Success Stories


IT Capability Design

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Chemicals

A division of a large chemicals manufacturer was unable to access a common set of information in order to make decisions. The President could not access emails when traveling to remote offices, the executive team was making decisions based on differing information and the disparate systems were confusing and difficult to use.

A consultant (now an HSC Managing Partner) was hired to help the manufacturer develop a high level IT architecture (or IT executive blueprint) that would define how the systems should be integrated in order to meet the needs of the growing business.

The consultant did the following to address the issues:

  1. Assembled a team from the manufacturer, including representatives from the IT organization and business users.
  2. Conducted a session with the executive team to develop design principles for the new IT system (e.g., data must be accessible from all company locations).
  3. Working with the team, developed a high level architecture laying out how various aspects of the company’s IT systems should interact with each other in an integrated way.
  4. Defined requirements for systems selection.

As a result of the consulting project:

  1. The executive team agreed to a common set of priorities and requirements for the new system and how to direct the IT organization.
  2. Participation by the team members and quantification of the benefits led to acceptance of the IT architecture by the entire division.
  3. The company decided to implement an Enterprise Requirements Planning (ERP) system that met its needs. The benefits of this plan was communicated to the entire North American company and led to a major project to implement this ERP system across the entire company.
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Manufacturing and Distribution

A privately held manufacturer and distributor struggled from poor systems integration, leading to weak financial control. They were concerned about the accuracy of their financial reporting because of data integrity issues, and they felt they were wasting a lot of time trying to reconcile data from different systems. The President and Chief Financial Officer (CFO) decided they needed assistance to select and implement a new IT system.

The manufacturer decided to hire a consultant (now an HSC Managing Partner) to help them. The consultant:

  • Assembled a team consisting of representatives from different parts of the business
  • Conducted a series of workshops, with research in between meetings, to determine requirements for the new, integrated system
  • Recommended several integrated Enterprise Requirements Planning (ERP) systems software tools for consideration as well as a new hardware technology platform
  • Helped the team determine selection criteria for evaluating the software alternatives

As a result:

  1. The manufacturer chose an ERP system that met their needs.
  2. They successfully installed the new hardware and implemented the new software, with the full support of all departments.
  3. The CFO commented that the new IT system gave them confidence in their financial controls and increased their productivity.
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Manufacturing Industry

A large steel manufacturer needed to develop a "pedigree" for their steel. Their largest customer demanded that the company track the metallurgy and processes through which they steel they bought had gone from the blast furnace all the way through the rolling mills. This request created a challenge for the manufacturer for the following reasons:

  • Because of the nature of steel making, normal tracking techniques could not be used because labels and tags like barcodes or RFID tags would be destroyed during the manufacturing process
  • The company’s operational computer systems on the plant floor were not linked to each other, much less to the financial computer system
  • The company had a history of losing track of the steel before it was shipped (e.g., in one case, several tons of steel were misplaced; later, they were discovered to have sunk in the mud in a storage yard, but there was no record of them having been stored there)

A consultant, now an HSC partner, was engaged to help the steel company develop a “pedigree” of the steel for its largest client. The partner:

  • Formed a cross-functional team, with representatives from all parts of the business
  • Worked with the team to define the issues that needed to be addressed and the requirements for the new systems and data needed along with methods for tracking the steel from process to process
  • Assisted the team in selecting software and hardware needed to implement the new, integrated solution along with a business case to justify the expenditure
  • After the solution was approved, assisted the team in developing an implementation plan, designing the data structures needed for tracking and linking the disparate computer systems
  • Worked with the team to implement the solution

As a result:

  • The steel company was able to keep the business of their largest customer by producing the “pedigree” the customer had demanded
  • The company began producing “pedigrees” for all of their orders and analyzing the results in order to improve product quality and processing speed
  • They no longer lost any steel
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Healthcare

A healthcare services provider had multiple issues with its Information Technology (IT) capabilities and services:

  • The extensive time their nurses spent on reporting took away from their available time to provide home health services to their patients. The company had approval from their board to implement an expensive new field reporting system for the nurses, but the status of the project was uncertain
  • The IT department had a services of projects to improve their infrastructure and capabilities, all of which were significantly behind schedule and a number of key IT personnel had left the company
  • The IT executive and the rest of the executive team were at odds regarding the company’s IT priorities

The healthcare provider’s executive team wanted to grow significantly, so they decided to hire a consultant, now an HSC partner, to help them address these issues. The partner began by interviewing all of the members of the executive team and a number of key employees, including some members of the IT team and some of the nurses. In addition, the partner observed how the company handled requests for their services. These activities uncovered some additional issues:

  • The major project for the new field reporting system was significantly behind schedule and would not be completed on time
  • The process for handling new service requests was inefficient and highly error prone. It was undocumented, except for sticky notes on the wall, making it difficult to on board new associates when the number of requests increased. In addition, patient data was frequently inaccurate (e.g., some patients were listed multiple times with slightly different information each time for the same patient).

Once the interviews were completed and these additional issues reviewed, the partner developed a matrix of all outstanding projects, their status and what was needed to complete them. The partner then conducted a strategic planning session with the executive team to define their IT requirements and priorities and develop a plan of action to address the needs, including:

  • Reprioritization of key projects, with dates and clear roles and responsibilities to complete them
  • Recommended changes to the IT infrastructure and systems
  • Recommended changes to the IT organization

The consultant worked with the client to update and document the process for taking service requests and helped them define a method to ensure the integrity of the patient data.

As a result:

  • The President gained agreement with the Board for a new delivery date for the new field reporting system. The company successfully completed the project by that date
  • IT projects started coming in on time
  • The new process was documented in such a way that new hires could quickly come up to speed, allowing the company to speed up the process of handling new service requests. In addition, the company was able to clean up redundant and incorrect patient data to ensure faster processing
  • Unfortunately, the IT executive was unable to make the changes required by the President. The partner helped the team define the requirements in a search for a new IT executive. The newly hired IT executive was in sync with the rest of the executive team and began implementing the new IT organization, infrastructure and systems changes
  • The President was so pleased with the IT strategic planning session and the outcome of the partner’s work that she requested the partner come back to conduct a strategic planning session for the company as a whole. As a result of that session, the executive team defined a new direction for the company to accelerate its growth.
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