Since 1931, the Junior Chamber of Commerce of Montreal (JCCM) has been working to make the Quebec metropolis a key part in the development and influence of the next generation of businesspeople. To the great pride of Sandrine Archambault, Executive Director of the JCCM, its network includes no less than 1600 members, executives, professionals, students, entrepreneurs and self-employed workers between the ages of 18 and 40, from a wide variety of industry sectors. It’s a diverse group that reflects the cosmopolitan nature of Montreal.
The COVID-19 pandemic has put a strain on the local economy and business. For the JCCM, as well as many local businesses, the flexibility and commitment of employees is essential to getting through it. Sandrine Archambault testifies: "Our challenge is to maintain the vitality of our network. To do so, we try to be as agile and flexible as possible. The commitment of our volunteers is very important to allow us to pivot quickly while remaining relevant. I love and am proud to work with them: they are young people who have a great desire to get involved, who are curious and who want to make things happen.”
Today, the JCCM has a fine group of 65 volunteers, with a permanent team of seven full-time employees.
Mariame Aboulhab, JCCM's accounting manager, is one of them. In the spring of 2020 she began working with Rise to simplify payroll processing and human resources management.
A small team that wanted to optimize its processes...
Mariame was looking for a simple and efficient solution to more easily manage administration for her team. "I had no difficulty managing our world because we are a small team at the moment and I was doing very well with Excel documents. But when it comes to keeping track of the documentation and history of each employee, it can get complicated and time consuming, especially when you do everything by hand.” On the pay and leave side, while the internal processes were working well, they were rather informal. Mariame was therefore also looking for an integrated solution to optimize processes and simplify management.
Sandrine and Mariame chose to trust Rise with our integrated HR and Payroll solutions.
A unique platform that is simple and intuitive
After a progressive implementation with attentive, helpful and patient specialists, Mariame has seen real added value on our all-in-one platform. "We made our transition to Rise in the middle of April. It was a very intense period, there were many other priorities to manage but we took the time to transmit all our necessary data. And it was definitely worth it!”
Mariame continues: "Of all the platforms I've had the opportunity to work on, I find that Rise really meets the needs of the customer, it's easier to learn and to take control of.” Now, JCCM employees can manage their own PTO balance and access important information in their files with just a few clicks. According to Mariame, the transition went very smoothly and the whole team saw the difference in the simplicity of managing their leave.
Both Sandrine and Mariame are delighted to have saved precious time and to have taken a step forward that will benefit the entire organization. "We can now focus on more interesting things. In small organizations like ours, this tool allows us to have better governance for the organization.”
"It's the right time to get started and try it!”
However, it was far from easy to start a transition in the midst of uncertainty. Many companies are concentrating their efforts on staying afloat rather than working on improvements. At the Junior Chamber of Commerce of Montreal, the team has made a real difference by initiating the right changes to get through this period.
Sandrine explains this turnaround: "We were already well established in terms of working remotely, the use of technological tools and databases. So going with Rise was part of our wave of change and it really helped us when we had to make a bigger shift.”
"We want to continue to develop our organization and a user-friendly tool like this one will be very useful to manage more employees, and eventually add our volunteers to the platform. It's the right timing to get started and try it out!" Mariame concludes with a word of encouragement for the entire Rise team: "You're going to conquer the market!”.
