All of our partners have been involved in the
management and leadership of international businesses.
We have also led turnaround situations with companies
operating in Europe, Asia and the USA. During this
time we have developed and refined a methodology aimed at
improving efficiency and reducing costs in comparatively short
timeframes. Our past success in helping these “companies
in crisis” led us to the thought that the same approach could
be used to help any well-run organization become even
better.
The process was initially developed in
the automotive industry but, since it is generic, the
principles are independent of type of enterprise or whether it
is public or private. Essentially it flows through an
eight-stage cycle:
1. Segregate the costs of the enterprise into elements
and prioritise- pareto.
2. Develop “
starting point” financial metrics for each element.
3. Analyse each, starting with the largest,
to see where there is scope for significant improvement.
This usually includes areas like organizational structure and
people, facilities, internal processes, procurement practices,
and others specific to the type of business.
4. Develop and refine proposals for each area targeted
- the creative ‘what if’ phase.
5. Recommend specific changes to senior management for
concurrence.
6. Prepare an implementation plan and facilitate
deployment in organisation.
7. Establish overall first-year savings goal
“finishing point” metrics.
8. Monitor monthly progress.
Clearly it involves much detailed work but this is where
our collective experience is helpful. We will
demonstrate how the efficiency of good organizational design
eases communication and control. We also have a passion
for the elimination of waste; the concept that “less is
more”. However, we are also mindful of the need to
minimize disturbance to the working
environment. We work with a small team drawn from
areas like finance, purchasing and human resources and because
of the rigorous nature of the process it is not unreasonable
to expect eventual flow-through savings of 10%-25% to the
bottom line.
If your organization is large we would
normally undertake a pilot exercise in one area,
department or location. Once we are mutually
satisfied with the results, the process can
be rolled out to other areas.
Organizations which have experienced a full cycle of our
process also report to us that there is a cultural
change. As employees are involved they start thinking
about the business from a new perspective and there is
a vitality which transcends the
enterprise.
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