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In this case study:
Client: Builders FirstSource, Inc.
Industry: Retail
Products and Services: Microsoft 365 Exchange, OneDrive, Azure and Microsoft Defender Antivirus
Country: USA
Quisitive constructs a strategic relationship with Builders FirstSource Inc.
Builders FirstSource, Inc. (BFS) is the largest supplier of structural building products, value-added components, and services to the professional market for new residential construction, repair, and remodeling in the United States.
In 2019, after a change in management, the company took a close look at its technology environment and realized it was not making adequate use of the Microsoft products it had already purchased licenses for.
“We knew our Microsoft maturity was not where we wanted it to be, and at the same time we knew that we had not leveraged our Microsoft contract properly, so we reached out to Microsoft and they recommended a few vendors to us,” said Ben Richard, VP, IT Operations, Builders FirstSource. “We selected Quisitive to help us implement and roll out the Microsoft products we were already paying for.”
These solutions included migrating to Microsoft 365 Exchange and OneDrive, Azure and Microsoft Defender Antivirus.
“Quisitive came in and in a matter of three months, we gained two years of Microsoft maturity,” Ben said, but pointed out that it was not just the outcomes that impressed him about Quisitive. It was also a combination of their strategy and their ability to work so well with his internal team.
“In my 20-year IT career, I have seen a lot of vendors who treat senior leadership in a much different way than they treat the IT staff working in the weeds. In Quisitive’s case, they are the real deal. They truly practice what they preach and respect the whole team,” he said. “I would put dollars to donuts that if asked, anyone on my team would have identical positive things to say about working with Quisitive.”
A True Strategic Partnership
According to Ben, one of the biggest benefits of working with Quisitive was the collaborative process it brought to the table.
“We wanted to be taught to fish. We did not want them to come in, do the heavy lifting, and leave — we wanted to learn ourselves how to keep the lights on and provide maintenance moving forward,” Ben said. “Quisitive was great in terms of providing us real-world learning on how to do everything, and they ended up becoming a real extension of our team.”
In fact, Ben said the Quisitive team and the Builders FirstSource team are in constant contact through Microsoft Teams chats.
“We consider Quisitive to be a significant part of our long-term Microsoft strategy, not a third-party consultant. They are an absolute key value partner in all of our decision making,” he said, adding that Quisitive has helped to educate the leadership team at Builders FirstSource on Microsoft maturity and advances over the last several years.
“We look to satisfy our clients’ needs not only in terms of what is contained in a statement of work, but also in other areas where we can provide partnership and leadership to help clients reach their full digital transformation goals, productivity goals, and cost goals.” said Dave Hickman, VP of Global Delivery, Quisitive. “With a client like Builders FirstSource, we’re able to have those discussions at a greater level, addressing the technical needs while ensuring the engineering tracks to business strategy.”
Building A Bigger Company
This strong partnership became even more critical to Ben and his team at Builders FirstSource when, in 2020, the company merged with BMC Stock Holdings Inc. (BMC). BMC is one of the country’s leading providers of diversified building materials and solutions to new construction builders and remodelers.
The result of the merger meant that overnight the combined organization ballooned to 26,000 team members, with a presence in 40 states, and a network of 550 distribution and manufacturing locations. This meant the company’s technology stack was suddenly also twice the size.
“We had such a great relationship with Quisitive that we started talking to them right away about a tenant-to-tenant migration,” Ben said. To date, Quisitive has completed an analysis of the environments, with the actual merging of tenants to be tackled once other integration activities are completed.
“If I were speaking to a peer at another company, I would tell them that I would strongly recommend working with Quisitive as a strategic partner if they want to leapfrog their Microsoft maturity. Quisitive is a great long-term partner, and really stepped up to the challenge,” Ben said.
“To sum it up, I would say that Quisitive routinely exceeded my expectations despite my expectations being significant. You cannot beat that.”
