Rahman Ahrar is a project management office director with a challenge on his hands. His role at the pharmaceutical company GSK is to run the project management office for initiatives that improve the delivery of regulatory applications for new treatments. This means facing the challenge of coordinating multiple innovation projects at once.
Keeping track of all these projects and ensuring that teams can post updates on their progress, share data and keep managers apprised of developments is a key task for Ahrar.
His office has deployed a variety of workflow software to help coordinate this wide range of projects, and cloud-based Smartsheet software has played a significant role in seamlessly managing many initiatives.
“Smartsheet has been instrumental in the past few years for my various teams thanks to its robust and flexible capabilities,” says Ahrar.
The software has helped GSK’s processes by introducing greater efficiency, transparency and accountability. “As a result, we have experienced improved coordination among teams, reduced administrative burdens, and enhanced overall project performance,” he says.
Smartsheet’s project management toolkit offers comprehensive dashboards, real-time updates and automated workflows, and these “significantly enhance our ability to deliver projects”, says Ahrar.
This is important work. Improving the delivery of regulatory data is an area of significant research for pharmaceutical companies as they strive to bring new medical treatments to market.
“Regulatory operations are a backbone of pharmaceutical companies,” says Ahrar. “As PMO director, my role is to create a project management office that will manage all these types of regulatory innovation projects,” he says.
Ahrar finds that Smartsheet’s wide range of functions makes it an adaptable and scalable solution for his innovation teams as they look for improved ways to present regulatory data.
Particularly impressive are the system’s premium applications such as Dynamic View, which allows users to share information with others while maintaining confidentiality. Another key app is Control Center, a project and portfolio management tool that helps users to create consistent projects.
Meanwhile, the premium Smartsheet app data Shuttle allows data to be exported to other databases such as the customer relationship marketing system or the enterprise resource planning (ERP) database. “If you look at Smartsheet’s whole range of capabilities, these make it super powerful compared with competitors,” he says. “And from a user’s perspective, it is very simple to learn. It’s not complicated and is very easy to navigate.”
A good example of Smartsheet’s versatility was its role in a budget management tool that Ahrar helped build for GSK Consumer, now Haleon. The tool provides the marketing, procurement and finance teams with a way to plan, budget and track expenditure. The tool integrates finance data from the ERP software, which connects the core processes of a business, with Smartsheet to gain a single budget oversight. “It allows detailed tracking of expenditures, budget allocations and financial forecasts ensuring that we maintain control over our financial resources and support informed decision-making,” says Ahrar.
A powerful feature of Smartsheet is the ability to manage projects with multiple users and external stakeholders, which speeds up communications and builds a single source of truth. For instance, the Smartsheet update request function allows managers to grant temporary access to specific rows and columns for external parties who are not even Smartsheet users. Allowing external parties to update fields helps simplify the process of gathering information while maintaining control over the system.
One project at GSK involved working collaboratively with four external consultancies alongside the internal GSK team. It was a quick turnaround project over 18 weeks that was high profile, high cost and had to be delivered during the pandemic. Smartsheet’s ease of use made it simple to convince the four consultancies and the internal team to use the system to work together easily.
Some of the existing digital platforms used by the regulatory operations teams lack certain key features, such as smart notifications, automation or planning. These are essential for smooth working.
Ahrar has integrated advanced Smartsheet features such as notifications and data visualisations into these platforms. “These integrations have significantly enhanced our ability to manage tasks and deadlines efficiently, so all team members are informed about critical updates and actions. This has improved coordination, reduced delays, and has created a more streamlined process,” he says.
GSK is developing new treatments in areas such as HIV, oncology and infectious diseases, and improving the delivery of regulatory data is a vital part of getting those treatments to the people who need them.
“Smartsheet has a variety of capabilities for integration, data visualisation and automation and it offers a simple user experience and easy-to-use interface,” says Ahrar. “Those features make Smartsheet a strong option for us.”
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