The Bottom Line: How Hive Helps An Insurance Software Company
- Hive improves efficiency by ~30%, saving this team 1 workday every week.
- Hive helps them manage all projects, both internal and external, with fewer tools and with less friction.
Hive is the go-to for this team, every morning. Some might even be lost without it.
Innovation in Insurance Technology
Behind every software provider is a group of other tools & software platforms that help power the business on a daily basis. Today we’re looking at how one of Hive’s customers, a leading software provider in the insurance industry, uses Hive to manage its processes more efficiently – and ultimately help its customers do the same.
This Hive customer develops technology solutions that help insurers and other agents improve business operations and work more efficiently. But the company is more than just a technology company. It is also an expert service provider, working closely with its customers to develop unique solutions, and to ensure customers reap the greatest reward from existing products.
The company has been helping customers improve their operations for almost over two decades – and with hundreds of employees now working for the organization, it was time to find a new solution.
Was there something they could improve internally to provide even better results for their customers?
The Need For Hive: Ditching The Spreadsheets
The company has employees working on three types of projects: software development projects, key strategic projects, and customer-facing projects. Before Hive, they used a combination of Microsoft Project and Excel to create and manage these projects.
The problem? Creating Gantt charts in Excel was time consuming and clunky. Because Excel doesn’t let multiple users edit a document in real-time, each project member would have to send around a new, revised document to team members anytime they made edits. The team knew it needed a more efficient way to work on these day-to-day tasks and engage with projects from start to finish.
In addition, the company wanted a platform that would let it monitor all projects from a higher-level management perspective. It used to send monthly updates to the development teams and team leaders, giving them a view of all ongoing projects, with statuses in Gantt view. They wanted to provide this insight again, helping leaders analyze the business and make more informed decisions.
Why The Company Chose Hive
After much research, the team compiled a list of project management tools to explore. As a Microsoft partner, it enjoyed using Microsoft Teams for communication but knew Microsoft Project wasn’t the best tool for its project management needs. After looking into Asana and LiquidPlanner — and doing a demo with Monday — they eventually found Hive.
Working with a Hive sales representative, the team completed several demos and was able to test out Hive internally before committing. From the start, the team had a great experience with their Hive Sales Rep The team knew they could rely on their rep for help and support and felt like it could actually form a relationship with the Hive team.
So what were the main features that drove the team to Hive?
1. External sharing: They needed a platform where it could share projects with customers. With Hive, their teams can share projects with external customers, or they can keep internal projects private within the company. Currently, they use Hive for all customer-facing projects lasting over 5 days.
2. Compatibility with existing tools: Hive’s integrations made the transition especially easy. Switching from Microsoft Project to Hive was painless, as teams were able to import project information directly from Microsoft Project to Hive. Their software developers use Jira, so Hive’s Jira integration was crucial for developers to communicate with other teams and sync workflows between the two tools. These integrations allowed everyone to start using Hive with as little friction as possible.
3. User-friendly and aesthetically pleasing: Look and feel were really important to the company. The teams wanted a platform that was user-friendly, aesthetically pleasing, and intuitive to use — and that’s where Hive really stood out among other tools.
How Hive Helps The Team Save 1 Day Every Week
The company now has many employees across different teams working in Hive. These users include software developers, project managers, and other internal executives and business leaders. Here are some of the most impactful benefits of Hive for the team:
1. Faster projects with less friction: Hive brings all project information to one central place, which is accessible by anyone on the team, 24/7. Real-time editing and collaboration have been a key time-saver, drastically reducing the amount of time spent waiting for someone to finish editing an Excel spreadsheet, or waiting to receive the most recent file version. With Hive, everything is instantly updated for smooth and efficient project management.
Hive allowed this team to be more efficient – saving about a day every single week — and everything they need to access is all in one central location.
2. More detailed projects: With Hive, the team is able to add notes and details to projects, increasing visibility and keeping everyone up to date. Its teams often comment on specific action cards, reducing the need to send information in another tool. The company also utilizes Hive’s “project homepages” as a central hub for each project. On these overview pages, individuals can post project status updates, attach files, and attach any project-specific Notes that are taken in Hive.
3. Higher level view: The portfolio view is incredibly helpful for company leaders and executives. This view shows the status of all projects on one single dashboard. And because this view is customizable, teams can add custom fields to track specific metrics. The team uses these reports on a weekly and monthly basis to show leaders how projects are progressing, how teams are tracking, and if projects are staying within budget.
The Future
When we asked one employee at the company how he would feel if he couldn’t use Hive anymore, his answer said it all: “I would be lost without it.”
Hive has significantly improved the workflow for many teams across the company. It has been nearly two years since they adopted Hive, and we are excited to see what they continue to accomplish ahead.
