Leading Forest Products Company Streamlines Processes and Reduces Operational Costs Using SharePoint™ Portal Server

Tembec Inc. is a leading integrated Canadian forest products company principally involved in the production of wood products, market pulp and papers. One of Tembec's leading paper sites is Spruce Falls Operations, which is located in Kapuskasing in Northern Ontario and is a producer of newsprint for a number of newspapers in the North Eastern United States. In June 1999, Tembec's Spruce Falls site was one of the first forestry producers to become certified to ISO 14001 standard through external audits of its environmental management system (EMS) which puts controls on business activities that impact the environment. In 2002, to comply with the commitment made to EMS by Tembec's Spruce Falls site, the organization replaced its paper-based document management system with a comprehensive system based on Microsoft® SharePoint Portal Server software. The SharePoint software solution provides employees with a single point of access to its Environmental Management forms, plans, information and manuals, thus improving internal efficiencies, streamlining processes and helping to save time and money throughout the organization.

Situation

As a leader within the forestry industry, Tembec has taken great measures to meet and exceed their social responsibilities to employees and the environment. Tembec is one of the first organizations within the Canadian forestry industry to adhere to the voluntary international standards on environmental responsibilities set by the International Organization for Standardization (ISO), ISO 14001. The ISO 14001 standard requires that a community or organization put in place and implement a series of practices and procedures that, when taken together, result in an environmental management system (EMS).

Tembec's Spruce Falls operations originally received its ISO 14001 registration in June 1999 and to retain the designation must undergo an external audit every year to ensure ongoing compliance with the requirements. Tembec's Spruce Falls site was due to be audited in September of 2002. The biggest challenge Spruce Falls faced was to meet the audit's stringent document management requirements with its existing paper-based system. Further, the organization was looking to reduce the administrative time spent by the internal EMS clerk maintaining the organization's reports, manuals for machinery, and health and safety and operating procedures. Over half of the EMS clerk's time was spent tracking down managers to notify them that their procedures were coming up for renewal as well as managing a large quantity of paper stored around the facility.

"Our mandate was to incorporate our manual environmental management system into an automated, state-of-the-art IT solution," says Jean-Louis Marin, Information Technology Superintendent, Tembec Paper Group, Spruce Falls Operations. "We were looking for a solution that was tailored to our Windows-based IT environment on which we run all of our mission-critical systems."

Environmental Management Systems are built on the "Plan, Do, Check, Act" model to ensure that the appropriate measures are taken to ensure environmental and employee security within an organization. Within the plant environment, where workplace accidents are more likely to occur, it is critical that health and safety procedures are up to date and easy to access in case of a chemical spill or line injury. The Spruce Falls site stored their Workplace Hazardous Materials Information System and other health and safety information in binders in offices or on the plant floor. As a result, if an accident were to happen, it could take a great deal of time to find the appropriate means to deal with the injury in the procedure binders. The site required a central repository for information that was easy to access for non-technical employees.

Solution

Prior to selecting a SharePoint-based solution, the organization was using Microsoft FrontPage® website creation and management tool, Excel, and Access to create and manage their Environmental Management Solutions forms, plans, information and manuals. While effective, the solution did not provide the organization with the efficiencies and customization that they required. Critical information was still being printed from Excel and Microsoft Word documents, with hard copies then being stored in binders. For users this meant they needed to spend a great deal of time searching for information on critical EMS information. Furthermore, from an administration perspective, Spruce Falls was increasingly faced with the task of ensuring all available paper copies were up to date and that employees were not referring to outdated versions.

Following an internal audit and recommendation by environmental consultants, Moore Environmental Solutions Co., Tembec Spruce Falls selected Microsoft SharePoint Portal Server to deliver a technology solution that would enable the organization to provide a single point of access to employees, as well as deliver a comprehensive solution for document management and collaboration.

Cutting Through the Competition

Working with Moore, Tembec Spruce Falls underwent a review of a variety of products and solutions ranging from Lotus Notes to solutions specifically developed for Environmental Information Management. After assessing four different vendors, the organization selected Microsoft SharePoint Portal Server to meet their document management requirements and tight deadlines.

"We went through an in-depth assessment process to find the appropriate system for Tembec to meet its ISO 14001 technical requirements," says Margery Moore, President, Moore Environmental Solutions. "The new environmental management information system (EMIS) is unique because it leverages Microsoft's SharePoint Portal Server and packages the necessary controls and processes to ensure an effective EMS."

Due to the nature of the rollout and their unique requirements, Moore selected Microsoft Certified Partner T4G Limited of Toronto to develop a comprehensive strategy for the design, development and deployment of the new portal as well as on-site training for the employees at Spruce Falls.

"At T4G, we use technology to offer 'green' scorecards for companies to track enterprise-wide how they are doing environmentally in near real-time," says Geoff Flood, President of T4G Limited. "Companies like Tembec are proving it's not only good for the environment, but it's good for business too."

Easy to Integrate, Deploy and Use

One of the key drivers for the deployment of SharePoint Portal Server was its ability to integrate with other technologies already in place within the IT environment at Tembec's Spruce Falls site. Running on Microsoft software, the organization felt most comfortable with the selection of another Microsoft product to integrate with its current Windows® 2000 operating system.

"The initial tests with SharePoint Portal Server were just phenomenal. It integrates right into Exchange and builds on our Microsoft infrastructure. The functionality of SharePoint Portal Server allowed us to tie it into SQL ServerTM 2000 for reporting," says Marin. "It has worked out perfectly for us. In less than three months we were able to implement the Environmental Management Information System from start to finish and have it work perfectly for the auditory process."

"The Environmental Management Information System we have developed is incredibly easy to use. We were able to embed an existing website as well as all of our home-grown Windows-based applications. We were impressed with the approval routing and document control embedded within the system. Furthermore, it was simple for our users as they could easily download a document from the website and work on it in Word."

Making Life Simpler With Document Management

Document management functionality was a key driver for the creation of the portal, and necessary for Tembec to be able to meet the ISO 14001 requirement. Key SharePoint Portal Server features would ensure the accuracy and timeliness of the mission-critical procedures. For example, the check-in and check-out features guarantee that only one user works on a document at a time.

"We had to have document library control. We have over 1,000 documents that we are controlling and that results in an incredible amount of data," says Marin. "The SharePoint-based solution enables us to better manage all this information by having it stored in one central repository."

SharePoint Portal Server is an out-of-the-box tool to create portals complete with enterprise level search functions, document management and version control tools. To customize the functionality of the portal using SQL Server 2000, T4G created a reporting system, which enables the EMS clerk to send out notifications to managers via email if one of their documents requires review or needs to be updated.

"Over the course of the deployment, we were able to develop reporting services and review process within the central document repository," says Flood. "The tight integration between SQL Server 2000 and SharePoint Portal Server enabled the development of the reporting and notification functionality, which ultimately improves efficiencies and work flow within the organization."

Benefits

Meeting and Surpassing ISO 14001

The SharePoint-based EMIS solution enabled Tembec Spruce Falls to meet their objectives by providing them with the appropriate framework to manage their documents properly and ensure that all documents were accurate and up to date. Working throughout the summer months, the Moore, T4G and Tembec Spruce Falls teams were able to deploy the solution in two months and then conduct training with internal staff in another month.

"When the auditors came in September, we passed with flying colours as a result of having a complete document management system. We were re-certified for ISO 14001 immediately," says Marin.

Saving Time and Potentially Lives

With thousands of procedures and documents in the system, the EMS clerk at Tembec Spruce Falls had a difficult time managing all the information and sending reminders to managers to update or review their documents. The new EMIS system has enabled the organization to improve internal efficiencies, as the EMS clerk has been able to reduce the time spent on organizing, managing and sending updates documents by 50 per cent.

"In terms of efficiency it has really helped the organization. It was not uncommon for the EMS clerk to spend a whole day determining what needed to be reviewed and who needed to be contacted," says Moore. "The system now sends the reminders to the clerk based on the document date and indicates how many notices or reminders each manager has received. Additionally, it shows the documents that are out of compliance and pushes those to the forefront."

"Previously, we had documents in binders which were too old, on bulletin boards or in personal file folders," says Marin. "With SharePoint Portal Server and our new document control library, we have one central repository of information which means that we have complete document control, which was one of the ISO 14001 requirements that we were missing."

Tembec has approximately 1000 employees on site, many of whom do not routinely use technology in their day-to-day jobs. As a result, it was imperative that the organization select a user friendly portal to store the Environment Management manuals and forms, so the system would not intimidate non-technical users. The organization required a portal solution that would allow users to view documents on the portal via a "three-click" process. Additionally, because SharePoint Portal Server is integrated with the tools in Microsoft Office, documents are viewed in a way that is familiar to the end user.

"If someone in the mill has spilled a chemical on their hand for instance, they may not know what to do to treat their injury and will need to search for the appropriate method to treat the spill immediately," says Marin. "Instead of going through binders containing procedures on how to deal with the matter, they can now go to one of the kiosks set up on the production floor, and within three clicks they will be able to find the information they are looking for."

Maintaining a Leadership Position

Tembec's Spruce Falls site is known to be one of the leaders within the Tembec organization, as a plant and because of their role in ensuring environmental compliance. The Spruce Falls site was one of the first sites in Canada to adopt the ISO-based EMS and since then the corporate head office has mandated that each site be 14001 certified. Since the 1930s the Spruce Falls site has been committed to reforestation, replanting the land from which they harvest the trees. Additionally, the organization's commitment to safeguarding the communities around them and their employees has remained at the forefront of their operations.

"We were in a position to become leaders because we are always looking at ways to be proactive in our approach to how we do business and manage our environmental responsibility," says Marin. "We also use this in our approach to technology. As we continually conduct internal audits, we look for ways to use technology to make our business more efficient and profitable."

Spruce Falls anticipates the demand to continue as the organization promotes the system throughout their operations across North America and in Europe.

"The great thing about using the Microsoft product is that Microsoft provides the products in a variety of languages," says Marin. "The rollout is simple as all we have to do is ensure that the menu structure is in French and the conversion procedure takes less than half an hour. I have no doubt that we will see our system being rolled out across the organization. The legwork is done, now all Tembec needs to do is deploy."

For more information about Tembec Inc.'s products and services, visit the website at: http://www.tembec.com/

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