systems increase.

Sokkia is now discussing how to use Groupmax in labor attendance management and in reimbursing travel expenses for business trips, in addition to their present applications (described above). Moreover, they are also studying how to use new facilities such as enhancing the link with Notes, and linking with webs.

"We accomplished our first and primary goal in implementing Groupmax-and that was to get our top management to use this system. Now we want to expand our user community. Though there are cost considerations, we want all our employees to use this system, which will also lead to increasing its effectiveness," said Mr. Okamoto. They are using Groupmax in various ways to construct an even more user-friendly and efficient system.