Richard Marshall of Grayton Limited – a structural and mechanical engineering company – talks about how the #GrowMySME Digital Catalyst scheme has helped the business to explore digital solutions to traditional business issues.

‘Technology and digital’ did not use to be a key focus for Grayton. Working in the perceived “old fashioned” industries of steel and cement meant that the business had not changed how they dealt with business processes for twenty years.

After enrolling on the Digital Catalyst scheme, the company found the digital maturity assessment – which is the first stage of the scheme – “mind-blowing”. The results of the assessment showcased the wide range of opportunities that the company was not taking, which Richard found remarkable. Richard and his colleagues found that being asked the ten questions on the maturity assessment was a thought provoking and valuable exercise, with the result being that the opportunities for business improvement via use of digital technology were huge.

The Digital Catalyst scheme has given the company “quick and simple” support, and has enabled the company to adopt digital scanning technology and integrate it into established company processes. For example, Grayton now places barcodes onto a range of key business documentation, and when scanned  allows for instant and automatic filing in the cloud. This has made the search for historic company data, information and documents extremely quick and easy. Richard says that while that might be a really simple step-change, it has been highly effective as it has given the company some space back, which can now be used as “part of the business” rather than “part of the storage”.

Richard would encourage any business to get involved with Digital Catalyst scheme, and ask the question “what is there to lose”? Due to enrolling onto the Digital Catalyst scheme, Richard became ‘consciously incompetent’ whereas previously he was in the position of “not knowing what he didn’t know”. Digital Catalyst was able to explain to Richard what Grayton could be doing better and how the company could harness digital solutions throughout its operations.

Grayton is now regularly hosting virtual staff and client meetings, using virtual videoconferencing software, and can now offer “face to face” meetings across the country – virtually! The company can now move faster than it’s ever moved before, and now communicates good ideas almost immediately.

Overall, Digital Catalyst has helped Grayton Limited to:

• Implement faster decision making
• Develop efficient home working
• Adopt improved asset usage

July 2021