Client Profile

Explore any kitchen in America and you’ll soon discover a beloved, trusted Land O’ Lakes (LoL) product. A global agribusiness leader is known for its butter and food products the company is the second-largest United States cooperative.

Land O’ Lakes’ mission is to be one of the best food and agricultural companies in the world. So, when its Payroll department chose Improv to assess and improve the company’s workflow for 10,000+ employees across 7 of its manufacturing facilities, we were eager and honored to help.

Thanks to Improv’s leadership throughout every step of this project, we hit our implementation goals, approached training in a whole new way, and we’re headed into the future pretty excited about everything our workforce management system can do for us.”

Project Summary

The Improv team completed a full Implementation Assessment, an ADP eTime system upgrade (from Version 6.3 to 8.0), and led a bold Change Management strategy to ensure positive user adoption.

To date, the highly successful, two-tiered Implementation Assessment/Change Management project is one of our favorite Workforce Management Software transformations. Land O’ Lakes’ complex workforce, ever-changing labor variables, multifaceted payroll process, and hidden gaps in efficiency and training, challenged and inspired us to come up with creative ways to add clarity and efficiency to their workflow and their learning environment.

Let’s take a stroll down the halls of Land O’ Lakes and you’ll see how Improv helped improve the company’s payroll process, reduced risk, and increased user adoption rates by 25%.

Project Takeaways

A project that began with an Improv Implementation Assessment, proved to be a game-changer for both our client and the Improv team in the areas of Implementation and Change Management.

Both Land O’ Lakes and Improv pushed technical and process boundaries to successfully impact LoL’s workflow efficiency and its training culture.

Project Challenges

Because of the company’s size and workforce complexities, the LoL profile proved to be a tricky equation from the start. Payroll processes across multiple divisions were outmoded, cumbersome, and introduced potential compliance risk. The payroll team ran 39 payroll exports coming from over 200 business locations.

With the original state of their eTime system, the company did not have a mechanism to ensure compliance reporting nor was there a standardized process for contingent workers, company policies, system usage, or pay code and holiday edits, which opened up the company to error and risk.

Project Variables

• A 10,000-person workforce comprised of full-time, hourly, part-time workers across 7 facilities nationwide.
• Multiple payroll exports and unstandardized inherited timekeeping practices.
• Limited compliance enforcement.
• Complex systems integrations.
• Contingent worker variables.
• Holiday and admin configuration issues.
• Lack of Advanced Scheduler Administration and Knowledge Transfer.
• Need for additional system training for users.
• Struggle with technology change in some areas of the organization.
• Lack of Change Management strategy to support new GUI rollout.

Improv Tasks

• Conduct a full Timekeeping Implementation Audit to assess system gaps and configuration weaknesses.
• Assist with the upgrade of ADP eTime.
• Formulate a custom Change Management strategy to encourage and maintain user adoption into the future.
• Create customized training plans and resources.
• Establish a knowledge base for future upgrades.

We didn’t realize we needed a Change Management strategy until we started hitting roadblocks during implementation. Once Improv put a communication and training plan in place that made sense for our culture, the momentum and shift was almost instantaneous.”

Outcomes

Implementation Audit

The Land O’ Lakes team was utilizing ADP eTime with the Accruals, Scheduler, and Attendance products.

Improv clearly identified numerous payroll processes negatively impacting workflow efficiency and increasing risk. During the Assessment phase, Improv identified critical configuration gaps and weaknesses in the eTime application and its interfaces.

Improv’s Implementation Audit allowed LoL to put an Implementation Path in place that would streamline and secure its payroll process and increase efficiency across multiple facilities.

Results:

• Identified workflow and configuration weaknesses and established a plan to streamline a dated, time-consuming process and immediately impact workflow efficiency.
• Identified significant workflow compliance risks and set a plan in motion to remedy the issues.
• Improv assisted with the successful upgraded of the eTime system from Version 6.3 to 8.0.

Change Management

A technology change isn’t always easy to introduce into an established workflow. The LoL team, while ready for improvements, needed a strong Change Management strategy to help ease the growing pains that came with system upgrades. Improv introduced an Engagement Manager (EM) to work in tandem with LoL’s management team to ensure a seamless rollout and adoption. The Improv EM provided leadership and consultative support throughout every step of the implementation process.

Bringing creative tools to the table customized for LoL, the Improv team collaborated with LoL managers to create training materials that engaged, inspired, and helped ensure a positive end user training experience.

During this project phase, the EM supplied essential UAT planning and execution, training planning and execution, and created Job Aids that proved critical to deliver collaborative training with ADP’s software upgrade.

The EM designed and delivered the system Navigators and Job Aids while providing a complete knowledge transfer to Land O’ Lake’s core ADP eTime team. In addition, the EM created a comprehensive communication and project plan designed to encourage and strengthen user adoption through each phase of the implementation.

Results:

• 25% increase in technology adoption by supervisors following Improv’s Change Management strategy.
• Streamlined payroll process and reduction in exports from 39 to 8.
• Library of custom training materials that can be used by LoL for future upgrades.
• Established a complete knowledge transfer process to ensure successful implementations and system changes in the future.