Swissquote works from home: an Outstanding IT Feat
The rapid transition to working from home by Swissquote employees due to Covid-19 put the IT team under intense pressure for several weeks. Key players in the process tell us about this unprecedented effort, which successfully ensured that departments remained operational.
The unleashing of a typhoon after several weeks of violent winds. That is the meteorological analogy used by Emmanuel Pierron, Head of IT Infrastructure at Swissquote, to best describe the pressure faced by his teams in the third week of March — the month that Europe became the epicentre of the Covid-19 pandemic and life changed dramatically. Let’s take a closer look at the series of events…
Beginning of March: the ramp-up
« As soon as the first cases appeared in Ticino in late February, we realised there was a significant risk of the epidemic spreading across the whole country », recalls Emmanuel. « So, in the first two weeks of March, we made preparations to increase remote working ». Fortunately, IT did not have to do this from a standing start, as a pilot home office project had been under way at Swissquote since November 2019. This aimed to test remote working one day a week, in teams able to organise themselves in this way. « We had developed a system that worked, but it was restricted to a maximum of 150 people », says Emmanuel.
When the epidemic began to spread through Switzerland in early March, Swissquote initially planned alternating weekly shifts in departments, to limit the number of people in offices. « We began by working on a new system capable of connecting more people working from home. By talking to departments, we assessed the need for at 400–450 connections », continues Emmanuel. Consequently, in the space of two weeks, the Network team created and made available more than 500 tokens (electronic tokens required for remote identification).
But as the days went by, public transport became an increasing source of anxiety for employees. On 16 March, as the virus continued to spread through Italy, Switzerland declared a state of emergency and closed its borders. On 17 March, France in turn imposed a general lockdown. The re-establishment of customs checks made journeys exceedingly difficult for cross-border workers. The announcement marked a turning point for Swissquote: « Everything accelerated and the idea of shifts was swept away by the need to transfer as many people as possible to remote working », says Emmanuel. In the IT department, it was all hands on deck.
« A slightly crazy period »
The challenge was to immediately switch the home office project from trial mode to production mode. « During the testing phase, we had included all the Swissquote profiles to determine what types of connections and applications were needed. From 17 March, we had to upgrade our infrastructure to ensure it was able to accommodate 600 to 700 connections — much more than initially needed », explains Christophe Hafis, Manager of the Service Desk and Corporate Systems teams.
Thanks to the pilot project, IT already had a clear idea of the technologies required. But the capacity needed to be increased urgently. « It was a slightly crazy period, which forced us to invent and implement solutions we had never imagined we would ever need to develop », recalls Julien Aegerter, Head of Networks.
Increasing bandwidth, buying new licences, ordering and distributing tokens, distributing equipment — all these tasks needed ticking off urgently to give everyone, in Gland and in the subsidiaries, the vital resources they needed to carry out their work. While in the background, infrastructure teams were busy increasing capacity, support teams were in the frontline.
An attentive Service Desk
Swissquote’s switch to remote working caused a spike in Service Desk calls. « In fact, most employees found themselves working from home without really knowing how it worked. It was a new way of working and connecting to the company. We helped these new remote users to connect and provided them with explanations and documentation », says Christophe. It was sometimes a headache given the wide diversity of employees’ equipment: « The different types of laptops and various versions of Linux and Windows made things more complicated. We had to adapt », he continues.
After a hectic first few days, the pressure barely let off and long hours remained the norm. « During the two or three weeks after 17 March, we worked tirelessly to adjust and optimise the new infrastructure while continuing to tackle the avalanche of tokens, which increased from 400 in January to almost 700 in March. The teams were 200% involved during this entire period », underlines Emmanuel. In the end, it became more of a marathon than a sprint for them. But the finish line was not yet in sight.
Several new servers and some unexpected victories
Improving the infrastructure involved bringing new servers online. « We had some in stock, as always. We set them up while keeping the old infrastructure, which was slightly less powerful. That initially allowed us to provide the necessary capacity », explains Emmanuel. « In early April, we received the new servers we had ordered. We consolidated the infrastructure and removed the old machines, which allowed us to regain power and stability ». We now have 10 active servers compared with six before the adoption of remote working at Swissquote.
The efforts of our IT specialists have paid off. « The user experience was not ideal during the first week », acknowledges Julien. « We had to manage some points of contention, since everyone connected at the same time ». But with just a little grinding of teeth, the teams on the frontline felt supported. « We were clearly in an extraordinary situation », says Christophe. « We were lucky that people were understanding ».
« Many were grateful that we were able to offer them a home office solution so quickly », confirms Julien.
Encouragement also came from some unexpected victories. « Customer Care was one of the teams we thought wouldn’t be able to work from home due to the sophistication of the telephone systems », says Emmanuel. « We started by telling ourselves: « It isn’t possible but we’ll see what happens » ». But the network team eventually managed to make the telephones work as softphones (calls made over the internet via the computer), which allowed Customer Care employees to work from home with a headset plugged into their PC.
Another challenge overcome: the induction of large numbers of new recruits in April. No employee contracts were deferred — on the contrary, the Service Desk provided a quick initial training to all new employees on the use tokens to connect remotely, before they started to work from home. As they did for everyone else in the company.
732 virtual machines and enhanced security
Emmanuel is most proud of « having completely succeeded in assembling 732 virtual machines, including 453 in March alone, for teams with a very disparate range of needs ».
This performance was all the more remarkable in that the period coincided with a general increase in cyber-attacks. The widespread use of remote working during the global public health crisis made some computer systems more vulnerable to intrusion. There was no question of Swissquote lowering its guard, however, as the confidentiality of customer data is fundamental to any Swiss bank’s activities. To counter any threat, « we also strengthened our security », explains the Head of IT Infrastructure. « We never gave in to panic and we rigorously checked that each request for priority access was justified. The system that we put in place allows us to isolate information, monitor its flow and control access to our critical resources ».
« Our greatest success was adapting very quickly to a constantly changing situation and giving the company the resources to remain operational with teams working entirely remotely », concludes Julien. He believes this success can also be attributed to the company as a whole, which reaped the benefits of its flexible structure. « It is in the management’s DNA to provide impetus or quickly adopt a position on technical choices », adds Emmanuel.
« We had no hardware constraints », emphasises Christophe. « As soon as the lockdown measures were decided, management came to see us and told us that we had free rein to buy what we needed ».
A story of tools, pride and increased visibility
While the health threat appears to be under control in Europe, Swissquote is moving towards normalising its operations as employees return to its premises. What will be remembered from these few frenetic weeks? Technological progress to be built on, says Christophe: « We have gained experience in the tools we developed and we will continue to operate the platform we put in place ». This should all eventually feed into strategic reflections on enhancing mobility within the company.
The teams that were on deck during the storm will long remember the feeling of having lived through an « exceptional period » that highlighted the solidarity that exists within Swissquote. « We overcame the challenges, as everyone is aware. Usually, infrastructure remains in the background, and we’re only called when there’s a problem. This time, we were thanked warmly», concludes Emmanuel. « We have gained positive visibility and we can take pride in this unprecedented experience ».
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