“My experience with the calendar features, I would rate it a 10!”
– Joshua Kephart, Network Operations Manager at CenClear
Customer: CenClear
Country: United States of America
End Customer Activity: Individual and family services
Product application: CB Exchange Server Sync
Who is CenClear?
Established in 1980, CenClear is a non-profit organization that offers a range of services to families and individuals in the United States, namely:
- Childhood services
- Preschool services
- Mental health services
- Drug and Alcohol treatment
CenClear serves over 6000 people across 16 counties, and their locations can be found across Western Pennsylvania.
The Problem with Busy Schedules and Internal Workflow
To ensure their services can be provided to many American residents, CenClear currently employs about 700 individuals. The upper management team and related positions count almost 40 people.
As one can imagine, these 40 people are usually quite busy, as higher-up management positions are often linked to a busy schedule. This can compromise the company’s internal workflows because the rest of the team finds it difficult to know the best times to contact the ones at the top of the business structure or schedule external appointments involving them.
Thus, calendar synchronization was the main issue for CenClear. Their main goal was to sync certain peoples’ calendar appointments to a public folder calendar, which was accessible to specific people.
Getting a Future-Proof Solution
Their first attempt to solve the synchronization issue involved a software’s free version. It worked for quite some time, but when CenClear decided it was time to commit to the paid version of this software, they were not happy with the quote that they got. That led to the search for other options.
During this process, they found and demoed solutions that seemed to fit their calendar synchronization needs, but it wasn’t until they found CB Exchange Server Sync that they felt they had the right features and a future-proof solution. “It seemed like Connecting Software with the CB Exchange was the best”, Joshua stated.
How Did They Commit to CB Exchange Server Sync?
Anyone who wishes to use Connecting Software’s solutions can test them out through a free trial. CenClear opted for a 15-day self-hosted trial, meaning that, for 15 days, they were able to test out CB Exchange Server Sync, with no cost and no commitment, in a server managed by them.
On March 11th, 2022, they decided our solution checked all the boxes and bought 40 synchronization pairs. We chatted with Joshua to find out the main reasons that led to their commitment, and he pointed out that the performance of CB Exchange Server Sync and how well and seamlessly it was working were the factors that most caught their eye.
Once ready to go, CB Exchange Server Sync can synchronize:
- Calendars
- Contacts
- Email messages
- Tasks
- Notes
- Folders
For CenClear, the calendar was what they wanted to synchronize, so this is the only feature of our solution they are currently using. They defined the sync pairs according to their specific needs. However, if they ever wish to synchronize anything else, they are fully free to do so!
Currently, they are using this solution on-premises, together with Microsoft Exchange 2016, but are in the process of migrating to the cloud for Exchange Online. Also, in this respect, they are covered as CB Exchange Server Sync supports every version of Exchange Server they might want to upgrade to, both in the cloud and on-premises.
Great, but Were There Any Issues?
Given they opted for a self-hosted trial, CenClear had to install and configure CB Exchange Server Sync by themselves. During this initial setup, CenClear had some difficulties configuring the calendar folder and the public calendar folder synchronization, so they decided to contact our customer support.
They received a reply almost instantly, and the problem was quickly solved through a simple remote call. “Overall, pretty good support,” he noted.
Final Thoughts
During our interview with Joshua, we asked him for his final thoughts, given that the solution has already been in use for two months. We were wondering if the end-users at CenClear, had said anything about CB Exchange Server Sync.
He answered that they didn’t even know it was running in the background! Calendar synchronization happens seamlessly, and, in Joshua’s words, “the sync is much quicker, when someone enters a meeting room item it updates on the public folder quickly”. We were thrilled to know they felt this way!
Additionally, we asked if he was happy overall with the product, to which he responded positively, adding that he doesn’t believe there is anything on the backend for our software team to work on, which is excellent! “My experience with the calendar features, I would rate it a 10!” he concluded.