Lotus Notes - to Microsoft O365 and beyond

RCAC released a request for proposal (RFP) to build a new reporting system for their Self-Help Housing Program.

The project involved the conversion of a legacy Lotus Notes data collection system into a SharePoint solution. The system is needed to collect and track data and generate monthly reports for RCAC’s Self-Help housing program.

Data from the legacy Lotus Notes system needed to be migrated to a new SharePoint system in the Cloud, in order to provide the Staff with the ability to input, upload and store all technical assistance information and housing documents.

Rural Community Assistance Corporation (RCAC) invited qualified SharePoint development companies to submit proposals for the conversion of a legacy Lotus Notes data collection and reporting system into a SharePoint solution and JFD was selected as the vendor of choice. 

The Plan Begins

Jack Frost Design (JFD) led the RCAC team through the Discovery (Planning), Design, Develop, Records Migration | Management, Data Integrate Testing, and Implementation of a new 365/SharePoint Intranet Solution.

Our submitted Project Plan was refined and JFD launched the project with our initial Stakeholder meeting in order to set the Goal, Scope and Timeframes for implementation.

A recent survey of their website users, both employees and the general public, revealed that almost everyone found their site to be very difficult to navigate and not very helpful at providing the information they were looking for.

JFD’s initial planning processes included analyzing and documenting the following project deliverables:

• Architecture Diagram: Lotus Notes to SharePoint
• Architecture Diagram: SharePoint Lists through Solutions Workflows
• Solution Architecture
• Wireframes the application requirements
• Solution Templates, Report Templates
• Field Mapping and Definition Worksheets
• Reports Mapping and Definition Worksheets
• Data Integrity LN Records to SP Records Worksheets
• Email Triggers Definition and Email Workflow Diagrams

Rapid Adoption of Microsoft O365

RCAC began its workplace transformation by deploying Microsoft 365—a comprehensive solution that brings together Office 365, Windows 10, and Enterprise Mobility + Security—to its administrative and managerial staff.

In just six weeks, all information workers had migrated from Lotus Notes and adopted the O365 Self-Help business solution in their everyday work.

The solution has changed the mindset of what RCAC can do as an organization and introduced a whole new world of productivity tools that their staff found easy and natural to work with.

To help with change management, RCAC encouraged “business champions” to mentor colleagues in the new workplace tool.  These core team members encouraged the use of Microsoft Teams as the global hub for collaboration across the organization.    The Technical assistance staff is relieved that the organization made the change from Lotus Notes to the cloud.

Training Today and Tomorrow

The online Training Wiki and Video implementation provides the Staff with:

• How to Information
• Where to find the records
• Why the information is needed
• Governance information

The Staff will be able to continue to enhance the training information as the environment grows and new employees will have a training environment to assist them in learning the entire solution.