Wedding: In an office of 25 or less do you really see a need to have something tracking all that when you can do basically the same thing with Windows Explorer and little old fashioned disscussion between the parties involved?
I absolutely think it makes sense in a small office. I think the Eng vs Surveyor debate is one that never seems to end, no matter the size of the company, and in my opinion, changing permissions as data moves through an approval process is pretty painful using Windows. Done automatically with Vault (after setup of course.)
The other piece that I find important is the automatic distribution of data to my outside collaborators. I once did a review on a Tech that was spending 4 hours a week on collaborating and data transfer. He handled many of the "Please send me X,Y, Z," requests as well as the "Here's an e-mail from so and so, put it in the right place," type information. If I could only cut that in HALF (still wasting 2 hours a week, IMO,) at a billing rate of 80$/hour, 52 weeks a year, that's 8,320 a year. That's more than enough to make a positive ROI on a Vault Collaboration installation. I fully agree that I won't have that impact across the full company, but there's time savings for all parties. With Vault, my partners never have to ask me to send them the latest, they already have it up on Buzzsaw, the minute my PM has approved and released it. They can access it from their computer, from their iPad, from their whatever. That's a level of service you can offer to your clients that I think makes for good business.
I agree with Michael that nothing can save you from poor management, but that doesn't mean you can't solve some of the problems and make life easier.
