Case Study. Operations Optimization. Business Challenge

Transcription

1 Tier 2 Cable MSO Leverages Vertek Operations Optimization Capabilities to Redefine VoIP Service Delivery, Enhancing Customer Experience and Scalability Business Challenge The client, a regional multi-system operator (MSO) focused on the residential market, made the decision to aggressively expand the company through entry into the commercial business space. It was initially thought that this expansion into new markets would include leveraging a hosted VoIP (HVoIP) offering that was acquired as part of an earlier corporate acquisition. The launch would initially focus on the client s current territory, with subsequent launches into the new territories of the acquired company. The planned expansion, however, was not without its challenges. The current adoption of the HVoIP offering had not met expectations. Customer satisfaction had not achieved acceptable levels, and ordering and provisioning were handled manually, which slowed rollout. Customers were also experiencing some difficulties implementing the solution. As a result, sales numbers did not meet forecasts. The client soon recognized that it had been premature to launch the new offering. Further scrutiny by the client determined that it would have to realign some portion of its internal operations to accommodate the processes required to effectively sell and support the new HVoIP offering. This held true as well for meeting the needs of a new set of target customers. The client knew it needed a partner that would assess key service delivery processes to determine how the merged organizations were operating, what was and wasn t working, and how to optimize operations to improve delivery capabilities for commercial HVoIP.

2 The client turned to Vertek. THE VERTEK SOLUTION Vertek has a depth of experience providing insights of the most prestigious strategy firms, and the delivery knowledge of a seasoned BPO firm to bring both innovation and proven best practices to communication providers. The company employs a time-tested approach to optimize operations, leveraging different models including the build, operate and transfer model. Using this model Vertek typically undertakes a review of current business processes, identifies areas of weakness or inadequacies and institutes improvements to reduce costs, increase customer satisfaction, streamline service delivery operations, improve flowthrough and meet client objectives around scale PHASE ONE First the client asked Vertek to create a Present Method of Operation (PMO) for service delivery. The Vertek team was tasked with identifying gaps and providing observations supported by numbers relative to a typical company embarking on a commercial effort. The focus of the PMO was on the people, processes, organizations and systems that were being used in each location. Vertek conducted over 40 interviews in several locations with a wide variety of client employees in various departments Interviewees included employees in engineering, provisioning, order entry, pre-sales, project management, product management, dispatch, quality control, mediation and administration management Ride-alongs, workshops and review of key performance indicators (KPIs) were conducted The resulting PMO captured the current way the client delivered commercial services to its customers. It became evident that it was serving business clients with approaches more suited to residential clients. The two basic products it was delivering were Internet access and some HVoIP, and the client had difficulty

3 scaling that operation into the rest of the footprint because HVoIP had some challenges even in the original footprint. Though the company that was acquired by the client was serving commercial customers, it was determined that, when implementing the more complex service offerings, some difficulties arose. Accurate reporting on those offerings needed to be addressed. To complicate matters, those offerings were managed regionally, not centrally. Client-wide training programs needed to be developed to better understand the offerings. And a repeatable and efficient process to deliver HVoIP needed to be created. Vertek then created a Future Method of Operation (FMO) for all commercial products to all customers. In preparing the FMO, Vertek facilitated a workshop with key client executives from service delivery, IT and development and asked them: How should their organizations function from a service delivery standpoint? What do they expect from Sales? What information do they have to provide to service delivery before service delivery can engage? What is their wish list? How would Service Delivery like to see input, service delivery processes and output? Much of this questioning was designed to answer any roadmap questions as they related to systems, IT, logistics and procurement organizations put a stake in the ground so that everyone is aiming toward the same goal. At the time, both the PMO and FMO were developed for all products and services with the understanding that there would be significant exceptions for HVoIP. Everything else was included, and as a result the client now had a point that it knew it could get to.

4 PHASE TWO HVoIP was tackled next. This second phase of the project emerged with the goal of bringing HVoIP in line with the one-year FMO. Vertek was engaged to tackle it and make it happen. A more detailed PMO was developed specifically for HVoIP. Order Management was first brought in-house at Vertek and executed using the HVoIP PMO. At that point the Vertek team started to modify the process In parallel, the team came up to speed on the HVoIP platform and offering being sold to the market as defined by the client s Product Management. Vertek received the orders from the client s sales teams, and placed the orders for the product. The Vertek team reviewed every order, made sure everything was correct (and if not get everything sorted), and then released the order to the Order Entry Group. Order Entry would physically put the order in the system and handle provisioning and test and turn up, but Vertek still project managed the entire process. At this stage the Vertek team essentially owned Order Management, tracked everything and controlled the orders. The Vertek team also coordinated everything between field technicians and support technicians. All interaction with the client s customers went through the team, which served as the point of contact for the customers. Recommendations were made for the entire delivery process, and systems, product features and functionality were modified as needed. KPIs needed to be developed specifically for the HVoIP product, in order for Vertek to baseline performance compared to strategic goals and objectives. The team optimized the process, and created the KPIs, enabling them to measure impact and improvements. To ensure alignment with the process changes, Vertek created Business Requirements to support system enhancements. Vertek was the liaison to IT to have the enhancements delivered into the HVoIP processes

5 The Vertek team developed customer training on the new offering, delivered it, optimized it and then handed it over to client Operations. Once all the changes were made and validated with real production orders by the Vertek team, and future results were now predictable, it was time to transfer this optimized process back to the client in a seamless fashion. By looking at the problem end-to-end, Vertek was able to reengineer process, systems and organizations through a build, operate, and transfer model. This model provided the client a highly scalable and repeatable delivery process which met its objectives and effectively delivered the HVoIP offering NET RESULT As a result of Vertek s efforts, the HVoIP product was relaunched, supported by the new delivery process. The client has seen enormous improvements in optimized operations, and significant growth in installations, territories and revenue. Sale order volume increased by 100% Regions increased 2 ½ times in 10 months New HVoIP sales increased 54% over a four-month period In less than 12 months, operations were seamlessly transitioned back to the client, and an optimized process was delivered with the ability to scale faster Go-to-market timeframes have accelerated A foundation has been set so that the client can pursue new markets Existing systems have been dramatically enhanced Customer and employee training has been implemented Customer Experience on HVoip rose to an all-time high