A Major Milestone

Becoming the best place in Canada to work takes more than an internal focus on putting people first. It also takes a focus on customers and innovation. For IBEX that meant finally admitting that our technology and capabilites needed a major overhaul so that we could deliver the features and innovations our customers want.

That process started for us in November of 2009 when we decided to commit whole hog to wholesale replacement of our payroll engine, online payroll/HR system and our inclusion (communitly living careware) platforms. Since that time, work on the new system, codenamed “Everest”, has been going non stop. There are currently 11 people working full time on Everest and the milestones are starting to happen. A few months back we ran our first payroll in the new system and a few weeks ago we printed the first cheque from the system.

So far, all the real customers in the system are what we call full service customers. They send in an email, phone us or fax us with their input and we do all the work in the system for them. Yesterday, we decided that we are ready to let customers into the system for themselves. We wondered if anyone would want to go first and if anyone would even be interested. In short, we were afraid. We wondered how we should find out if anyone was interested. Susan Turner, Payroll Specialist and Culture Queen had a simple solution – “Send out an email and ask”. It was a brilliant idea and we did just that. We were hoping to get at least three customers that we could work with one-on-one in the new system. I hoped maybe ten customers might respond so we could pick three to begin with. Boy, was I off the mark!

Within 24 hours, 13% of all our customers emailed back saying they wanted to be the first to work with Everest. The response was very gratifying and inspiring. Maybe it was the free coffee mug that we were offering or maybe people really are interested in a new and better system.

We have picked three customers for personalized training and we plan to engage most everyone who wants to be in trying Everest over the next weeks and months. So our milestone is really two fold. 1) we are letting customers into Everest for the first time and 2) people are really wanting to see us do this and make the system better. We are inspired to keep going and see this through.

Darryl

IBEX Payroll extends our profound respect and immeasurable gratitude to all the ancestors and keepers of the land on whose traditional territories our work takes place. We acknowledge that we are on Treaty 1 territory, the traditional gathering place of the Anishinaabe, Cree, Oji-Cree, Dakota and Dene people and the traditional homeland of the Métis people. This land is sacred, historical, and significant.

Every time we acknowledge this truth, we have an invitation and an opportunity to reflect on the wrongs of the past, what we do in the present, and what we can do to continually honour the people whose lands and water we benefit from today.

This statement only acts as a first step in honouring the land we reside on and its peoples, and must be paired with education, understanding and informed action.