This white paper focuses on two types of services that should be explored instead of direct cost reduction measures. Those that: 1. Bring in value through better realization of benefits 2. Take measures to reduce costs through optimization channels
Investing in such services, especially during these times, will allow service providers to better position themselves in the challenging competitive arena.
This document discusses how outsourcing value analysis can help increase value for customers and service providers. It recommends providing a strategic governance framework, identifying unmet needs, and transforming business processes. It then summarizes how NorthPoint's outsourcing value analysis software can deliver value by identifying risks, customer needs, and opportunities to improve the customer relationship and maximize value realization. The software provides comparisons to best-in-class data and can help improve customer satisfaction, retention and sales cycles.
Taking a Performance-Based Services Approach to Improve the Effectiveness of ...Alan McSweeney
Performance-Based Services Contracting (PBSC) is concerned with the structured of the results and measurable outcomes to be achieved rather than the manner by which the work is to be performed.
Performance-Based Services Contracting approach is about defining what the required results of a service will rather than how the contractor will perform the tasks.
This document provides an overview of performance measurement and discusses key concepts. It covers:
- The purpose of performance measurement is to provide perspective on past, present, and future performance to facilitate improvement.
- Indicators should be developed based on goals and track critical success factors over time. Both lagging and leading indicators are needed.
- Indicators can characterize internal vs. external performance and process vs. outcome measures. A balanced set is ideal.
- Performance measurement maturity evolves from basic budget and cost tracking to continuous learning and improvement culture.
The document discusses how outsourcing technical support is often viewed as a commodity based on cost, but there are opportunities for outsourcers to differentiate and add value through optimization of processes, performance, and delivery. Focusing on outputs, processes, and inputs can help outsourcers engineer solutions that reduce total cost of ownership and enhance customer experience beyond basic people, process, and technology.
1) The document discusses pragmatic approaches to optimizing operational costs during times of radical change and uncertainty. It outlines a 3 step process of engage and set up, discover and diagnose, and iterative design and implementation.
2) The discover and diagnose step involves defining customer segments, attributing costs, conducting a holistic analysis of the operating model, and identifying cost optimization opportunities across components like customers, processes, partners, organization, locations, and technology.
3) The iterative design and implementation step defines initiatives, establishes waves for iterative delivery, and tracks benefits to realize savings on the bottom line. Various levers are discussed like shifting customers to lower cost channels, reducing failure demand, streamlining processes, rationalizing applications,
La Dove Associates -- CRM/Customer Care Consulting Overview LaDove Associates
This document summarizes the consulting services and experience of Brett LaDove. It includes testimonials from past clients praising Brett's strategic vision and ability to balance tactical execution with long-term goals. The document also provides examples of Brett's work including planning processes, defining objectives and metrics, prioritizing strategies, and articulating plans to support business cases. It describes Brett's methodology for tasks like technology selection, vendor selection, and customer satisfaction research.
Given the continued growth of outsourcing, leading organizations are beginning to view effective relationship management with suppliers as a core competency. However, businesses often underestimate the resources and skills required to manage multiple outsourcing relationships. It is critical to begin developing the relationship management model early in the outsourcing process, and to budget 10-15% of the annual contract value to the costs of managing the relationship. Proper governance ensures outsourcing relationships deliver expected benefits.
This document discusses how outsourcing value analysis can help increase value for customers and service providers. It recommends providing a strategic governance framework, identifying unmet needs, and transforming business processes. It then summarizes how NorthPoint's outsourcing value analysis software can deliver value by identifying risks, customer needs, and opportunities to improve the customer relationship and maximize value realization. The software provides comparisons to best-in-class data and can help improve customer satisfaction, retention and sales cycles.
Taking a Performance-Based Services Approach to Improve the Effectiveness of ...Alan McSweeney
Performance-Based Services Contracting (PBSC) is concerned with the structured of the results and measurable outcomes to be achieved rather than the manner by which the work is to be performed.
Performance-Based Services Contracting approach is about defining what the required results of a service will rather than how the contractor will perform the tasks.
This document provides an overview of performance measurement and discusses key concepts. It covers:
- The purpose of performance measurement is to provide perspective on past, present, and future performance to facilitate improvement.
- Indicators should be developed based on goals and track critical success factors over time. Both lagging and leading indicators are needed.
- Indicators can characterize internal vs. external performance and process vs. outcome measures. A balanced set is ideal.
- Performance measurement maturity evolves from basic budget and cost tracking to continuous learning and improvement culture.
The document discusses how outsourcing technical support is often viewed as a commodity based on cost, but there are opportunities for outsourcers to differentiate and add value through optimization of processes, performance, and delivery. Focusing on outputs, processes, and inputs can help outsourcers engineer solutions that reduce total cost of ownership and enhance customer experience beyond basic people, process, and technology.
1) The document discusses pragmatic approaches to optimizing operational costs during times of radical change and uncertainty. It outlines a 3 step process of engage and set up, discover and diagnose, and iterative design and implementation.
2) The discover and diagnose step involves defining customer segments, attributing costs, conducting a holistic analysis of the operating model, and identifying cost optimization opportunities across components like customers, processes, partners, organization, locations, and technology.
3) The iterative design and implementation step defines initiatives, establishes waves for iterative delivery, and tracks benefits to realize savings on the bottom line. Various levers are discussed like shifting customers to lower cost channels, reducing failure demand, streamlining processes, rationalizing applications,
La Dove Associates -- CRM/Customer Care Consulting Overview LaDove Associates
This document summarizes the consulting services and experience of Brett LaDove. It includes testimonials from past clients praising Brett's strategic vision and ability to balance tactical execution with long-term goals. The document also provides examples of Brett's work including planning processes, defining objectives and metrics, prioritizing strategies, and articulating plans to support business cases. It describes Brett's methodology for tasks like technology selection, vendor selection, and customer satisfaction research.
Given the continued growth of outsourcing, leading organizations are beginning to view effective relationship management with suppliers as a core competency. However, businesses often underestimate the resources and skills required to manage multiple outsourcing relationships. It is critical to begin developing the relationship management model early in the outsourcing process, and to budget 10-15% of the annual contract value to the costs of managing the relationship. Proper governance ensures outsourcing relationships deliver expected benefits.
Agile Technologies provides consulting services to help clients select and implement new insurance applications. Their standard approach involves defining requirements, reviewing vendors, selecting a vendor, and providing implementation oversight. Agile has deep insurance industry expertise and experience helping clients select and implement policy administration, claims, and business intelligence systems.
Everyone "knows" that B2B customers buy products when you show them the economic advantages of buying your offering. Often, you can develop a strong economic argument without collecting massive amounts of data, installing enterprise software systems or spending a ton of money. In this webinar, Jim Geisman of Software Pricing Partners shares his extensive experience working with companies to sharpen their value propositions.
Jim Geisman provides practical advice and tips that have helped B2B marketing and sales professionals in companies ranging in size from global companies to start-ups.
Microsoft Accounting Software | Value Proposition AnalysisKashyap Shah
This presentation describes various features of Microsoft's Accounting software for SME & MSMEs in India. It also includes balanced score card and competitive analysis based on the value offerings by Microsoft.
Shared Services Pricing Models - Drive Desired Behavior with the Right Pricin...Stephen G. Lynch
The pricing model chosen for a company's shared services has a significant impact on how the business units that consume those services behave. An effective pricing model that is buyer-driven will enable competitive pricing, deliver needed services, drive innovation, and properly allocate organizational resources. In contrast, a supplier-driven model where the business units have little input into services and pricing is bureaucratic and will not promote innovation or cost leadership. Careful consideration of pricing options is needed to select a model that creates the right incentives and speaks to the needs of stakeholders.
Buyers have a new obsession. It is called 'benefits realization', or alternatively 'benefits delivery'. They have lost faith that promises made before the sale will actually materialize and are determined to intervene to ensure that they do. But if buyers are focused on benefits realization, then sellers must be too. In this article we will show you how you can use this important concept to boost your sales success.
This document discusses strategic vendor management and categorizing vendors. It provides an overview and agenda, then discusses creating a vendor management office to focus on processes and relationships. Vendors are categorized into four boxes: strategic, foundational, niche, and commodity. Strategic vendors are essential partners while foundational vendors provide important products/services. Niche vendors fill unique needs but dependence on them provides less leverage. The goal is managing vendors efficiently based on their categorization.
A leading consumer packaged goods company was nearing the end of a five-year term $60 million contact for IT outsourcing. The client needed to determine their strategy and approach for the next generation deal. In this case study, WGroup leveraged its knowledge of the global service provider landscape including capabilities, pricing and service expectations to help ensure a renegotiation is a win-win solution for both a client and provider.
The document outlines a 10-factor checklist for evaluating business cases, including scoping the boundaries and stakeholders, linking benefits to objectives, assigning values to both tangible and intangible benefits, accounting for full lifecycle costs, establishing assumptions and alternative scenarios, planning benefits realization, developing cash flow statements for each scenario, calculating financial metrics like ROI and NPV, and identifying risk profiles. It provides contact information to request a copy of the full checklist or learn more about business case evaluation services.
Source to Pay 2.0: Using Smart Enterprise Processes to Drive Global Effective...Genpact Ltd
This document discusses how procurement organizations can achieve higher effectiveness and better business outcomes through the use of smart enterprise processes. It outlines that effective organizations focus on outcomes rather than just efficiency, and achieve performance levels 2-3 times higher than average organizations. The document then introduces Genpact's Smart Enterprise Processes methodology, which takes a scientific approach to creating smarter processes that drive greater effectiveness across the source-to-pay lifecycle. Key aspects of the methodology include establishing clear linkages between activities and desired outcomes, managing processes at a granular level, and removing non-value adding activities. The methodology helps organizations achieve significant improvements such as 30-40% increased spend visibility and 5-10% reduced working capital.
Innovative Data Leveraging for Procurement AnalyticsTejari
This webinar will explore the types of problems and questions faced by procurement executives that can benefit most through the application of analytical solutions (e.g. innovation, strategic cost management, risk mitigation, etc.). In addition, we will cover the different forms of cognitive solutions that are emerging to drive real-time decision-making and predictive sourcing capabilities.
Benefits realization management - how to do it right - Wovex and Trevor Howes...Wovex Limited
Benefits realization management is important and hard to do it right.
Understand more about areas of importance and expand your ability to be more successful with benefits realization management.
Wovex is software for Value and Benefit Realization Management at https://www.wovex.com/
Switching Relocation Providers: Seven Steps for Surviving the TransitionXONEX Relocation
Economic fluctuations, turmoil abroad, cost-cutting efforts and a need for greater service, has led many of companies to seek out new relocation partnerships. But, deciding on a new partner is only half the battle. There are still many decisions to make, and processes to set in place, in order to implement a successful switch. Download for seven steps that you can take to ensure a smooth transition.
Presentation on lessons of Finance Shared Service Centre implementation at BAT Russia delivered at Marcus Evans conference in Amsterdam, March 2008. I was the Project Manager for this change programme.
Benefits Management: the essential ingredient for change, 10 Jan 2017. Southampton
Transformational change is here to stay.
We are living in an era of continuous transformation where standing still is simply not an option in today’s ultra-competitive and constantly changing business environments.
This presentation describes the key drivers and management imperatives for successful transformational change in organisations. It shows how placing Benefits Management at the heart of change management directly addresses and enables success.
In the main there are two key attributes of the Benefits Management methodology that help deliver successful business change.
The first is a flexible framework which can be easily embedded across the entire organisational change structure. This provides powerful change management capabilities that focus on delivering the desired end results and outcomes for the business.
Secondly and arguably most importantly, is the need to focus on the decision makers and data owners within the organisation. They are responsible for driving the change and associated benefits forward. This applies equally to; the senior responsible owner, the business change manager and benefit owners.
Benefits Management done well will naturally draw people into the change process and can achieve game-changing results. It does this by fostering in people; joined-up thinking, good communications, readiness for change and a culture of shared goals and objectives.
Today’s market drivers for constant business change don’t offer the luxury of choice.
If there is new technology or a threat to our current or aspired market objectives, then organisations must rise to the change challenge or accept the inevitable consequences such as reduced market share or business failure.
If directed to cut costs or do more for less, it should be done intelligently. Benefits management is essentially about making sure that the organisation has an unrelenting focus on delivering business value and not just traditional time, cost and quality outputs.
In the real world, it’s about people and winning the hearts and minds of the people, that will deliver true success.
On the theme of benefits management, the presentation impressed the need for measurable improvement but not at all costs. One of the challenges of benefits management is to identify which benefits are the ones to address, and not just because they happen to be measurable!
Several useful frameworks and tools are recommended and referenced in the presentation.
The presenters were Neil White, Chair of APM Benefits Management SIG and Merv Wyeth, Secretary.
See also: http://bit.ly/2iykbXX
Purchasing, Procurement, Vendor, Contract and RFP Process Management with Sha...Optimus BT
Using the Document management, Collaborative and Self service features of SharePoint to implement a turn key procurement management business solution, that will streamline the procurement process, help you comply with regulations, enable you manage contracts, empower self service and participative procurement, aid in informed procurement decisions, in executing an effective procurement strategy and make your procurement function hassle free. Optimus BT is a leader in providing Procurement software and other turnkey solutions using SharePoint.
This ISG white paper, co-authored by a senior IT leader at Boeing, discusses how an effective sourcing strategy requires a comprehensive and regimented process to address business needs, ensuring that decisions to renegotiate, renew or rebid contracts in a multi-sourced environment are made for the right reasons.
This document discusses Quartesian, a clinical research organization, and its functional service provider model. It describes Quartesian's history and locations. It then explains the benefits of the multi-tier partnership model, which includes executive oversight, operational management, and project delivery. Management structures and tools are defined to effectively develop the partnership. The relationship is described as flexible and scalable. Moving from a vendor to partner relationship requires changes in thinking and processes. Benefits of the functional service provider model include reduced costs, improved quality, and increased consistency through use of dedicated staff and resources.
Wonder how some businesses are getting value out of social media? Wonder how to calculate the ROI of social media? This paper will walk you through some of the fundamentals of looking at how to evaluate how social media changes a business and the resulting value it brings to the whole organization. If you want more information, go to www.drnatalienews.com
Mit Benchmarking zu standardisierten IT ServicesWerner Feld
Benchmarking von Outsourcing Verträgen erlaubt die Aufdeckung von Ineffizienzen, die typischerweise auf marktunüblichen IT Serviceanforderungen des Kunden beruhen.
Agile Technologies provides consulting services to help clients select and implement new insurance applications. Their standard approach involves defining requirements, reviewing vendors, selecting a vendor, and providing implementation oversight. Agile has deep insurance industry expertise and experience helping clients select and implement policy administration, claims, and business intelligence systems.
Everyone "knows" that B2B customers buy products when you show them the economic advantages of buying your offering. Often, you can develop a strong economic argument without collecting massive amounts of data, installing enterprise software systems or spending a ton of money. In this webinar, Jim Geisman of Software Pricing Partners shares his extensive experience working with companies to sharpen their value propositions.
Jim Geisman provides practical advice and tips that have helped B2B marketing and sales professionals in companies ranging in size from global companies to start-ups.
Microsoft Accounting Software | Value Proposition AnalysisKashyap Shah
This presentation describes various features of Microsoft's Accounting software for SME & MSMEs in India. It also includes balanced score card and competitive analysis based on the value offerings by Microsoft.
Shared Services Pricing Models - Drive Desired Behavior with the Right Pricin...Stephen G. Lynch
The pricing model chosen for a company's shared services has a significant impact on how the business units that consume those services behave. An effective pricing model that is buyer-driven will enable competitive pricing, deliver needed services, drive innovation, and properly allocate organizational resources. In contrast, a supplier-driven model where the business units have little input into services and pricing is bureaucratic and will not promote innovation or cost leadership. Careful consideration of pricing options is needed to select a model that creates the right incentives and speaks to the needs of stakeholders.
Buyers have a new obsession. It is called 'benefits realization', or alternatively 'benefits delivery'. They have lost faith that promises made before the sale will actually materialize and are determined to intervene to ensure that they do. But if buyers are focused on benefits realization, then sellers must be too. In this article we will show you how you can use this important concept to boost your sales success.
This document discusses strategic vendor management and categorizing vendors. It provides an overview and agenda, then discusses creating a vendor management office to focus on processes and relationships. Vendors are categorized into four boxes: strategic, foundational, niche, and commodity. Strategic vendors are essential partners while foundational vendors provide important products/services. Niche vendors fill unique needs but dependence on them provides less leverage. The goal is managing vendors efficiently based on their categorization.
A leading consumer packaged goods company was nearing the end of a five-year term $60 million contact for IT outsourcing. The client needed to determine their strategy and approach for the next generation deal. In this case study, WGroup leveraged its knowledge of the global service provider landscape including capabilities, pricing and service expectations to help ensure a renegotiation is a win-win solution for both a client and provider.
The document outlines a 10-factor checklist for evaluating business cases, including scoping the boundaries and stakeholders, linking benefits to objectives, assigning values to both tangible and intangible benefits, accounting for full lifecycle costs, establishing assumptions and alternative scenarios, planning benefits realization, developing cash flow statements for each scenario, calculating financial metrics like ROI and NPV, and identifying risk profiles. It provides contact information to request a copy of the full checklist or learn more about business case evaluation services.
Source to Pay 2.0: Using Smart Enterprise Processes to Drive Global Effective...Genpact Ltd
This document discusses how procurement organizations can achieve higher effectiveness and better business outcomes through the use of smart enterprise processes. It outlines that effective organizations focus on outcomes rather than just efficiency, and achieve performance levels 2-3 times higher than average organizations. The document then introduces Genpact's Smart Enterprise Processes methodology, which takes a scientific approach to creating smarter processes that drive greater effectiveness across the source-to-pay lifecycle. Key aspects of the methodology include establishing clear linkages between activities and desired outcomes, managing processes at a granular level, and removing non-value adding activities. The methodology helps organizations achieve significant improvements such as 30-40% increased spend visibility and 5-10% reduced working capital.
Innovative Data Leveraging for Procurement AnalyticsTejari
This webinar will explore the types of problems and questions faced by procurement executives that can benefit most through the application of analytical solutions (e.g. innovation, strategic cost management, risk mitigation, etc.). In addition, we will cover the different forms of cognitive solutions that are emerging to drive real-time decision-making and predictive sourcing capabilities.
Benefits realization management - how to do it right - Wovex and Trevor Howes...Wovex Limited
Benefits realization management is important and hard to do it right.
Understand more about areas of importance and expand your ability to be more successful with benefits realization management.
Wovex is software for Value and Benefit Realization Management at https://www.wovex.com/
Switching Relocation Providers: Seven Steps for Surviving the TransitionXONEX Relocation
Economic fluctuations, turmoil abroad, cost-cutting efforts and a need for greater service, has led many of companies to seek out new relocation partnerships. But, deciding on a new partner is only half the battle. There are still many decisions to make, and processes to set in place, in order to implement a successful switch. Download for seven steps that you can take to ensure a smooth transition.
Presentation on lessons of Finance Shared Service Centre implementation at BAT Russia delivered at Marcus Evans conference in Amsterdam, March 2008. I was the Project Manager for this change programme.
Benefits Management: the essential ingredient for change, 10 Jan 2017. Southampton
Transformational change is here to stay.
We are living in an era of continuous transformation where standing still is simply not an option in today’s ultra-competitive and constantly changing business environments.
This presentation describes the key drivers and management imperatives for successful transformational change in organisations. It shows how placing Benefits Management at the heart of change management directly addresses and enables success.
In the main there are two key attributes of the Benefits Management methodology that help deliver successful business change.
The first is a flexible framework which can be easily embedded across the entire organisational change structure. This provides powerful change management capabilities that focus on delivering the desired end results and outcomes for the business.
Secondly and arguably most importantly, is the need to focus on the decision makers and data owners within the organisation. They are responsible for driving the change and associated benefits forward. This applies equally to; the senior responsible owner, the business change manager and benefit owners.
Benefits Management done well will naturally draw people into the change process and can achieve game-changing results. It does this by fostering in people; joined-up thinking, good communications, readiness for change and a culture of shared goals and objectives.
Today’s market drivers for constant business change don’t offer the luxury of choice.
If there is new technology or a threat to our current or aspired market objectives, then organisations must rise to the change challenge or accept the inevitable consequences such as reduced market share or business failure.
If directed to cut costs or do more for less, it should be done intelligently. Benefits management is essentially about making sure that the organisation has an unrelenting focus on delivering business value and not just traditional time, cost and quality outputs.
In the real world, it’s about people and winning the hearts and minds of the people, that will deliver true success.
On the theme of benefits management, the presentation impressed the need for measurable improvement but not at all costs. One of the challenges of benefits management is to identify which benefits are the ones to address, and not just because they happen to be measurable!
Several useful frameworks and tools are recommended and referenced in the presentation.
The presenters were Neil White, Chair of APM Benefits Management SIG and Merv Wyeth, Secretary.
See also: http://bit.ly/2iykbXX
Purchasing, Procurement, Vendor, Contract and RFP Process Management with Sha...Optimus BT
Using the Document management, Collaborative and Self service features of SharePoint to implement a turn key procurement management business solution, that will streamline the procurement process, help you comply with regulations, enable you manage contracts, empower self service and participative procurement, aid in informed procurement decisions, in executing an effective procurement strategy and make your procurement function hassle free. Optimus BT is a leader in providing Procurement software and other turnkey solutions using SharePoint.
This ISG white paper, co-authored by a senior IT leader at Boeing, discusses how an effective sourcing strategy requires a comprehensive and regimented process to address business needs, ensuring that decisions to renegotiate, renew or rebid contracts in a multi-sourced environment are made for the right reasons.
This document discusses Quartesian, a clinical research organization, and its functional service provider model. It describes Quartesian's history and locations. It then explains the benefits of the multi-tier partnership model, which includes executive oversight, operational management, and project delivery. Management structures and tools are defined to effectively develop the partnership. The relationship is described as flexible and scalable. Moving from a vendor to partner relationship requires changes in thinking and processes. Benefits of the functional service provider model include reduced costs, improved quality, and increased consistency through use of dedicated staff and resources.
Wonder how some businesses are getting value out of social media? Wonder how to calculate the ROI of social media? This paper will walk you through some of the fundamentals of looking at how to evaluate how social media changes a business and the resulting value it brings to the whole organization. If you want more information, go to www.drnatalienews.com
Mit Benchmarking zu standardisierten IT ServicesWerner Feld
Benchmarking von Outsourcing Verträgen erlaubt die Aufdeckung von Ineffizienzen, die typischerweise auf marktunüblichen IT Serviceanforderungen des Kunden beruhen.
Most sourcing organizations focus on direct procurement, potentially overlooking indirect procurement and missing key opportunities to reduce spend. As indirect purchases increasingly become a larger percentage of overall spend, for many organizations, indirect procurement can be a diamond in the rough. This article makes the arguement that the value of indirect procurement should not be overlooked.
The document discusses how organizational value can be eroded throughout the project/program management lifecycle in three stages: value exaggeration, destruction, and decay. Value exaggeration can occur early in planning when benefits are optimistically estimated or stated without detailed understanding. Value destruction happens when delivery decisions are made based on cost/schedule alone without considering benefit impacts. Value decay results from failing to properly transition benefits realization after a program's completion. To prevent value erosion, the document recommends linking benefits to organizational value maps, systematizing benefits management processes, and improving collaboration between program, business, and finance teams.
Next generation IT outsourcing and the global enterprise model (GEM)WGroup
Disruptive technologies such as cloud computing and the “as-a-service” model for software, infrastructure and platforms have led to fundamental changes in how IT services are organized, managed and delivered—whether they are outsourced, insourced or a combination. The reality that IT services can be delivered to anywhere on the globe via the “Cloud” has accelerated the commoditization of IT. Ubiquitous access to IT services has lessened business units’ dependency on internal IT and shifted the IT organization’s prime role from process excellence to technology and service innovation. This article discusses through WGroup's perspective how outsourcing can create value through changing the way business is done.
Winning Finance Transformation: How to Add Value to the Finance FunctionRenoir Consulting
With finance transformation, your stakeholders can get better strategic insights and achieve a higher standard of decision-making.
But what does it take to unlock the full potential of your #finance function?
Start by looking at these five key areas of change.
White paper providing the business case for integrating strategy with finance and operations to achieve superior strategy execution and organization performance
Next Generation Approaches: Why Smart Buyers should Abandon the Traditional A...EightyTwenty Insight
The traditional approach to sourcing, involving only a cursory look at the overall strategy before diving into the transaction (build or buy), is now being recognised as not being ‘fit-for-purpose’. This presentation looks at the new drivers for change, and provides some tips on how to move forward.
For more information, please go to www.8020i.co.uk .
Zero-based Budgeting for You
Zero-based Budgeting concept is applicable in all industries and personal finance. It lets every business management to develop their budget, which includes all their operations and essential expenses to run the business. It is said to replace the traditional approach of budgeting. It enables the efficient allocation of resources based on the needs and benefits of the company by the managers.
The document discusses challenges faced by professional services organizations and how outdated tools can limit their ability to address these challenges. It describes 7 key challenges: 1) managing growth smoothly, 2) improving operational efficiency, 3) delivering superior customer experiences, 4) winning more business, 5) executing projects profitably, 6) optimizing resource utilization, and 7) attracting and retaining top talent. It argues that professional services organizations need new tools that provide transparency, flexibility and access to data to help them overcome limitations and take advantage of opportunities to improve business performance.
Business Process Re-Engineering by ADITI WALIAAditi Walia
For the first time ever, this presentation on BPR has a wide coverage of so many topics regarding BPR, it includes not only definition + issues affecting BPR + about core processes of business + history about BPR + General Model + Role of IT in BPR + its objectives + Outcomes as well as problems related to BPR in a very simple and fluent manner along with interactive diagrams and figures so as to aid even the naive or first time reader.
Rapid Response is a strategic framework that uses lean principles to enhance customer satisfaction by quickly addressing requests and driving business innovation through responsiveness. It transforms IT's brand by reducing costs through demand management while building credibility for strategic initiatives. Rapid Response borrows the lean concept of Little's Law to prioritize requests and reduce lead times without impacting quality or capacity.
A Comprehensive Approach to Application Portfolio RationalizationCognizant
A comprehensive approach to application portfolio rationalization will enable organizations to maximize the business value of their applications and focus on strategic opportunities.
The document discusses how auditors can increase profitability while maintaining audit quality. It provides guidance on setting audit fees, including exploring value-based and time-based fee methods. The key to greater profitability is improving efficiency through better planning, delegating tasks to clients, using technology, and maintaining quality. Auditors should regularly review and increase fees to cover costs while clearly communicating fees to clients.
Project Execution in Changing Times - Focus on the EssentialsEndeavor Management
Many approaches are being taken to reduce the cost of capital developments as the current performance of megaprojects has not significantly improved over the last decade. There are essential elements that permeate the project execution lifecycle and contribute to improved project performance.
Outsourcing in literal terms, means sourcing from outside. The term is increasingly used to refer to sub-contracting of a set of functions or processes by one firm to another, or to a group of individuals. Outsourcing is being pursued as an active business strategy in the current economic scenario, since it enables a firm to focus on core-competency areas. It also frees the firm from resource and labour intensive functions, which are now performed by trained personnel at much lower costs.
QA or the Highway - Component Testing: Bridging the gap between frontend appl...zjhamm304
These are the slides for the presentation, "Component Testing: Bridging the gap between frontend applications" that was presented at QA or the Highway 2024 in Columbus, OH by Zachary Hamm.
Northern Engraving | Modern Metal Trim, Nameplates and Appliance PanelsNorthern Engraving
What began over 115 years ago as a supplier of precision gauges to the automotive industry has evolved into being an industry leader in the manufacture of product branding, automotive cockpit trim and decorative appliance trim. Value-added services include in-house Design, Engineering, Program Management, Test Lab and Tool Shops.
"$10 thousand per minute of downtime: architecture, queues, streaming and fin...Fwdays
Direct losses from downtime in 1 minute = $5-$10 thousand dollars. Reputation is priceless.
As part of the talk, we will consider the architectural strategies necessary for the development of highly loaded fintech solutions. We will focus on using queues and streaming to efficiently work and manage large amounts of data in real-time and to minimize latency.
We will focus special attention on the architectural patterns used in the design of the fintech system, microservices and event-driven architecture, which ensure scalability, fault tolerance, and consistency of the entire system.
GlobalLogic Java Community Webinar #18 “How to Improve Web Application Perfor...GlobalLogic Ukraine
Під час доповіді відповімо на питання, навіщо потрібно підвищувати продуктивність аплікації і які є найефективніші способи для цього. А також поговоримо про те, що таке кеш, які його види бувають та, основне — як знайти performance bottleneck?
Відео та деталі заходу: https://bit.ly/45tILxj
QR Secure: A Hybrid Approach Using Machine Learning and Security Validation F...AlexanderRichford
QR Secure: A Hybrid Approach Using Machine Learning and Security Validation Functions to Prevent Interaction with Malicious QR Codes.
Aim of the Study: The goal of this research was to develop a robust hybrid approach for identifying malicious and insecure URLs derived from QR codes, ensuring safe interactions.
This is achieved through:
Machine Learning Model: Predicts the likelihood of a URL being malicious.
Security Validation Functions: Ensures the derived URL has a valid certificate and proper URL format.
This innovative blend of technology aims to enhance cybersecurity measures and protect users from potential threats hidden within QR codes 🖥 🔒
This study was my first introduction to using ML which has shown me the immense potential of ML in creating more secure digital environments!
What is an RPA CoE? Session 1 – CoE VisionDianaGray10
In the first session, we will review the organization's vision and how this has an impact on the COE Structure.
Topics covered:
• The role of a steering committee
• How do the organization’s priorities determine CoE Structure?
Speaker:
Chris Bolin, Senior Intelligent Automation Architect Anika Systems
Connector Corner: Seamlessly power UiPath Apps, GenAI with prebuilt connectorsDianaGray10
Join us to learn how UiPath Apps can directly and easily interact with prebuilt connectors via Integration Service--including Salesforce, ServiceNow, Open GenAI, and more.
The best part is you can achieve this without building a custom workflow! Say goodbye to the hassle of using separate automations to call APIs. By seamlessly integrating within App Studio, you can now easily streamline your workflow, while gaining direct access to our Connector Catalog of popular applications.
We’ll discuss and demo the benefits of UiPath Apps and connectors including:
Creating a compelling user experience for any software, without the limitations of APIs.
Accelerating the app creation process, saving time and effort
Enjoying high-performance CRUD (create, read, update, delete) operations, for
seamless data management.
Speakers:
Russell Alfeche, Technology Leader, RPA at qBotic and UiPath MVP
Charlie Greenberg, host
From Natural Language to Structured Solr Queries using LLMsSease
This talk draws on experimentation to enable AI applications with Solr. One important use case is to use AI for better accessibility and discoverability of the data: while User eXperience techniques, lexical search improvements, and data harmonization can take organizations to a good level of accessibility, a structural (or “cognitive” gap) remains between the data user needs and the data producer constraints.
That is where AI – and most importantly, Natural Language Processing and Large Language Model techniques – could make a difference. This natural language, conversational engine could facilitate access and usage of the data leveraging the semantics of any data source.
The objective of the presentation is to propose a technical approach and a way forward to achieve this goal.
The key concept is to enable users to express their search queries in natural language, which the LLM then enriches, interprets, and translates into structured queries based on the Solr index’s metadata.
This approach leverages the LLM’s ability to understand the nuances of natural language and the structure of documents within Apache Solr.
The LLM acts as an intermediary agent, offering a transparent experience to users automatically and potentially uncovering relevant documents that conventional search methods might overlook. The presentation will include the results of this experimental work, lessons learned, best practices, and the scope of future work that should improve the approach and make it production-ready.
What is an RPA CoE? Session 2 – CoE RolesDianaGray10
In this session, we will review the players involved in the CoE and how each role impacts opportunities.
Topics covered:
• What roles are essential?
• What place in the automation journey does each role play?
Speaker:
Chris Bolin, Senior Intelligent Automation Architect Anika Systems
inQuba Webinar Mastering Customer Journey Management with Dr Graham HillLizaNolte
HERE IS YOUR WEBINAR CONTENT! 'Mastering Customer Journey Management with Dr. Graham Hill'. We hope you find the webinar recording both insightful and enjoyable.
In this webinar, we explored essential aspects of Customer Journey Management and personalization. Here’s a summary of the key insights and topics discussed:
Key Takeaways:
Understanding the Customer Journey: Dr. Hill emphasized the importance of mapping and understanding the complete customer journey to identify touchpoints and opportunities for improvement.
Personalization Strategies: We discussed how to leverage data and insights to create personalized experiences that resonate with customers.
Technology Integration: Insights were shared on how inQuba’s advanced technology can streamline customer interactions and drive operational efficiency.
"Frontline Battles with DDoS: Best practices and Lessons Learned", Igor IvaniukFwdays
At this talk we will discuss DDoS protection tools and best practices, discuss network architectures and what AWS has to offer. Also, we will look into one of the largest DDoS attacks on Ukrainian infrastructure that happened in February 2022. We'll see, what techniques helped to keep the web resources available for Ukrainians and how AWS improved DDoS protection for all customers based on Ukraine experience
LF Energy Webinar: Carbon Data Specifications: Mechanisms to Improve Data Acc...DanBrown980551
This LF Energy webinar took place June 20, 2024. It featured:
-Alex Thornton, LF Energy
-Hallie Cramer, Google
-Daniel Roesler, UtilityAPI
-Henry Richardson, WattTime
In response to the urgency and scale required to effectively address climate change, open source solutions offer significant potential for driving innovation and progress. Currently, there is a growing demand for standardization and interoperability in energy data and modeling. Open source standards and specifications within the energy sector can also alleviate challenges associated with data fragmentation, transparency, and accessibility. At the same time, it is crucial to consider privacy and security concerns throughout the development of open source platforms.
This webinar will delve into the motivations behind establishing LF Energy’s Carbon Data Specification Consortium. It will provide an overview of the draft specifications and the ongoing progress made by the respective working groups.
Three primary specifications will be discussed:
-Discovery and client registration, emphasizing transparent processes and secure and private access
-Customer data, centering around customer tariffs, bills, energy usage, and full consumption disclosure
-Power systems data, focusing on grid data, inclusive of transmission and distribution networks, generation, intergrid power flows, and market settlement data
Conversational agents, or chatbots, are increasingly used to access all sorts of services using natural language. While open-domain chatbots - like ChatGPT - can converse on any topic, task-oriented chatbots - the focus of this paper - are designed for specific tasks, like booking a flight, obtaining customer support, or setting an appointment. Like any other software, task-oriented chatbots need to be properly tested, usually by defining and executing test scenarios (i.e., sequences of user-chatbot interactions). However, there is currently a lack of methods to quantify the completeness and strength of such test scenarios, which can lead to low-quality tests, and hence to buggy chatbots.
To fill this gap, we propose adapting mutation testing (MuT) for task-oriented chatbots. To this end, we introduce a set of mutation operators that emulate faults in chatbot designs, an architecture that enables MuT on chatbots built using heterogeneous technologies, and a practical realisation as an Eclipse plugin. Moreover, we evaluate the applicability, effectiveness and efficiency of our approach on open-source chatbots, with promising results.
1. WHITE PAPER
BRINGING OUT REAL VALUE
INVESTING IN THE RIGHT OUTCOME-BASED SERVICES TO
INCREASE VALUE OF EXISTING ASSETS AND OPTIMIZE COSTS
2. CONTENTS
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY 1
INTRODUCTION: THE CHALLENGE TO INCREASE VALUE FROM EXISTING ASSETS 2
REALIZING BENEFITS AND OPTIMIZING COST CHANNELS 3
SERVICES THAT REALIZE BENEFITS AND VALUE 3
SERVICES THAT OPTIMIZE COSTS 5
CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS 6
3. EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
The economic downturn has prompted service providers to look for
measures of reducing costs – which is compounded by a competitive
landscape that is getting tougher every day. Providers are now aiming
to “do more with less” – improve the customer experience and explore
new growth engines while constantly looking at ways to save.
In many cases, direct cost reduction measures result in lowering the
level of service that providers offer which in turn reduce loyalty and
customer spending. Therefore, instead of directly cutting expenses,
service providers should explore other investment approaches – that
will result in higher value and return on investment (ROI).
This white paper focuses on two types of services that should be
explored. Those that:
1. Bring in value through better realization of benefits
2. Take measures to reduce costs through optimization channels
Investing in such services, especially during these times, will allow
service providers to better position themselves in the challenging
competitive arena.
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4. INTRODUCTION: THE CHALLENGE TO INCREASE VALUE FROM EXISTING ASSETS
For service providers, times couldn’t be more challenging. On one
hand, economic pressures prompt them to massively reduce and
reconsider large investments such as product transformations. On
the other hand, the competitive arena couldn’t be tougher. More
than ever, providers need to offer the best service to their customers –
personalized, focused and efficient, with attractive pricing. They
must keep up if they don’t want to lose the race.
To achieve this, service providers must offer their customers a high
scale of customer experience, position themselves for innovation and
explore new growth engines. The major challenge is to accomplish
all this without expanding costs, reducing revenue options or
delaying programs.
So how can service providers overcome this challenge? How can they
bridge through these times of uncertainty? Is it just about reducing
expenses or can providers pull out more value from their assets?
“Do more with less” has become a common phrase. But what does it
really mean? How do service providers get more from what they have?
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5. REALIZING BENEFITS AND OPTIMIZING COSTS
The instinct to reduce expenses when trying to increase net income For the different stages, such services may include:
is not always the right approach. Although cost cutting is inevitable,
Requirements recognition and analysis
in many cases, taking measures to directly reduce costs may result in
service providers reducing their ability to provide their customers with > Value and ROI Analysis – The current economic climate
the level of service they expect and, in turn, increase churn and reduce demands that service providers take a hard look at potential
loyalty and customer spending. Instead of directly cutting expenses, investment projects and reject those that don’t deliver significant
service providers need to explore the right form of investment. One that ROI – and fast! A structured, consultative and collaborative
will result in higher value and return on investment (ROI) for them. process, supported by the right tools, can provide sound financial
analysis to support budget applications and business case
Recent surveys show that “74% of CFOs admitted that their companies development, as well as enable investment decisions. The impact
often get their cost-cutting priorities wrong by cutting what is easy to of system and process change on key business drivers, including
measure rather than what is most needed.” reduced operating costs, deferred network spend, lower TCO and
Source: PricewaterhouseCoopers enhanced revenues must all be considered. Yet this type of analysis
should not be seen as just a numbers exercise. The ROI analysis
Service providers shouldn’t be tempted to take the easy route, even process helps to foster cross-departmental cooperation across
if short term. They need to explore all avenues of investing in their business and IT functions. It helps to focus all parties on the
existing business and operational support systems (B/OSS) solutions service provider’s business objectives and challenges,
through cost optimization channels and additional value-based, high- demonstrating how solutions address those challenges, and so
end services offered by vendors with the right level of industry, product deliver benefits which may be both qualitative and quantitative.
and service expertise. Two types of services are key to the investments ROI analysis for a potential project also helps with decisions
that will result in optimal monetization of existing assets: Those that regarding project phasing, ensuring that each phase delivers value
bring value by realizing significant benefits, and those that reduce costs in its own right.
through cost optimization methods.
> A wider level of initial analysis is with Business Case
SERVICES THAT REALIZE BENEFITS AND VALUE Development – Accurate data around the current operation
With the need to continue to invest, yet with the call to truly realize together with insight to best practices and correct financial
the value behind each investment, it’s crucial for service providers to modelling techniques bring the right services to bear to form
invest in services that define and materialize each project’s business and deliver a robust business case, which reduces uncertainty
case. An approach based on business outcomes serves as the strongest and risk when engaging in a new project. The right level of
foundation for such services; and allowing for solid and short term ROI business case development is based on specialized operational
will increase providers’ ability to commit to these projects. analytics. With increased scrutiny around expenditures and
pressures on budget reductions, it’s key for service providers to
Services that deliver a deep understanding of the desired business and have accurate data on how operations are performing. These
project benefits help drive all project activities with this outcome in types of services, as the basis of the approach, use specific analysis
mind. Services that accompany the different stages of the lifecycle (see techniques to marry anecdotal evidence around areas of
figure 1 below), have a major impact on the right decision making and inefficiency with statistical confidence in the root cause. Yet,
setting the implementation path to result in success. With the market analytical techniques on their own are not enough; they have to
changing rapidly, services that measure and track results frequently, be combined with a true appreciation of the operational
throughout the project decision and implementation lifecycle, ensure environment (the industry) and the underlying systems and
that benefits constantly reflect a changing business environment, and organizational estate. A generic business case is not enough in
allow for a lower level of risk for failure. this case. Providers need to use an analysis level that brings focus
to improvement initiatives and increased rigor in assessing
where to prioritize resources, as well as more confidence in
FIGURE 1 Requirements achieving maximum benefit for investment.
Recognition Analysis &
Decision
Support
Project
Initiation
Project
Implementation
03
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6. Throughout project initiation, implementation and support phases HOT SPOT OF COST OPTIMIZATION
Recently, a Tier 1 mobile service provider, invested in a cost
> Benefits Realization Management – Delivering on the outcomes and process assessment to identify hotspot areas of cost
of the business case doesn’t stop once activities get under way. inefficiencies. The project’s goal was to provide an improvement
On the contrary, most challenges arise due to unexpected changes roadmap with defined benefits for prioritization. Objectives
throughout the journey. Investing in a service where specialized of this assessment were to drive significant efficiency
and dedicated resources are aimed at ensuring the entire program improvements in the reduction of operating expenses. ROI
effort is directed at realizing the initial defined benefits will help improvements and reduction in time to market were also
in keeping the project within the defined track. Imperative to this investigated at a wider level.
success is adjusting the resources in parallel to the invariably
changing business environment. Managing benefits realization To achieve these objectives, the provider devised a strategy
also supports the situation where the overall risk and reward to focus on targeted areas of inefficiencies and define an
from a project can be shared between all parties involved in improvement roadmap, as well as find areas of revenue
delivering change. This type of situation is becoming more and protection opportunities. Reaching these goals would involve
more common with the changes in investments. streamlining processes, reducing duplicated and manual activity
that allows faults to be resolved quicker, limiting the amount of
> Workforce Readiness – Tough economic times influence human revenue degradation and improving the customer experience.
capital in various aspects. Dismissal often occurs, remaining
employees are asked to do more, and thus need to be skilled The project is currently in progress and has identified estimated
and prepared accordingly. Business transformation, mergers savings of over EU4.5 million (over US$6 million) per year going
and acquisitions, and organizational changes often shake the forward based on the realization of process-driven efficiencies.
whole organization. An enabled workforce ensures higher
motivation and loyalty, has a significant effect on customer
satisfaction and profitability, and makes a substantial impact
on innovation and new product development – right people, right
skills, right motivation. In search of cost reduction measures,
service providers should look at services that promote and enable
their human capital assets, thereby ensuring a better linkage
between organizational strategy and business results.
0ִ 4
PAGE
7. SERVICES THAT OPTIMIZE COSTS COST / COMPLEXITY LEVEL FIGURE 2
HIGH
Service providers must set out to achieve better alignment across
the organization in terms of processes and mechanisms to improve –
st ity
performance and therefore reduce costs. This includes process, co ex
ig h pl
hardware and workforce optimization and simplification, using the 20- H com
80 rule. Providers should maximize the benefits of such investments l ow
COST LEVEL
by focusing on simplification and alignment of the 20 percent most
inefficient processes, hardware investments and workforce performance
throughout the organization. This will result in an elevation of
performance and outcomes, therefore reaching a new level of cost
reduction. Cost reduction is achieved this way as a result of investment –
in optimizing existing assets. ity
p lex
m st
co w co
Service areas to explore include: igh lo
H
> Process optimization – Industry specific expertise, track record
LOW
based methodologies and best practices come into play when
dealing with process optimization. Cost and performance LOW COMPLEXITY LEVEL HIGH
based profitability is increased by leveraging all channels to create
operational efficiencies, looking at a specific process or domain and
proposing improvements across process, people and systems. One
approach to process optimization may be an analysis of costs versus
complexity of processes. With the right criteria in place, a
comparison of the level of complexity versus the cost per process > Hardware optimization – In this area, service providers should be
may be created. Processes that rank high on the costs side but low looking into methods of optimization to ensure maximum
on the complexity side should raise a red flag. In some cases, capacity to accommodate new customer growth, and reduce total
those that rank low on the costs side but high on complexity should cost of ownership with unified tools for application deployment,
be looked into deeper. Solving these inefficiencies can provide for operation and management. Services that help providers realize
ongoing cost reduction. the hardware assets they already have for new subscribers and data
may result in large savings in this regard.
Example: A recent, similar approach was taken by a Tier 1
service provider to assess cost efficiencies and look for areas of > Workforce performance optimization – Service providers should
improvement. Steps were taken to asses these cost inefficiencies, look for workforce performance optimization solutions to
including an analysis that measured the cost level of the process in maximize current systems’ benefits. Workforce performance
the context of complexity per process. In order to achieve this, a set improvement solutions on current processes and applications
of industry best practices-based criteria across people, processes and could be executed quickly with rapid ROI. Such tools and services
systems was established. Criteria scoring used a model of ensure the workforce is focused, therefore increase sales,
complexity versus costs as illustrated in figure 2. Two areas of reduce operating costs through increased efficiency, support
inefficiencies were looked at: when costs are high and complexity continuous process adherence and improvements, and increase
levels are low; and when costs are low but complexity levels are customer retention.
high. The first shows cost inefficiencies, where the latter may be a
symptom of shortcuts and incorrect processes used resulting in
non-optimized efforts. Solving these red zones of cost inefficiency
resulted for this service provider in an increase of the return on
investment from the existing products without the need to go
through a product transformation or upgrade process.
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8. CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS
The real challenge is not to succumb to simply reducing measurable
expenses in tough economic times but to be bold enough to invest in
areas that will realize value and ROI, and explore and capitalize on cost
optimization channels. Service providers should also carefully evaluate
the necessity of new product and product upgrade investments to avoid
lagging behind competitors once the financial downturn terminates.
As providers look into the opportunities of outcome-based services,
they should keep in mind the following:
> Service providers should explore services that assist them in
improving their business results by increasing the value of their
existing assets and optimizing costs.
> In order to maximize the business results of any investment in
services and reduce the risk of failure, service providers should select
vendors with deep and focused industry knowledge and a proven
track record.
> Vendors that can also support product-related activities with deep
and specific product knowledge are the right choice for these types
of projects as they can commit to lower risk and full accountability.
> A well planned investment in services can significantly improve a
service provider’s competitive positioning.
“CARRIERS NEED TO FOCUS ON BOTH SIMULTANEOUSLY GROWING VALUE WHILE
OPTIMIZING COSTS.”
(GARTNER, DATAQUEST INSIGHT: IMMEDIATE CARRIER COST SAVING STRATEGIES IN THE CURRENT
ECONOMIC CLIMATE, MARCH, 2009)
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