Jakarta, 29 September 2021 – As a part of Pertamina’s Oil and Gas Holding that carries out the role of Gas Subholding, PT Perusahaan Gas Negara Tbk (PGN) has had the main task of managing and distributing natural gas to all parts of Indonesia for the past 56 years, ensuring Indonesia to have enough energy supply. During that time, 3,288 employees of PGN and its affiliates spread across Indonesia continue to improve the effectiveness of their internal communications, so that their operational activities can run smoothly. Thanks to cloud-based technology, PGN has succeeded in transforming the company’s internal communication system and has doubled the effectiveness of their internal communications. Along with this increase, the operational costs were also reduced by 12%.
“Internal communications effectiveness is one of the first and foremost aspects that the organization continues to improve. This is because internal communications is one of the keys to collaboration, enabling us to respond to customer needs swiftly. Especially for organizations like PGN, whose coverage area is spread throughout Indonesia, it is important to improve the quality of internal communications in order to avoid any miscommunication that can have a major impact on our services to customers and the society of Indonesia,” said Rachmat Hutama, PGN’s Corporate Secretary.
To maximize the communications between divisions and regions, PGN has been using the Microsoft Teams integrated communication platform since 2017. Through this technology, PGN makes phone/video calls, sends text messages, shares documents, saves files, and performs collaborative work in one platform only.
Irwan Santoso, PGN’s Group Head Information and Communication Technology said, “One of the most useful features of Microsoft Teams is the Teams Phone System, where phone calls with official office numbers can be made directly via laptop, desktop, tablet, or mobile phone, without the need for additional devices or cables. From a process perspective, this increases the effectiveness because we no longer need to enter a telephone code or connect to an operator to be able to contact our colleagues. Instead, we just need to enter the name of the colleague we want to contact in Microsoft Teams. From there, calls can be made instantly, regardless of the region we’re in.”
“At the same time, operational costs are significantly reduced because we don’t have to spend on additional platform investments or maintenance. In addition, telephone payments can also be made according to monthly usage, thus avoiding the occurrence of ‘sleeping numbers’ or payment of telephone bills for numbers that are no longer active,” Irwan continued.
This effectiveness and efficiency are increasingly relevant in the midst of a pandemic, where most works are done at home, so the device used by the employees is only the device for their daily work. During the pandemic, PGN employees themselves are increasingly accustomed to maximize the technological capabilities provided to them. As a result, the user adoption rate for the technology solutions provided to them has increased by around 67% over the last 1.5 years.
Norman Yoshua, Public Sector Director of Microsoft Indonesia said, “PGN has succeeded in showing how technology is not a source of cost, but rather a long-term investment that can increase the company’s cost-efficiency. After assisting PGN on its digital transformation journey for the past five years, we see that one of the keys to enable this digital transformation is a collaboration between different parts of the company. Starting from the right direction from the leader, the technical expertise of the IT team, and the willingness of all employees to try new things. Hopefully, PGN’s journey can inspire other companies to transform, so that we can increase company resilience in the midst of a pandemic and contribute to Indonesia together.”
From PGN’s perspective, digital transformation has indeed become one of the company’s main strategies to continue to survive and thrive in the intelligent cloud era. “Technology is not a supporting tool for the company, but rather an enabler of business process optimization. By utilizing the right technology and maximizing its use, we will be able to support our business development,” said Irwan.
In the future, PGN will continue to explore more integrated technology solutions that can improve the company’s working system. One of them is related to data analytics and AI that can assist PGN in managing gas supply, increasing engagement with customers, and maximizing the effectiveness of business processes.
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