In the current circumstances relating to the Coronavirus crisis, we at Wilmington find ourselves facing new and different challenges in collaborating and connecting with colleagues and team-mates across multiple locations, with little to no face-to-face contact. However, we are in a fortunate position where we already have the technology and resources available to allows us to collaborate and connect with colleagues across our global offices. This has been proven, time and time again, before any of the recent restrictions in place. One recent example is the launch of an exciting product by RISE in the US. RISE is one of three brands that make up Wilmington FRA, led by Ellen Wofford in North Carolina. Through these brands FRA serves the legal, financial and healthcare industries in the US.
At the end of last month RISE launched a new membership portal. This portal is a space where healthcare professionals in the US can access content, interact with other members and share expertise whenever they want to and wherever they are. This portal is a huge step forward in achieving FRA’s mission to provide a community for like-minded professionals across the US legal, financial and healthcare markets to come together for networking, education, and industry collaboration to stay ahead and advance their careers. It gives members access to exclusive content, live webinars, user groups, quarterly newsletters, discussion boards, a job board, conference discounts, and a directory of solution partners. This will allow them to stay ahead of industry developments and expand their knowledge and skills on the go.
The creation of the portal was a combined effort of the RISE team based in the US and the Wilmington technology team who are based both in the UK and the US. With Kristen Smith, Vice President of Marketing for RISE, spearheading the project from the RISE side, the technology team, led by Sylvie Downs, brought RISE’s requirements to life. Speaking to Sylvie it is clear how important teamwork was in getting this project finished. Part way through the team realised that using Salesforce for member authentication was not a viable option. Stephen Grainge in the UK and Vince Saelzer in the US, both technology colleagues, put their heads together and came up with the efficient solution of using Marketo instead. This allowed the RISE team to launch the product on time. As Sylvie says it was this sense of collaboration, evidenced throughout the project, that ensured an efficient, high calibre finished product. In fact, since the launch at the end of February the number of members has grown by 100, bringing the total membership to 1647.
We are currently living in a very different world to that of just last week and for many working from home is relatively new. However, these changes can be viewed as an opportunity to embrace new technologies, explore different working styles and strengthen the collaboration that is already such an important part of Wilmington.