{"id":61,"date":"2018-08-01T07:23:36","date_gmt":"2018-08-01T14:23:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.microsoft.com\/en-us\/power-platform\/blog\/power-apps\/americanredcross\/"},"modified":"2024-10-03T10:27:23","modified_gmt":"2024-10-03T17:27:23","slug":"americanredcross","status":"publish","type":"power-apps","link":"https:\/\/www.microsoft.com\/en-us\/power-platform\/blog\/power-apps\/americanredcross\/","title":{"rendered":"American Red Cross: Power platform customer success story"},"content":{"rendered":"\n


Nick Gill was a Training Specialist at the American Red Cross. He presented his Power Platform adoption story at the Microsoft Business Applications Summit. You can watch his presentation here<\/a>. Below is his story in his own words.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Hi, I\u2019m Nick Gill, a Training Specialist at the American Red Cross. I have no formal IT background but had some prior knowledge in SharePoint. I taught myself the PowerApps, Power BI and Microsoft Flow tools and used them to transform the process that 650 instructors use to order supplies needed for their training classes. I have since been promoted to the Manager of Logistics for the Preparedness, Safety, and Services department for the entire country, where I will be replacing many of our antiquated processes with the Power platform. There are several others building apps at the American Red Cross as well. I have included some of their examples below, including one from a volunteer who created an app while deployed in Houston during Hurricane Harvey. I hope you enjoy this story and share it with others to motivate them to jump in and start creating apps on the Power platform.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Business scenario<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n

The American Red Cross staff and volunteers work to deliver vital services \u2013 from providing relief and support to those in crisis, to helping you be prepared to respond in emergencies. Every day, a team of 650 instructors (paid employees and volunteers) across the country are teaching First Aid, CPR, and other lifesaving trainings. They utilize supplies such as gloves, face shields, pocket masks, and manikin lungs to deliver these trainings. After feedback was received from the instructor team with concerns of the length of time it took to receive supplies, a workgroup was formed to create a solution to measure and shorten the order lifecycle for instructor supplies.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Before PowerApps \u2013 business process & challenges<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n

A paper form was completed by instructors, scanned and submitted to group email inboxes. The form was then sent to the local Logistics Coordinator, who in turn ordered the supplies. From there we had no visibility of the status of supply orders or any of the data from the forms. When leadership asked for data on the number of orders filled each month and the usage of supplies, we found ourselves unable to answer these basic questions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Supply<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

The previous paper based process posed a number of challenges:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

– Orders were lost with no way for the Logistics team to account for them<\/p>\n\n\n\n

– Instructors were unsure if their orders were even received, let alone when they would be receiving them<\/p>\n\n\n\n

– No visibility into order volume and item demand<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Power Platform solution \u2013 \u201cSupply Hub\u201d<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n

My journey started when I noticed the PowerApps icon appear in the Office 365 app launcher and began to familiarize myself with the tool. I soon realized that this would be a great tool for gathering data around the supply order process. I utilized the PowerApps documentation, YouTube videos created by users and Microsoft employees, and the community forum to learn the product.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I created a shopping cart app from a blank canvas and connected it to SharePoint lists that I built for the back-end. The app allows instructors to add supplies to a shopping cart, provide the address where they would like the supplies shipped, and then checkout the items when ready \u2013 an intuitive online \u2018shopping\u2019 experience we are all already familiar with.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A Power Automate approval workflow is triggered on item creation. This provides an extra level of oversight that was never previously part of the order process. This workflow is also used to send email notifications to the instructors to provide feedback on the status of their orders.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The app was shared with 3 territories and approximately 200 instructors, where it was piloted for 6 months. During that pilot, I found that Power BI was able to easily connect to the SharePoint data and provided daily updates on the progress. The solution is now being rolled out to all 650 paid and volunteer instructors and the SharePoint approval workflows are being replaced with Microsoft Flow.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Supply<\/figure>\n\n\n\n
\"Supply<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Benefits from using the Power Platform<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n