GRIMME GmbH – No small potatoes: GRIMME leverages Microsoft 365 to connect its teams.

Challenge.

For over 160 years, farmers have been using GRIMME agricultural machinery for their harvesting needs and have over 150 innovative machines to choose from. With agricultural technology produced in Damme from GRIMME and its subsidiaries, ASA-LIFT and SPUDNIK, farmers in 120 countries harvest potatoes, beets and vegetables such as onions, beetroot, carrots, leeks, chives, celery, fennel, peas, lettuce, etc. Damme is a town of 17,000 inhabitants located in the Vechta district in the north west of Germany. GRIMME and Damme go hand in hand and both enjoy the large farming community, bustling social life and the residents’ innovative ideas. GRIMME is both traditional and forward-facing, which is why Damme’s largest employer puts a premium on innovative workplace technologies, change management and a motivated workforce that can thrive in a transparent environment. These aren’t just buzzwords for GRIMME. These are woven into the corporate fabric, which is why the company turned to Bechtle. GRIMME not only wanted to network their employees with standardised software to become the most state-of-the-art company in the industry, but also to create a working environment that facilitated collaboration in order to bring this vision to life.

“Everything we set out to do, we did so with Bechtle by our side. Supported by Bechtle subsidiary, HanseVision, we are seeing the fruits of our labour. Microsoft 365 has provided us with a foundation on which to build our digital workplace and further develop our OneGRIMME strategy. Now, we are well-connected, enjoy open communication and work more efficiently regardless of time, place and end device.

Stefan Speer, Head of IT, GRIMME Landmaschinenfabrik GmbH & Co. KG

Solution.

GRIMME made the decision to install Microsoft 365 and shift work into the cloud. Employees were already using Microsoft Office products such as Outlook to write e-mails, Word for letters, Excel for spreadsheets as well as SharePoint and Skype for video conferences. Microsoft 365 made these apps more modern and versatile. There were services delivered from the cloud, meetings could now be held online. everything was connected. Employees could do their job from anywhere, and data could be shared in a number of ways. GRIMME staff were greeted with a new culture of virtual collaboration. A culture that would see fundamental changes to the way people work together at GRIMME—provided everyone felt at home in the new environment and knew how to navigate it. That meant one thing was absolutely essential—change management. GRIMME’s employees had to be onboard from the very start of the digital journey to understand the purpose of the new tech and feel able to share their ideas and opinions. GRIMME embraced the challenge with the help of Bechtle subsidiary, HanseVision. In an initial workshop for remote, agile ideating, the two teams laid the foundations for a close partnership, leveraging everything Microsoft 365 has to offer.

The cloud-based solution empowered all new forms of collaboration, enabling GRIMME and HanseVision to implement the agreed work packages optimally and within the planned time period. As users’ needs were always at the heart of the project, everyone showed a great deal of flexibility and project meetings regularly turned into an intensive exchange with company leadership. For the people at GRIMME, the outcome was much more than some new technology. For example, the self-service platform is home to solutions for a whole range of problems. The project was characterised by unhindered communication, and even though the partners were never in the same room, they collaborated on presentations to help GRIMME’s employees get a feel for the technology. The GRIMME project team also learned how to use Microsoft tools efficiently and this knowledge and the vision to make the company a digital leader in its industry is shared and lived every day. Only after this preparation for the digital journey was completed did GRIMME install its new technological basis for the digital workplace, which saw the company digitalise many processes which had previously been analogue. Employees are now able to work from another location than their desks with all the files they need available in digital form. And that’s not the end of GRIMME’s journey, which everyone at the company is eager to go together.

Business Benefits.

GRIMME succeeded in making a seamless switch to Microsoft 365. The company’s employees now enjoy collaborating using Office 365, Teams, SharePoint, etc., saving them considerable time. The switch to a digital workplace was child’s play thanks to the excellent preparation and transparent communication. HanseVision also provided the added impetus and new approaches to change management, so GRIMME can now continue to develop its OneGRIMME strategy.