With the successful implementation of OneDirectory at Citizens Alliance Bank, their workforce has enjoyed increased collaboration and connection with one another in their day-to-day operations.
About Citizens Alliance Bank
Founded in 1902, Citizens Alliance Bank provides banking services to consumer and commercial customers with a focus on Ag and Small Business Lending.
They employ approximately 175 local staff members within ten communities in West-Central Minnesota and three communities in Western Montana. From their original charter as the German American Bank in 1902, they’ve grown from $10,000 to more than $950 million-plus in assets.
The Challenge
Before the introduction of OneDirectory, Citizens Alliance Bank struggled to keep all of our employee records connected and up-to-date.
The IT team had the tedious and unending task of constantly updating Active Directory only to manually copy information into a separate employee directory. Employees found it difficult to look up contact information and team roles, leading to a disconnected workplace atmosphere. They needed a solution that could provide one source of truth for employees in order to make communication easier, faster, and more efficient.
“Using OneDirectory, you really get a sense of comradery with the coworkers you don't get to see often, be they in a different department or even a different state.” - Alex Calvin, Virtual systems administrator at Citizens Alliance Bank.
Critical Needs
- A digital employee directory solution
- An employee directory tool that integrated into Active Directory
- An easy-to-use tool with a great user interface
The Solution
After spending some time carefully working through possible solutions, Citizens Alliance Bank eventually decided that OneDirectory was the right solution for their needs.
Citizens Alliance Bank had considered both Office 365 and their existing HRIS system since they already were familiar with the tools. However, neither of these options had the same flexibility and focus that they needed – in the end, OneDirectory ended up being the best fit.
"OneDirectory's design focuses on providing a streamlined approach to creating and using an employee directory," says Alex Calvin, Virtual systems administrator at Citizens Alliance Bank. "Its modern interface is intuitive and easy to use so that any employee can find what they need without having to be technical wizards. That's why we chose OneDirectory – it felt like the perfect fit for us."
By directly connecting with Azure Active Directory and Microsoft 365 profiles, Citizens Alliance Bank were able to utilize enriched employee profiles and better connect people across their organization. OneDirectory’s suite of features includes an org chart, people search, skills directory, and office directory, to create a better corporate experience.
“OneDirectory is focused on being an employee directory and doing it well. It has a very modern interface that is easy for any employee to use, no matter their technical skills.” - Alex Calvin, Virtual systems administrator at Citizens Alliance Bank.
The Benefits
Citizens Alliance Bank always sought to cultivate a spirit of inter-office collaboration, but operating over multiple locations made this task particularly challenging.
The introduction of OneDirectory has proven to be a game changer for the bank: their employees now use it daily to quickly and easily find and connect with one another.
This has had an immediate impact on the workplace atmosphere, resulting in increased comradery between coworkers located in different offices. In addition, OneDirectory significantly reduced the time and resources needed to maintain the employee directory - freeing up the team’s attention for other tasks.
Clearly, establishing connections has become much easier at Citizens Alliance Bank since they adopted OneDirectory into their system.
1. Increase in employees finding and connecting with each other
2. Decrease in duplicate employee data in different systems
3. Decrease in time spent having to manually update data
The Bottomline
With the successful implementation of OneDirectory at Citizens Alliance Bank, their workforce has enjoyed the increased collaboration and connection with one another in their day-to-day operations.
Staff can quickly search the directory and find the right people to connect with in a matter of seconds, ensuring they are connected with the right person for each task. Making communication – both internally and externally – more efficient has led to a smoother workflow and improved customer service response times.
In conclusion, by creating connections between staff members through OneDirectory, Citizens Alliance Bank has been able to increase efficiency within their organization.
Success Highlights
- Increase in employee collaboration
- Decrease in duplicate data in Active Directory and their employee directory
- Decrease in time spent having to update their old manual employee directory
