The Challenge with Legacy Methods
“We had challenges pertaining to timekeeping. The use of multiple systems made it a strenuous task,” says Larry Marshall, VP at Station Casinos. The hiring managers were spending too much time one-on-one with vendors, being more reactive than proactive. On the accounting side, processing multiple invoices, and trying to tie resources to particular projects was adversely affecting their productivity and workflow. Station’s legacy workforce management model didn’t have the capability to track down contractors to enter timesheets, unable to view project spend, and manage overall processes, which ultimately increased the risk of being overcharged. “With our legacy methods, we had compromised on consistency with vendor agreements exposing us to potential risks,” adds Marshall.
A Strategic Partnership
With escalating complexities and the goal of moving toward an agile workplace, it became essential for Station to find a more efficient way of doing things. Marshall and his team were in search for a powerful workforce management system to mitigate complications that affected overall performance, productivity, and turnover. Station found a solution with Renhead technology. The pair entered into a strategic partnership to accomplish this goal. “Right away, our implementation team audited Station’s process, reviewing every component to identify setbacks to find room for improvement. This included interviews with employees within each department—accounting, project management, and legal. We also conducted individual interviews with their existing vendors to understand how best to align their valued resources,” Allison Tam, co-founder of Renhead, explains. “With a good understanding of Station’s processes, we were able to collectively envision future vendor engagements and plan strategic initiatives that would lead Station Casinos to further success.”
“We were on a mission to become an agile organization. Our team collaborated with Renhead to integrate their agile methodology to configure their Vendor Management solution to meet our needs,” says Marshall. To Station’s delight, Renhead accomplished this customization within three weeks after their initial conversations. Immediate advantages and improvements were noticed. Renhead enabled Station’s accounting department with immediate visibility into their processes and tasks by offering timely data presented with dashboards specific to the appropriate hiring managers and vendors. This helped in identifying that time and resources weren’t being efficiently allocated, providing Station with actionable data to better plan for strategic decision-making.
The Renhead platform successfully reduced the volume of input that accounting teams had to process which led to the Station accounting team avoiding payment discrepancies. Subsequently, product owners could better manage their budgets and timelines, making the process overall more efficient. Renhead thus rendered a resource that gave Station better control over their departmental initiatives and budgets, while reducing administrative time significantly. It was essential to implement a sustainable process that would align with their future vision to help them grow into a truly agile organization with minimal disruption to their day-to-day workflow.
The Transformation
By restructuring the clients’ vendor agreements, the firm ensured that all parties are in compliance with labor laws. With an audit trail in place for every component of the client’s process, the company now ensures a true “footprint” for lasting effect. By implementing Renhead’s technology, Station was able to eliminate nearly 90 percent of the data that vendors were being asked to manually log, as well as removing the need to create invoices on a weekly basis. Automating this process allowed Station’s managers to focus less on administrative tasks and more on building long-lasting relationships and recruiting new resources. Ultimately consolidating their database – which was being spread across multiple platforms – into one system, the client has access to all financial documents, compliance agreements, project resources, etc. resulting in transparency across all teams, plus actionable data delivered in robust reporting tools.
Engagement with Renhead has become a game-changer in Station’s vendor interactions. The company’s technical expertise has enhanced the client’s contractor timesheet and expense processing by reducing the time it takes to submit and process. These advantages were aligned with specific projects for implementing a sustainable and agile organizational process moving forward. Renhead technology enabled Station’s product owners to align Statement of Work (SOW) agreements with the contractors involved, which has helped their product team view their existing spend easily and in real time. Vendors also gained enhanced visibility and access to timesheets, expenses, approvals, and the candidate interview process, which drastically reduced vendor outreach. Conversations with hiring managers soon became more about the relationship instead of vendors asking “when am I getting paid?” By streamlining the contractor onboarding process, Renhead’s platform offered visibility into tasks, documents, and assets, resulting in transparency as well as seamless “off-boarding.” Additionally, as Marshall points out, the presence of Renhead’s team on-site to enhance system administration and provide training, added even more value to the relationship.
By building a true partnership both companies were able to have meaningful conversations upfront about the client’s requirements and then collectively create an out-of-the-box workflow specific to those needs. “Station had a vision of what they wanted to achieve, which was to find a more efficient and effective workforce management solution, and Renhead was able to provide that.” adds Tam. “Now successfully transformed into an agile workplace, we are able to deliver more value to the business and our customers than ever before.” concludes Marshall.
