Google Data

Posted by Mary Gendron, Senior Vice President and Chief Information Officer, at Celestica

Editors note: Today’s guest blogger is Mary Gendron, Senior Vice President and Chief Information Officer, at Celestica, a Toronto-based innovative supply chain solutions company that provides end-to-end product lifecycle solutions from design and manufacturing through to delivery and after-market support.

Our talented global team is dedicated to delivering innovative supply chain solutions to our customers – helping them to stand out in their markets. This requires our employees to work together effectively and increase the sharing of knowledge and ideas across functions and geographies.

After piloting Google Apps, we quickly realized it would enable our global workforce to work more collaboratively, and as a result, we have recently decided to move 19,000 of our employees to Google Apps. Now my team can meet spontaneously using the video chat feature in Gmail or draft our team strategy simultaneously in a Google Doc. That type of collaboration allows us to build on everyone’s ideas to develop better solutions. Also, by sharing a document where all team members have the opportunity to contribute, everyone is invested in the project because we did it together.

Because we’re no longer tied to different time zones or other people’s schedules, we can work together where we want, when we want, and we can all edit a document together in real time. With Google Apps, the stress of compiling edits in time for a meeting or ensuring you are presenting the final version of a deck are gone. Recently, I was working on a strategy document with my team. I could close my laptop in the evening and know that, when I woke up, those in a different time zone or who preferred to work at night would have added their comments and input directly in the document. Overall, we’re accomplishing more together and faster than before.

We’re in the early stages, but I believe Google Apps will help us achieve our objectives faster, more efficiently and with greater success.