Digital Transformation in a High Security Environment

Challenge

A not-for-profit organization in the power and electric sector was in a unique position due to the sensitive and highly regulated nature of the industry. As a result of the strict regulations and the potential for security issues, the organization had previously been unable to take advantage of certain modern business tools, but some of those regulations were due to change soon. To prepare for this new phase of regulations and move to more modern systems like the cloud, the organization needed assistance from a trusted partner who could guide the team through the process and set them up for success in a secure environment. When it was time to explore this critical digital transformation and modernization project for their company, they turned to INSPYR Solutions to find out what technology solutions they offered.

Solution

The organization’s leadership team was considering moving to a cloud solution to keep up with peer organizations with a particular interest in the Microsoft Office 365 U.S. Government Community Cloud (GCC) offering. They had worked with a Microsoft reseller but were not confident in that vendor’s ability to deliver on the implementation project. The organization’s leadership also had many valid concerns about moving to the cloud, especially when it came to secure access and the security of highly sensitive data. As a potential target for bad actors such as terrorists or cybercriminals, the stakes were high, and security must always remain a top priority for any project. Only a highly trusted expert in the field would be the right partner to take on this project.

Once engaged for the project, the INSPYR Solutions team provided a comprehensive proposal detailing the plan for initiating the discovery and assessment phase, with subsequent phases to follow based on performance and the organization’s requests. INSPYR Solutions deployed an experienced team consisting of an Architect, an Office 365 Engineer, a Reporting Communication Specialist, and a Project Manager to handle the project going forward.

The initial phase for discovery and assessment took several weeks and included a series of meetings with the organization’s team to validate the initial proposal, refine certain aspects of the proposal, and build a deep understanding of the organization’s environment and needs. One key piece of Phase I was a two-day meeting session with the organization’s entire IT department to address various questions and concerns, thoroughly understand how their mail was routed, and review all security requirements necessary for moving to Office 365’s mail service. The leadership team was pleased with the results of the initial phase of the project and convinced that INSPYR Solutions was the right partner to continue the project.

Phase II focused on a technical readiness component to ensure that the tenant was operational, all necessary firewall rules were in place, and that the environment was prepared for the first mailbox migration to get the organization started on the Microsoft Office 365 Mail platform. The INSPYR Solutions team split this phase into two pilots to ensure that no confidential information would be at risk while demonstrating a working solution. The initial pilot exclusively consisted of users without access to the organization’s highly sensitive information and the second pilot moved to those with more sensitive access. The INSPYR Solutions team demonstrated that they were able to provide both the functionality and the security the organization needed, so the changes were rolled out to production, which included 700 user mailboxes and 334 shared mailboxes.

Because the leadership team was pleased with the results of the initial phases of the project, they engaged INSPYR Solutions for further work, expanding the scope of the project to include multi-factor authentication (MFA). The MFA portion of the project included rolling out MFA to non-corporate assets, which was a new, but urgent and necessary function to implement.

Outcome

Due to the heavily regulated and sensitive nature of the organization’s field, the INSPYR Solutions team needed to maintain a high degree of trust and discretion throughout the project. The team was highly attuned to the change management component of the plan and put safeguards in place to ensure the security of the organization’s data at every stage. This included activating specialized support teams and other resources to have on standby to put the leadership team at ease and ensure a rapid response in the event of an issue. The INSPYR Solutions resources performed well, implementing the organization’s digital transformation to a new and advanced cloud system that would perform faster and more efficiently than the old system.

The organization’s leadership team has been exploring further projects with the INSPYR Solutions team to leverage core Office 365 technology, including bring your own device (BYOD), data loss prevention (DLP), and further advanced security features. As part of INSPYR Solutions’ standard project support, the team provided transitional and ongoing support resources to ensure that the organization’s team will have all the resources and knowledge they need to utilize the provided solutions going forward. INSPYR Solutions continues to work with this organization to provide further support and additional technology solutions beyond the initial project.

Client Profile

A not-for-profit organization that works to ensure reliable power supplies and transmission infrastructure to consumers within its service region. The organization is known for working to provide competitive pricing to those it serves and is expanding the area they serve while also working together with similar organizations in other areas of the country.