PZU Ukraine has been one of the leading insurance providers in Ukraine for over 30 years. Its team consists of more than 500 experienced professionals, delivering corporate and individual insurance services across all insurance classes.
PZU Ukraine is part of PZU Group – one of the largest financial institutions in Poland and Central & Eastern Europe, with a history spanning over 200 years. PZU Group is a leader in the insurance sector, operating more than 600 branches across Poland, Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, and Ukraine. The company’s team of over 16,000 professionals ensures customer confidence and security, offering a portfolio of more than 200 products.
For many years, PZU Ukraine has contributed to the development of the country’s insurance sector. Managing such a large team and complex business processes – spanning different professionals, departments, and numerous branches in various cities – requires a specialized approach. The need for an integrated platform for communication, corporate culture support, and convenient access to critical information and resources led to the decision to implement a modern technological solution. SmartPoint Intranet, developed by SMART business, became this platform – an all-in-one tool for creating a unified communication environment. In this case study, we share insights into the project’s details, implementation stages, and benefits.
Project Background: Why PZU Ukraine Needed a Unified Digital Communication Environment and the Key Objectives Behind the SmartPoint Intranet Implementation
PZU Ukraine is a growing company that continues to scale its business processes, expand its team, and strengthen its corporate culture. As a result, the company’s requirements for a corporate portal also evolved. The previous system no longer fully met the company’s needs, particularly in terms of easy access to information, integration of key processes into a unified digital environment, and automation to enhance internal communications. Additionally, the outdated interface and limited functionality led to low employee engagement with the portal. This highlighted the need for a more modern, flexible, and functional platform to address the company’s new challenges and business objectives.
One of the key prerequisites for the project was the need for a unified integrated platform that could connect 500 employees across different cities in Ukraine. SmartPoint Intranet, based on Microsoft 365, was selected following our internal procurement process, which considered SMART business’s expertise in corporate solutions implementation and our trust in Microsoft technologies
Reliability, security, and flexibility were key factors in selecting the solution, which is built on Microsoft 365. This allowed the company not only to deploy an out-of-the-box solution with essential functionality quickly but also to customize the system to meet its specific needs.
Project Goals for the Implementation of SmartPoint Intranet for PZU Ukraine
The SmartPoint Intranet implementation project for PZU Ukraine aimed to achieve the following objectives:
- Establishing a Unified Environment for the Corporate Knowledge Base – The new environment was meant to structure, systematize, and centralize all critical company information, including internal policies, guidelines, procedures, document templates, training materials, and other corporate resources. This knowledge base format would ensure quick search capabilities and stable access to up-to-date information for employees.
- Engaging Employees in the Company’s Active Life – The solution’s modern, user-friendly interface was intended to provide intuitive navigation for quick adoption of the system, granting access to current news, events, internal initiatives, and more.
- Building an Organizational Structure – The solution was designed to enable the creation of an interactive organizational structure with centralized access. This portal component aimed to visualize the hierarchy of departments, divisions, and teams. Convenient data updates would ensure the structure’s relevance, which is crucial for transparent management and quick identification of responsible individuals or units.
- Accelerating the Onboarding of New Employees – By providing access to essential materials in one place, the system aimed to reduce the time needed to search for necessary information and resources, facilitating efficient work.
- Implementing an Employee Directory – SmartPoint Intranet allows for a centralized employee directory featuring individual profiles with details such as contact information, job positions, and departments. This tool enables quick identification of the right colleague for communication, which is particularly important for large cross-functional teams with a complex structure, like at PZU Ukraine.
- Aggregating Information in One Place – The corporate portal was designed to serve as a single-entry point for accessing other essential company systems.
- Ensuring Accessibility from Any Device – The system was expected to enable employees to use the portal from a computer, tablet, or smartphone, regardless of location, ensuring connectivity even outside office premises.
- Creating a Unified Repository for Corporate Documentation – This objective aimed to centralize document management, simplify search and simultaneous access, and implement version control, ensuring the necessary security levels and role-based access permissions.
As a result, the project addressed PZU Ukraine’s strategic objectives focused on enhancing internal business process efficiency, fostering corporate culture, and establishing a modern digital workplace for employees.
Implementation of SmartPoint Intranet: Challenges and Achievements
The SmartPoint Intranet implementation project for PZU Ukraine was carried out in several stages, including both standard solution deployment and custom enhancements tailored to the company’s specific needs.
An out-of-the-box solution was installed and configured for the customer, providing broad functionality to meet key business requirements through essential portal components, such as the Personal Account, Personal Services, Employee Directory, and Organizational Structure.
Notably, the customer lacked a unified system containing up-to-date data on employees and departments. As part of the implementation, the SMART business team developed enhancements to build the company’s organizational structure using:
- Microsoft Entra ID — a system that enabled automatic retrieval of employee data, including positions, departments, and other details,
- Manual Data Entry through a specially configured list – for cases where Microsoft Entra ID data was insufficient or additional details were required.
As a result, the SmartPoint Intranet platform became a single “source of truth”, consolidating accurate employee data and establishing a clear, visualized company structure. The solution now allows for quick searches of employees and relevant information while simplifying data management and updates. Additionally, for HR professionals, the system has become an efficient tool for managing human capital
Enhancing Corporate Information Security with SmartPoint Intranet and Reducing Unauthorized Access Risks
As part of the enhancements, functionality was implemented to meet information security requirements regarding access to SmartPoint Intranet. Security policies were configured to allow user access to portal information only from corporate devices and “whitelisted” IP addresses. This significantly increased corporate information security and minimized the risk of unauthorized access. To monitor and control document access based on an employee’s role, position, or department, a script was developed to generate audit reports on access permissions.
Employee Adaptation to the New SmartPoint Intranet Solution
Major changes in communication tools often cause stress or resistance among employees. One of the challenges was overcoming concerns about a prolonged adaptation process for PZU Ukraine employees and convincing the team of the new solution’s benefits. However, a well-thought-out approach helped to dispel all concerns. Specialists from different departments – project management, IT, marketing, and PR – were involved in the implementation of SmartPoint Intranet on the customer’s side. This comprehensive approach ensured that all key aspects of the platform were taken into account, from technical configurations to ensuring ease of use for end users.
For our team, this was the first experience working with a Microsoft 365-based solution, so we and the vendor focused significantly on explaining the architecture and portal structure, discussing technical details, and exploring integration possibilities with other Microsoft 365 products. SmartPoint Intranet unified all the necessary tools and services, which were previously scattered or insufficiently integrated into a single, centralized solution. Thanks to this, employees now have convenient access to information, communication tools, a knowledge base, documentation, and other resources in a single window. It was through the productive collaboration between our two teams that we successfully achieved one of the project’s primary goals – creating a unified digital communication environment
Taking all custom modifications into account, the implementation of SmartPoint Intranet took 13 weeks. The entire company is now using the portal, and SMART business continues to provide technical support at the customer’s request.
Initial Results and Next Steps for Expanding the Corporate Portal and Digitalizing Other Business Areas
Currently, 500 employees of PZU Ukraine actively use the portal. Thanks to the SmartPoint Intranet app, integrated into Microsoft Teams, the portal is accessible from any device where Microsoft Teams is installed (computer, phone, tablet). Employees no longer need to switch between different systems or applications – everything they need is available through Microsoft Teams’ convenient interface, regardless of their location. Synchronization with Microsoft 365 tools provides access to files, calendars, task lists, and more. This has turned the system into an environment where all essential work tools are just a few clicks away, ensuring a smooth, fast, and intuitive experience with corporate information.
The customer particularly highlighted the functionality of the Task Center portal component. It allows employees to create and assign administrative tasks, track their progress, and monitor completion. This helps keep the focus on important tasks, enabling employees to dedicate more time to strategic objectives by reducing routine actions.
The company does not plan to stop at its current achievements and has already outlined further development directions for the SmartPoint Intranet portal. Planned enhancements include customized security settings, such as expanding access rights and control over confidential corporate information, ensuring the portal meets modern cybersecurity standards.
Building a unified digital environment for a company is a prime example of a people-centric business and corporate culture. The company not only enhances work efficiency by integrating tools and information into a single space but also fosters openness, transparency, and emotional comfort among employees – an especially crucial factor in today’s business environment.
We are proud to be partners with PZU Ukraine in transforming the employee experience through the implementation of a modern solution ecosystem. Together with the customer, we have already identified the next steps for implementing SMART Payroll and SMART HCM & LMS, which will help automate and optimize key HR and financial management processes that are closely interconnected.
Would you like to learn how SmartPoint Intranet, combined with other SMART business software solutions, can enhance the efficiency of your business processes? Request a consultation and get a ready-made solution tailored to your needs!
