"The other thing we did which was very transformative and very revolutionary is we don't meter it out ... in the old days, we paid for everything a la carte," he said.

As we refresh, everyone gets the full toolset, whether they use it or not, which allows end users to make the decision over what to use, when to use it and how to use it, he explained. The approach is proving "an incredibly powerful business model," said Nikoljesin.

Allowing employees to pick and choose from a package of tools is opening new avenues for innovation and a lot of workflow redesign, according to Nikolejsin. Employees are finding ways to transform their own work using a rich set of tools, which isn't innovation designed at the Office of the CIO or IT headquarters, but innovation coming from the front line, he pointed out.

Nikolejsin pointed out success with Groove, which allows users to collaborate outside their organizational boundaries and without extensive aid from IT. The online collaboration tool also provides a more secure method of sharing than faxing or e-mailing, which are methods employees will use to get around firewall obstacles, he explained.

"We use a lot SharePoint like other organizations do and have had an extensive SharePoint infrastructure for quite some time, but one of the problems with doing that type of collaboration is the IT group is in the middle. You have to have someone to configure it and set it up ... it takes time," he said.