Run a complex conference center without fighting your tools
Managing meeting rooms and the services attached to them? See how elia adapts to how your conference center operates, from room booking to structured service requests.
Legal services
How a Law Firm Replaced Its Conference-Center Tool with a More Flexible Setup
Running a busy conference center means juggling room bookings and a steady flow of event requests. This law firm brought both onto elia, moving off an older system and onto a setup shaped around the way their teams already work.
At a glance
700 users
on one platform
30 rooms
configured and synced with Outlook
Legacy tool
replaced
LOCATION
Canada
INDUSTRY
Legal services
SIZE
500-1,000 employees
company overview
A Canadian law firm with 500-1,000 employees. Its main office runs a large conference center where meeting rooms and event services are part of daily operations. elia is live across 2 of the firm's sites.
PRODUCTS USED
The conference center is one of the busiest parts of this firm's main office. Rooms turn over through the day, and plenty of bookings arrive with services attached for an event. The people who run it hold a high bar, and the details have to land.
A dedicated platform had handled all of it. The firm decided it was time to modernize: one system that could keep pace with a space this involved and adapt as its needs changed.
Requests were the place to start. There was no set way to submit one. Someone organizing an event might email the coordinator to ask for wine for a client reception, then leave out the date or the room. The coordinator would track down the missing pieces before anything could move.
The challenge
The firm wanted two things to work together: room booking that could handle a demanding setup, and a real process for the services tied to those rooms:
- replace a legacy conference-center tool the team had outgrown
- give staff a quicker way to book space and see what’s free
- turn scattered service-request emails into a structured intake process
- cut the manual coordination behind events and room services
- keep room availability in sync with the calendars people already use in Outlook
The conference-center and service teams run high-pressure daily operations, so any new platform had to earn buy-in across every stakeholder and make their work easier from the first day.
How elia Helped
elia worked directly with the firm's conference-center, service-management, and IT teams to configure the platform around their operations. The existing system stayed in place until the new one was ready to take over.
Advanced meeting room booking
THE ISSUE
The conference center's room setup is complex, and the legacy tool felt dated for everyday booking.
ELIA'S SOLUTION
elia configured advanced meeting room booking around the conference center's actual layout and rules, with color-coded rooms and 30 rooms synced to Outlook, so what people see in elia matches their calendar.
Structured service requests
THE ISSUE
Event requests came in without a consistent format, which slowed the team down.
ELIA'S SOLUTION
elia set up service requests as a structured intake with 4 service categories, so requests arrive with the right information attached, and a team of 6 manages them from one place.
Automation for routine steps
THE ISSUE
Much of the coordination behind a request was manual and repetitive.
ELIA'S SOLUTION
6 automations are configured to take routine steps out of the request process.
A rollout on the teams' terms
THE ISSUE
Switching tools touched several groups at once: the conference center, service management, and IT. Each had to be on board.
ELIA'S SOLUTION
elia rolled out gradually, adding and tuning features with each team, so the change landed without disrupting daily work.
The results
The conference center now runs on one platform for both rooms and requests:
- room booking and request management in a single place
- 30 meeting rooms live and kept in sync with Outlook
- a clear intake for event and service requests, backed by 4 categories and 6 automations
- 700 people using elia across 2 sites
- a dedicated team of 6 handling event and service requests
The clearest wins so far are a smoother day to day and an interface people picked up on their own.
Why it matters
A conference center like this rarely fits a tool straight off the shelf. The value came from a platform that could adapt to the firm's specific way of working, and from a team willing to build the missing pieces alongside them.
For anyone running a high-touch operation, that willingness to adapt counts for a lot. The feature list matters, and so does whether the people behind the product will shape it to fit.
