Casal: connected teams and technological innovation with Google Workspace
About Casal
Companhia de Saneamento de Alagoas (Casal) is in charge of building, running, and maintaining the water and sewage systems of Alagoas state’s population centers.
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About RW3 Tecnologia
Through its expertise with public entities, RW3 provides tools to improve people’s experiences with digital media.
Supported by RW3, the company noticed a meaningful culture change due to improved interaction between teams, increased productivity, and time savings.
Google Cloud results
- Cost savings with reduced hotel stays and fewer trips to attend meetings
- Better message and file storage resources
- Collaboration driven by document sharing and editing
- Increased protection and ensured security thanks to the platform’s authentication features
Drive is directly integrated to the company’s intranet
Established in 1962, Companhia de Saneamento de Alagoas (Casal) is headquartered in Maceió, the state capital of Alagoas. This public organization is in charge of water abstraction, treatment and distribution, and sewage collection and treatment in several municipalities. It operates in 78 cities throughout Alagoas, serving nearly two million people in both urban and rural areas.
As Casal has nearly 700 employees, as well as young apprentices, convicts that are part of a reeducation scheme, and other collaborators, it is renowned for its community work in Alagoas. Aiming to deliver quality services, the company began to take a closer look at the technological tools it was using.
Casal had a hard time during the COVID-19 pandemic because it had no platform for setting up virtual meetings. The company ended up choosing free alternatives that caused activity shutdowns and technical issues. Looking to solve those problems and increase productivity, Casal’s Information Technology Management (GETIN) began mapping new plans.
“As far as technology and digital media are concerned, it’s safe to say that the resources Casal was using were inadequate for our needs. We decided to keep that environment for a while due to contractual issues in the public sector, where we operate, until we found a new way to migrate and solve our problems,” explains Inaldo José Lourenço da Silva, Casal’s IT manager.
A new step: migration
Casal’s choice of Google Workspace was driven by a series of differentiators such as easy in-platform storage, email with additional tools, video conferencing capabilities, and collaboration between teams.
Casal began its journey to the cloud supported by Google Cloud partner RW3 Tecnologia. RW3’s role was crucial from the moment Google Workspace was hired until resources were fully incorporated. The partner held training sessions together with the technical team and an event to promote the tools among employees called Google Day.
"Hiring was quick. After that stage, migration was smooth and gradual. We were worried about integrating employees to the platform’s services, but that process happened in the best way possible, with transparency for users."
—Inaldo José Lourenço da Silva, IT Manager, CasalA total of 800 licenses were granted. In that first stage, only existing email accounts were migrated to the platform. After Casal started using it, the other resources were incorporated into its employees’ routine.
"Inaldo and Pedro at Casal had a great attitude during the project and were very engaging in their communications with users. Everything flowed very smoothly," explains Daniel Piola, RW3 Tecnologia’s Head of Operations.
"To help with adoption, we shared a variety of materials with employees, such as videos, supporting literature, and FAQs. We also held a Google Day, which gave the team a general overview of Google Workspace’s resources and showed them what they would gain after implementing them," adds Daniel Piola.
Benefits and changes as an inspiration for future projects
The benefits provided by Gmail, Calendar, Drive, Google Meet, Chat, integrated apps, and other customized details provided positive results. The team managed to cut costs and access better file storage resources. Employees also gained the ability to edit documents online and communicate through virtual meetings.
The team has also seen other improvements: real-time collaboration, increased productivity, ensured data protection, and less time spent logging information and sharing ideas.
"After using it, I understand Google Workspace’s security assurance. Besides Gmail and Drive, which are essential for our work, there’s Calendar, which is very important too as it gives me shared access to the company’s president’s diary, so I can keep up with previously scheduled commitments and meetings."
—Diego Henrique Barros Melo, Communications Adviser, Casal"We also managed to solve technical issues related to our archive using Drive. Our intranet is directly and automatically integrated into it using Google Workspace permissions," explains Inaldo José Lourenço da Silva. "It’s a complete change in culture and a deployment with a positive impact for us," he adds.
As for Google Meet, which enables online conversations between professionals, its benefits include sizable cost savings on hotel stays, as employees no longer need to travel to another city to attend meetings.
Casal plans to continue its journey by furthering technological transformations using the cloud, a decision based on the security provided by Google Workspace that will lead to the adoption of more Google Cloud resources.
"We are now starting a second phase with the migration of a part of our servers, including our commercial system and a few tools, to Google Cloud. Another positive is that we are planning a third migration phase encompassing our data, which will have a favorable impact on the company’s services."
—Inaldo José Lourenço da Silva, IT Manager, CasalTell us your challenge. We're here to help.
Contact us
About Casal
Companhia de Saneamento de Alagoas (Casal) is in charge of building, running, and maintaining the water and sewage systems of Alagoas state’s population centers.
About RW3 Tecnologia
Through its expertise with public entities, RW3 provides tools to improve people’s experiences with digital media.