Success Stories
Operational Assessment
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An industrial service company, recently acquired by a venture capital firm, developed an aggressive growth strategy designed to significantly increase marketable value in preparation for the venture capitalist’s exit. Shortly after the acquisition, however, the acquired service company began struggling with profitability and cash constraints.
Harmonic Systems Consulting (HSC) was hired by service company leadership (the client) and tasked with identifying problems, recommending both short and long term solutions and assisting with implementation where appropriate.
As a first step to improving financial results, HSC partners conducted an Operational Assessment, focusing on five key areas of concern, as defined by client management. At the conclusion of the assessment we recommended improvements to control the procurement process, suggested effective new ways to use information technology, proposed new methods to evaluate pricing and identify profitability, defined a new set of metrics and developed a comprehensive plan to unlock the full potential of their talent.
Keeping the venture capital firm’s intentions in mind, we recommended a three year implementation plan with emphasis on early benefits. We also assisted the President in preparing his case to obtain financing for further capital investment that was needed for the company to continue to grow. Within six months, the client turned the corner on profitability, exceeded their growth targets for the year and generated enough cash to make a major new capital investment. After a year and a half, the company had far exceeded growth plans, remained profitable and positioned itself as an attractive acquisition target.
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A successful company, serving diverse markets, wanted to double in size in the next 5 years, but were unsure of how best to organize operations and prioritize actions to accommodate anticipated growth.
Harmonic Systems Consulting (HSC) was invited in to conduct an Operational Assessment and help leadership structure and articulate organizational direction.
Working with the management team, partners at HSC first helped the client to identify what distinguished their business from that of their competitors; then we evaluated their business operations against current needs and future plans. Once we understood their unique business circumstances, we developed recommendations tailored to their strategy, which included:
methods to improve their proposal to delivery process- the identification of, and means to achieve, key organizational competencies
- structural changes to foster their competitive positioning
- advice to leadership on the importance of changing culture (so that delivery of their services could be managed more efficiently)
- the identification of a new information technology service-oriented architecture (SOA) e and new agile application development methods
- an approach to optimize resources across multiple projects
We then developed prioritization criteria, recommended a phased one year implementation plan with metrics for measuring success and created a change management approach. We also developed communications content for the executive team to use with the rest of the organization.
Immediately following our recommendations the company began implementing the structural changes, changed their order management process, introduced an organizational project management discipline to establish priorities and manage projects, and began orchestrating the cultural changes necessary to support the desired growth over the next 3 to 5 years.
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