Really when we think about what businesses are trying to do if we strip back all the mission statements and values etc., kind of what they’re there for is to either make money or save money. They tend to be pressured to do one or the other or in some cases, both depending on where the business is in its marketplace and its competitive construct, etc.
This is where business stakeholders will often initiate ideas that lead to data science because they’re looking for answers that they can’t find at the moment. They can’t find it intuitively, they don’t have enough data to find it or maybe they have sufficient data or they suspect they may have sufficient data, but they can’t find the insights or the answers that they’re looking for.
Two real examples of what was done in this space. They both actually are retail examples and retail is good because we all understand how retail works, at least at a superficial level once you dig beneath the surface, there are nuances we could never imagine. One of the big problems around retail is a little thing called shrinkage.
Now I’ll avoid the obvious shrinkage jokes and simply say that shrinkage is the term used in retail for goods being stolen, going missing, magically ending up in the pockets of the employees sometimes. Essentially it’s stock loss, and stock loss has a direct impact on cost because obviously this is inventory that you’re purchasing, that you’re spending money on but not getting any money back from. And Big Data can help.
Focus on shrinkage is a big driver in most retailers and certainly very much falls in the category of saving money. All retailers do a lot of work around shrinkage already. They have big teams in some cases that deal with it purely but in this case, the business goal was to understand the shrinkage drivers and to validate some hypotheses about why shrinkage is happening, and then to actually reduce the lost due to shrinkage, so to provably show that we can find the source of shrinkage, make some changes and fix it. Also, within this particular organization, their analytical sophistication was low so they wanted some easy-to use tools, and they wanted the answers, etc.
The appropriate use of information and analytics will be critical to achieving our shared economic and environmental goals, especially given the urgency of climate change. Bringing American energy into the 21st century is imperative – and an incredible opportunity.
Through an aggressive merger and acquisition phase, one of the broadband industries largest Multi-System Operators (MSO), found themselves needing help in systematically migrating their subscriber billing and workforce automation systems. To reach this goal, the client enlisted the help of experts at Cliintel to both maintain service levels as well as improve efficiency in the field.
The Client:
The MSO was the world’s largest provider of cable television, high-speed internet and local telephone service to 14 markets across the United States.
The Business Issue:
The Atlanta market consisted of over 100 dispatchers and over 500 technicians, all serving 600,00+ subscribers. This market utilized multiple groups of contractors to assist in field installations, service and audit functions. Atlanta was also the last of nine markets to be on an older, outgoing Workforce Management tool. Severe contractual penalties were associated with an extensive data center being kept on-line to support these tools. If the system was not shut off within 60 days from project initiation, the previously pro-rated cost to the market would exceed $1 million a month. The problem was particularly precarious in this case because the Atlanta market division of the MSO was highly dependent on the outgoing system that was actively utilized by the routers, dispatchers and field technicians.
Due to the success of this migration, increases in the efficiency of in-house labor allowed for the reduction of contract labor, allowing the MSO to realize an immediate profit of over $5 million, with a gross savings of over $300,000 in the first 90 days.
The Approach:
The Atlanta market’s staff had grown accustomed to change and transition. The decision to utilize Cliintel was based upon the team’s ability to execute the project plan utilizing the best practices identified from lessons learned from the prior deployments to successfully overcome the risks and issues brought to bear during the implementation. The urgency to sunset the old system and avoid the associated costs was extreme, mandating that the deployment of the new solution be on time, on budget, and fully available in production. It also had to be deployed with performance
reporting and cost/benefit trending analysis capabilities.
The Solution:
Discovery meetings were held by the project team to gather information from the market’s staff, vendors and management. The meetings engaged upper management in making high-level decisions on configuration, and to gain buy-in. Meetings between upper and middle management were held to assess criteria for these two levels and to achieve goal alignment between upper and middle management. Finally, meetings were held with front-end users and supervisory staff.
The goal of the meetings was to properly size the level of effort required to deploy the work force automation platform into this system across the four key departments: routing, dispatch, field technicians, and administrative.
Normally, training was held in a phased format utilizing one team of trainers to work through each department. In this instance, training was required in parallel in a “just-in-time” fashion. This approach required exacting coordination between the project management staff, market staff from dispatch, routing and field supervisors and both the corporate and market training staffs. Coordination would also have to occur in parallel with the wireless hardware and service provider, as well as the vendor for the work force automation platform itself.
The field, including that day’s routing, dispatch and all phone, radio and internet communication, would have to make a hard cut from the old workforce automation system, cellular phone and radio, to one handheld device in the same day. Technicians would hand in their hand held device on their way into training and leave to deliver their portion of the day’s production, with a new handheld device, having been qualified as proficient – all in the same shift.
The Results:
Cliintel was highly successful in coordinating the entire span of this endeavor and moved from field service to implementation and utilization by the network maintenance and outage dispatch teams. The rapid implementation schedule throughout the affected departments, and fast utilization of the handheld devices were attributable to unwavering executive sponsorship with consistent reinforcement. Logical, focused processes helped to achieve buy in, goal-alignment, and participation in training and meetings where the players were able to see the commitment from upper management. If resistance was noted, issues could be addressed on the spot and be immediately resolved.
The solution was deployed on time and under budget. All departments were successfully using the new system on day one. The outgoing product was smoothly replaced and the client was able to shut down the data center without incurring the $1 million per month penalty.
Due to the success of this migration, increases in the efficiency of in-house labor allowed for the reduction of contract labor, allowing the MSO to realize an immediate profit of over $5 million, with a gross savings of over $300,000 in the first 90 days.
We’re proud to help our clients solve tough problems and achieve stunning results. To see what kind of results Cliintel can deliver for you, please visit www.cliintel.com or e-mail askcliintel@cliintel.com.
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