What is the purpose of your groups?
We use Samli in two different ways. On one hand, we have our knowledge network, where we facilitate sparring and knowledge sharing around quality standards. On the other hand, we use the platform for courses and to store documents, so our clients always have one central place to go. That is the core of it all: making sure important information does not get lost in an inbox.
We work in the food industry with quality certifications, and here we bring together companies with otherwise competing interests – production companies, consultants, trading houses and transporters. What they have in common is that they all have to meet the same requirements from the Danish Veterinary and Food Administration and external auditors. And the challenges are largely the same. So it makes a lot of sense to bring them together and give them a shared voice, rather than having a small company in western Denmark trying to shout into a large certification universe on their own.
What challenges did you have before you started using Samli?
The biggest challenge was having a shared information channel. Previously we used newsletters, and as everyone knows, newsletters get read – rarely by all the relevant stakeholders. Important information just disappears, and that is frustrating when it is something people actually need to know.
Many of our clients may have just one employee working on quality. That person sits quite alone with it and has no natural sparring partner. That is exactly what we want to facilitate: that they can ask each other, share experiences and say “have you ever dealt with this? What did you do in that situation?” – without having to call a consultant at 1,000 DKK an hour to get an answer.
What made you choose Samli?
My manager and company owner likes to support small, innovative projects and is not afraid to try something new. The Samli we use today is actually significantly different from what we started with – and that is one of the reasons we chose it. We have been allowed to contribute input along the way and say “this is what we would like,” and that has made a difference.
The closest alternative we considered was Microsoft Teams, but there we have no control over anything from the inside. With Samli we came across a system that worked and that we could adapt to our needs. Now it feels just as much like our own platform. There is also very little distance from idea to action – we can write to support with an idea and the answer is typically “we can do that, it will come through the pipeline.”
What is the biggest value Samli has created for you?
It is the simplicity. Everything is gathered in one place: contact details, documents, meeting invitations and chat. Our clients do not need to search through their inbox – they know that what they need is in Samli.
A concrete advantage is that we can answer general questions in one place, so the answer is visible to everyone in the group. If someone asks “what does the standard require for salmonella?”, we can reply in the chat and reach all the relevant stakeholders at once, rather than calling around one by one. That makes our communication significantly more efficient.
And it works across all age groups. Our oldest participant is over 80 years old and absolutely loves the system. Our youngest is in their 30s. It is a wide range of people who use the platform on a daily basis.
Can you give a concrete example of how Samli has changed your day-to-day?
The platform has become our central hub. That is where contact details for everyone in the network are stored, that is where we plan events with links to locations, and that is where documents from our meetings and courses are kept – so a new representative from a company can always go back and see what has been discussed previously.
We have created a safe space in the network, with a clear agreement: no sales talk, and what is shared stays confidential. If one company shares a challenge around bacterial growth in their product, it stays within the group. That makes people feel comfortable sharing the difficult things – and that is exactly where the real sparring happens.
We can already hear through the grapevine that people have started talking to each other directly through Samli – without us as facilitators being involved. That is the best sign that the network has taken on a life of its own.