During the recent global pandemic and ensuing lockdown periods businesses realized the importance of digitalization and embracing digital platforms to better serve their customers. As the world moves into the post-pandemic “new normal”, consumers themselves are looking for smarter, more efficient and convenient ways to go about their lives. Understanding this new paradigm shift is therefore imperative for businesses to thrive. In an effort to streamline processes and increase productivity within its ranks, Sarvodaya Development Finance (SDF) recently consulted Google’s largest local partner in Sri Lanka since 2010, FineTech Consultancy. Through the working partnership SDF was able to migrate their workflow management to Google App Sheets.
“Taking a customer centric approach across our branch network while assuring accurate yet speedy service delivery was a challenge for SDF. Ever since we implemented App Sheets by Google, we have been able to deliver better service in a secured environment. As a result, today SDF is in the forefront of service delivery providing access to finance for the bottom of the pyramid. SDF has become the ‘financial solutions provider in the village’ for more than three decades. It has empowered villagers to find their financial solutions through a secured and convenient digital space” said Nilantha Jayanetti, CEO Sarvodaya Development Finance.
Sarvodaya Development Finance is Sri Lanka’s first development finance company and is based on the principals of the Sarvodaya Movement. For decades the company has been committed to financing and funding development at the grassroots, and has promoted entrepreneurship among rural communities.
Dealing in housing loans, leasing facilities for farmers, micro and SME loans, and general savings SDF has been a catalyst for change. Adopting Google App Sheets in to their workflow will allow SDF to better manage their internal processes and inter-team communications, increase employee productivity, and reduces cost.
“Google App Sheets is a widely recognized tool that allows individuals and businesses to capture and review data from its own sources.
Any device can be linked to the platform which instantly syncs to the original data source, updates data securely and analyzes in real time for accurate reporting. For a financial institution like SDF the ability to capture and analyze sensitive data in a secure environment is very important. The security features in Google App Sheets therefore makes it a trusted source for such a requirement. We are glad that businesses like SDF are migrating to the digital space and have been able to customize solutions required for the nature of their business. We look forward to adding more value to their processes in the future”, said Finetech Consultancy’s Founder and Director/CEO Clehan Pulle.
Google App Sheets also allows users to automatically capture a user’s location, dates, times and duration of work which allows management to review activities logged, time spent and measure productivity. The app also allows images to be uploaded and annotated to help with documentation that is required in financial transactions. Furthermore the system has the ability to identify text and handwriting from documents which speeds up data entry, reduces transcription errors and moves away from a paper-based workflow.