Master Builders Association of Victoria (MBAV) is constantly raising the standard within the building industry. In 2016, to further this goal, MBAV sought to digitally transform their business – a transformation that would impact every department, relationships with members, and industry engagement as a whole. With Newpath as MBAV’s chosen Microsoft Dynamics 365 partner agency, the reconstruction of MBAV’s digital presence and digital systems began.
Ten years prior, MBAV had commissioned an astute developer to build an all-in-one Content Management System and ERP. While this highly capable platform was tailored to every process, it became costly to change if the business made strategic shifts in policy or process. The organisation also recognised that their entire operational platform faced key-man risk – lowering this risk would be key to the association’s continuing development and growth as an essential figure in Victoria’s flourishing and dynamic building industry.
Newpath Web was tasked with the process of rebuilding this platform using best-of-breed tools that would suit each of their seven major departments (each of which operating like a separate business). Functions such as membership applications and management, website content management, marketing automation, e-commerce, and a range of significant systems integrations would need to be designed and built from-the-ground-up. As such, it was seen as a high-priority venture with many perceived risks.
Assisting with the initial technology selection, Newpath took up the project to not only design and develop the new Drupal 8 website but also develop the Microsoft Dynamics 365 ERP component. As their previous platform was a proprietary all-in-one website and ERP, the integration between the website and Dynamics 365 would need to be tightly integrated to enhance member experiences while also ensuring customer service processes were not disrupted.
From a design perspective, MBAV had also taken on a rebranding process. This posed a range of project control challenges that would need to be met with tight project governance and a strong design methodology.
Our process would need to be agile in every sense to effectively tie research, technical scoping, design, development, systems integration, and quality assurance together into a high quality delivery.