The Clorox Company

Created a cutting edge IT control system to allow real-time core management decisions, specifically for project scope and funding approvals.

The Client

The Clorox Company is a leading manufacturer and marketer of consumer products with annual revenues of $4.8 billion. With 7,800 employees worldwide, the company manufactures products in 25 countries and markets them in more than 100 countries.

The Challenge

At Clorox, project managers were saddled with too many projects, misaligned resources and cumbersome processes. Rapid strategic change was critical. To initiate this, a business-driven IT Governance was implemented to deliver important projectrelated tasks and make core management decisions based on real-time information particularly when it came to project scope and funding approvals.

To pull this off, Clorox knew it had to move from tracking individual activities to managing projects at the enterprise level. Sharing project knowledge collaboratively with all major stakeholders was also a top priority.

While a basic project management (PM) tool and methodology were already in place, the existing system was barely able to plan new task requirements, monitor critical paths or provide easy access to reports for multiple levels of management.

Other key challenges included:

• Providing an integrated solution within rigid time limits
• Delivering success within fixed budget constraints
• Maintaining access to existing project data throughout the transition
• Integrating project data from multiple legacy systems without loss of content
• Migrating existing knowledge from the old system to the new solution

Clorox decided to replace its out-of-date time recording system by incorporating these functions into the overall solution design and implementation.

The Pcubed Solution

To deliver a project this complex, Clorox turned to Pcubed - a Premier Microsoft Project Partner with a reputation for innovative problem solving using Microsoft's latest PM software on a global basis.

Pcubed proposed a pragmatic, no-nonsense solution that combined PM best practices with the technical delivery expertise that would satisfy Clorox's needs. By leveraging the technical expertise of its Global Solutions Center, Pcubed was able to quickly design an integrated PM solution that featured three primary tools:

• Microsoft Project replaced a variety of existing systems, providing a single, consistent, world-class source to develop and manage complex project work plans, as well as managing scope, timing, costs, resource requirements and dependencies
• For the first time, Microsoft Project Server, a web-based collaboration tool, made it possible for Clorox project managers and team members to input, review and share real-time task, status and assignment information
• Pcubed's Digital Portfolio Dashboard, a web-based application, provided a wide range of reports and projects to program managers, resource managers and Clorox executives for making business decisions. A "one-stop shopping" communication tool allowing information access for the whole organization, eliminated time spent generating reports

Key elements of the solution included:

• Instant access to project data - anywhere in the world
• A workforce trained in PM best practices and tools, customized for all project managers and administrators
• "Ad hoc" status reporting that allow managers to slice and dice project data in ways that are meaningful, easy to understand, and always relevant
• A visual "early warning" system with graphical indicators that track key categories chosen by project managers