The newly achieved project overview provides more up-to-date information for project contributors and company management
The quick and broad acceptance leads to a considerable increase in project work efficiency
The efficient and detailed planning enables more accurate forecasts and creates an improved overview across resources
The transparent and standardized reporting and controlling possibilities increase transparency
With headquarters in Fischamend, Austria, Cargo-Partner Headquarter GmbH is a midsized specialist for transportation and integrated logistics with particular strength in sea Cargo solutions. Besides the strong air and sea Cargo position, its focus is on transport by truck or rail and connected logistics services.
The company was established in 1983 and is considered one of the “first movers” on entering the Eastern European market. Now they are maintaining over 100 locations with more than 2,400 employees around the world. The logistics powerhouse, of course, only uses best-in-class software solutions in all countries of operation for maximum efficiency and transparency.
The company has tried to keep this fast-paced business as convenient and straightforward as possible from the beginning. Consequently, Cargo-Partner strive for continuous improvements of their products for tracking and tracing systems and other logistics structures in the areas of B2B and B2C.
Cargo-Partner’s project management has developed out of the IT department and is restricted to the administrative level, i.e., the headquarters in Fischamend near Vienna and the regional headquarters.
About 50 to 70 employees are regularly involved in project management or working as project managers and are primarily occupied with IT and organization projects.
In connection with the ongoing optimization of the Project Management Office (PMO) belonging to the Cargo-Partner IT department, Christian Polanyi, CIO of the Cargo-Partner group, has also been primarily responsible for introducing a new project management solution.
The growing need for professional planning possibilities, an improved overview of all projects, and a reporting tool for performance visualization and prioritization triggered the search for an adequate software solution for their in-house project management.
Usability was the key factor when looking for an integrated solution. Additionally, project monitoring, controlling, and reporting functions in a single tool were crucial for Cargo-Partner.
In search of an integrated project management software, Cargo-Partner performed a comprehensive market review through Internet research and symposiums and thus came across Planforge. Mr. Polanyi and his colleagues instantly got the sense that Planforge's software would meet Cargo-Partner's needs.
The usability in terms of the easy-to-use and clear user interface could quickly convince them. This appeared decisive due to hardly any previous experience with project management software.
In June 2011, the new Planforge software was used productively with licenses for project managers and time tracking users for the first time.
From Mr. Polanyi's point of view, the installation was completed in a short time; the process has only become a little bit more time-consuming and complex due to the increasing demand for information and planning requirements on the Cargo-Partner's side.
Within just a few training days, the key users learned how to handle the new software easily and adapt it to their needs. Due to the quick software acceptance, the employees were soon able to create new projects and record the essential data.
After entering all project data, including their work packages, within a short period of time, now the main emphasis of Cargo-Partner is to use Planforge for effective scheduling.
Cargo-Partner's resource utilization in Planforge
Since Planforge is in use at Cargo-Partner, several software options on different levels have been implemented to match their growing organizational needs.
The software has been deployed in the areas of Business Process Optimization, Application Management, Application Development, IT Service Desk, and IT Technical Management in the Fischamend headquarters.
For Cargo-Partner, the solution’s most significant benefit at present is the newly gained project overview providing more up-to-date information and thus enabling substantial improvements for both project planning and communication within the team and company.
Accordingly, the focus right now is undoubtedly on project planning and project overview when using Planforge.
Besides, line managers/team leaders already use the reporting functions to create quarterly reports for the upper management.
cargo-partner relies on the intensive customer-oriented refining of the project management software and is convinced that the development is on track to meet the continuously growing requirements.
For example, the Cargo-Partner employees would like to see some improvements in the user interface, the integration of additional search functions, and an improved sorting in tabular views.
Since Planforge always takes the individual company requirements into account when planning future releases, Cargo-Partner is very positive that Planforge will address these issues.
Cargo-Partner's cost controlling (Earned Value) in Planforge
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