Frequently Asked Questions

Business leaders recognise the importance of the need to radically transform their organisations in order to survive and ultimately achieve sustainable competitive advantage in their chosen fields. But the process of implementing significant organisational change is complex and hard to manage and studies show the failure rate of this type of program has remained at around 70%

We believe a key element in this long-standing problem has been the lack of an integrated solution to manage the transformation activity. Xpoint™ software has been developed to fill this void and provide executives and managers with the “missing link” to enable transformation success rates to be radically improved. The solution provides a unique, complete environment which addresses the  human aspects of change whilst also enabling complex and multiple projects to be managed systematically and simultaneously.

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The xpoint™ platform from element8 is a Web 2.0 software application developed on Microsoft Sharepoint and SQL Server that provides a single, cohesive, collaborative environment where organisational transformation is planned and implemented. Its inclusivity enables everyone in the business to engage and all types of business initiatives can be managed   from strategic programs through to ‘quick win’ ideas. 

 Xpoint™ offers:

• At its heart, a structured life-cycle methodology with supporting e-tools to allow teams to systematically deliver the desired change and embed this into core processes.  
• A communication vehicle for leaders and all staff that accelerates organizational engagement and alignment around business changes – forums, blogs, ticker announcements, etc.
• An intuitive, light-touch virtual environment where everyone can capture, develop and contribute to business initiatives of all types
• Real-time dash-board information about all change activity.  Any user can:
• view performance at a glance via key measures
• cut and dice information about initiatives along any dimensions
• drill-down into all data to the individual initiative level
• The means to find and re-use knowledge across your organization by finding relevant experts, initiatives and documentation.

More information on the product structure and its benefits can be found by visiting the Solutions section

Business transformation is now central to the strategic agenda, with over 82% of leaders in a recent survey highlighting it as of vital importance. Most organizations have a burning platform in their business and need faster change, cheaper change and sustained change.  However, currently:

• UK companies are estimated to lose £1.7bn/year from the failure to effectively implement organisational change
• 20% of companies do not even measure change management performance. 

Some types of issues that businesses are grappling with, and which xpoint™ can support, include:

• Profits erosion quarter on quarter – driving the need to work significantly smarter, achieve  greater efficiencies and substantially reduced costs
• Customer experience issues which need to be turned around, for example, significantly reduce abandoned call levels, and time to resolution of call-centre calls
• Cultural change initiatives to deliver a more innovative and business-savvy workforce
• Better asset management and/or reduced operational costs, for example reducing m2/person so assets can be released
• Delivery of challenging environmental and/or corporate responsibility goals
• The need to deliver disruptive business innovations that will transform the business.

The majority of companies now have integrated software solutions to support day-to-day business delivery.  However, virtually none have any environment to support people as they try to deliver new business capability.  This means that:

• Teams are struggling to lead and deliver change with limited tools.  They have no on-line environment or processes to help move initiatives forward, or to support working at a distance
• The health of initiatives (both strategic and tactical) remains largely ‘opaque’, reporting offers only brief, backward-looking glimpses into how things are really going
• Leaders have limited means of communicating with their organization to get key change messages across, to steadily build alignment in regular and manageable ways.

The platform provides this:

• Stimulating and enabling broad engagement the business strategy
• Equipping leaders and initiative teams to deliver organizational change - at all levels
• Reducing time-to-impact and accelerating knowledge capture and sharing.

It allows everyone to engage in driving the business forward via contributing to top down, bottom up, or cross-functional initiatives that are all aligned to the business imperatives.  We call this TBX-transformation – everyone pulling in the same direction, taking ‘strategic action every day’.

The Platform provides a number of unique functionalities required to support the delivery of business transformation:

User:

• I can select an appropriate change process for my initiative (from strategic initiatives through to quick wins).  The process provides me/my team with:
• A virtual environment where we can work on initiatives and take them from concept through to business impact
• The structure, tools and workplace to complete our work
• Collaboration tools such as chat, forums, email, etc. (imagine Facebook-type functionality wrapped around business change processes)
• Functionality in the office that I have at home for everyday communication
• I can connect my initiative to other initiatives – for example three sub-projects will also be needed to deliver my project.  So, I can connect three sub-projects, and associated data for all of this can be pulled up to a dashboard level 
• I can easily find and re-use knowledge – both people with relevant experience, and initiatives that can be re-used
• I can see how things are going, and can:
• View performance at a glance via key measures on the dashboard
• Cut and dice information about initiatives along any dimensions
• Drill-down into all data to specific initiatives
• I can contribute to other’s initiatives, sharing my experience via the forums
• I can keep current with what’s important to the business via business documents, forum discussions with leaders, blogs.

Leader

• I can share business information with all staff little and often, reinforcing messages about the business imperatives via forums, blogs, ticker announcements, etc. 
• I can publicly recognise in small but highly visible ways achievements and ‘noble failures’ to reinforce the right sort of behaviour
• I can keep my finger on the pulse, easily seeing how things are going, and can:
• View performance at a glance via key measures on the dashboard
• Cut and dice information along any dimensions
• Drill-down into all data to specific initiatives
• I can easily find, recognise and encourage re-use of knowledge – both people with experience, and initiatives that can be re-used across the broader operation.

Overall the Platform helps power successful transformation, enabling – people to collaborate using social networking tools to get specific change projects done (rather than to simply network and chat in an ad hoc manner).

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xpoint™ is sold in different ways to fit customer needs. The core platform is usually purchased as a licensed software product with ongoing maintenance, support and upgrades. Deal structures vary from initial purchase of licenses, installation and configuration to Software as a Service (SaaS) where charges accrue month by month Customers can choose to expand the scope of their deployment by acquiring additional xpoint™ modules  that complement the functionality of our base solution. Pricing depends on the type of deal (initial license or SaaS), the use of the additional modules, and the number of users who will have access to the system.

A typical customer implementation will contain the following elements: software license, ongoing maintenance and support, training, and professional services. Element8 also provides hosting services to facilitate rapid deployment without the need for in-house installation.

To receive a pricing estimate or request a formal quote, please contact us and describe some background to your organization's needs. You can also call us on +44 (0) 117 9706661 or
contact us here

We believe xpoint™ is unique, not simply better. Why -?

• An integrated versus point solution

  No other solution available today brings together all the relevant technologies to provide a cohesive environment in which change can be managed and delivered.  Most solutions address one-dimensional business issues (front end idea management, expertise locators, social networking, and project management).  Recent research from the Gartner Group highlighted that collaborative capabilities needed in the future to be integrated into new productivity platforms, the challenge would be to solve the technical issues.

• Scalable, robust and secure architecture

  The software is built on Microsoft SharePoint.  This allows local through to global implementations to be handled with ease.  Many software vendors have built their offerings from the ground up with the associated cost and performance issues.  Many industry advisors, such as Gartner and IDC, express concern regarding ‘home grown’ business web applications. 
  Recently, Microsoft’s Head of Strategic Consulting for Europe, described element8’s xpoint™ as a ‘lighthouse exemplar’.  The design and functionality that prompted such comments, combined with element8’s deep expertise in change management, helps quick and sustained delivery of bottom-line business impact.

Element8’s xpoint™ delivers bottom line impact in a number of ways:

• The visible delivery of business impact and its recognition  helps to build organizational momentum and confidence Transparency of performance allows leadership to quickly adjust off-track performance and recognise and encourage on-track delivery
• The costs of co-ordinating, communicating and managing change are dramatically reduced Changes are delivered faster by teams, with quicker cycle times for gaining feedback and input from colleagues. 
• Changes are more enduring as they remain on the radar until fully embedded and become ‘business as usual’

Yes, xpoint™ incorporates a real time reporting capability that allows users at different levels within the organisation to quantify the benefits of work completed to date and also project the additional benefits that will accrue when the project is completed.  This is made possible by linking individual projects to strategic initiatives, enabling benefits to be summarised and reported right up to executive levels 

Yes. The platform has been designed from concept to be configured to support a wide range of models of operation:

• The platform can be branded and configured to fit with the client environment
• Users can configure their own personal transformation home page
• Transformation life-cycles are configured from pre-built standard libraries to match existing business processes when required
• Alerts and notifications are configured to meet client requirements
• Dashboard graphs and Business Impact Reports are configured to meet your exact needs.

Yes.  Change initiatives are often launched with a fanfare and then lose momentum once the initial impetus is lost.  The reasons behind this are complex, but key contributing factors are:

• the lack of engagement felt by participants in the change who have little or no chance to contribute to the program and
• the absence of a cohesive system to support managers and teams tasked with the transformation  work

This repeated cycle of launch and subsequent failure can lead to a cynicism within the organisation regarding subsequent initiatives
Xpoint™ provides extensive collaboration tools to allow everyone in the organisation to engage and contribute to the change program. Its structured transformation lifecycles and comprehensive reporting capability give managers and their teams the right tools to deliver and monitor progress. This combination promotes “buy-in” and allows management to sustain the program through to completion.

Yes. The centralisation of all documents, processes, experience and strategic direction relating to business change significantly improves joined-up thinking and action. Users no longer develop ‘localised’ point solutions which they then need to remember to share.
The platform integrates with necessary client applications to provide a seamless enterprise transformation layer. Integration capabilities include:

• Email
• Knowledge Bases
• HR systems
• Project Management tools
• Finance
• Performance management.

Element8 have an Implementation Model which enables rapid deployment of xpoint™. Typical implementation times vary from 4 – 8 weeks depending on size and complexity.

Yes. The application has powerful nesting capabilities to support the cascading of strategic goals into sub programs and local initiatives, which is ideal for large complex organizations. Also, the base architecture enables the platform to support tens of thousands of users and initiatives.

The application has been tested and independently verified by several 3rd party ‘penetration’ testing companies. It was approved for use in a global financial environment in October of 2008 following extensive ‘penetration’ testing. The Platform has continued to pass regular ‘penetration’ tests carried out to ensure sustained performance over time. In addition the internal security of both public and private initiatives ensures that only the appropriate data is shared and made visible.

The application can be deployed in a number of ways such as a ‘cloud’ configuration enabling global deployment and use. The application is accessible via a web browser.

Yes, clients are realising multi-million impact today from utilisation of the platform.