Hera employees collaborate digitally on international healthcare projects

Hera collaborates with a network of experts, research organizations, governments, NGOs, and public health institutions. The consultancy consists of an international, multidisciplinary team of highly trained professionals who combine their expertise in health and development research, programming, evaluation, and policy.

Hera has been active since 1990 and has contributed to strengthening health sectors in more than 100 countries in Africa, Asia, the Caribbean, Europe, Latin America, the Mediterranean, the Middle East, and the Pacific.

The extensive Hera digitization project was implemented in phases according to the AXI methodology.

In the first phase, all documents were migrated from the shared file server to a new intranet environment designed and developed by AXI. A SharePoint intranet was chosen, as it is highly intuitive to use and integrates all M365 apps.

In a second phase, AXI ensured that all projects created in the external project application were integrated into MS SharePoint and MS Teams, so that all project information is centrally available to all involved employees via the intranet.

MS Power Automate regularly automatically checks which projects have been newly created or modified in the external project application. Based on this trigger, all external information is pushed to SharePoint and kept up-to-date.

In addition, thanks to this trigger, an MS Team is automatically created in M365 for new projects, containing the predefined team members and the necessary folder structures. When a project is closed in the external project application, this information is also synced—via a Power Automate trigger—with SharePoint. When a project is closed, the created Team is automatically archived to prevent overgrowth and keep the structure up-to-date. It's important to note that while the Team will no longer appear in the list of active Teams, employees will still be able to access all documentation related to the closed project via SharePoint.

Thanks to this design, Hera can now rely on maintaining a robust M365 structure, which only enhances collaboration.

Thanks to the M365 applications and features, Hera employees can be sure that:

• Power Automate will automatically create a Team with various channels, a predefined folder structure, and team members for all new and ongoing projects.
• All closed projects in Teams will be archived.
• In SharePoint, every employee can track all projects and view details and documents via the corresponding link.

The biggest advantage is that employees who don't have a license for the external project application can now access all projects via their M365 license and track their status if necessary.

In a third phase, a solution was also found to optimize collaboration with numerous subcontractors – who play a key role in all healthcare projects.

For all these subcontractors – who function as freelance experts – CVs need to be uploaded and stored centrally.

Previously, CVs were received via email and manually uploaded to the shared file server. This manual process has been fully automated. In practice, this means that there is now a single, central SharePoint list containing all subcontractors and their CVs linked to it.

The subcontractor must take the necessary steps themselves:

• The subcontractor fills in all the information via a form on the Hera website and uploads their CV.
• An email is then automatically sent to a central mailbox.
• Using a Power Automate flow, all information from this email is stored in a SharePoint list containing all subcontractors. The CV attached to the email is saved in a separate document library, which is then linked to the relevant contractor in the SharePoint list.