Client Problem

One of Australia’s household retail brand names required a comprehensive audit of their business strategies and processes to ensure they were achieving leading practices.

Large, complex organisations sometimes focus on the operational components of their business at the expense of best utilising its organisational strengths. The retail chain engaged SMS to conduct an holistic review of their day-to-day intranet operational processes, in order to highlight any areas for improvement and recommend strategies to support future operations.

SMS Approach

SMS performed a detailed scoping exercise to provide a current snapshot of organisational procedures and current business costs.

Utilising its tried and tested ‘RACI’ approach, SMS conducted a scoping exercise and mapped the existing processes. Each key finding was benchmarked against global best practice and specific, expert industry knowledge. All relevant existing documentation was taken under review to provide an accurate picture of current positioning and future improvements, such as standardising the way content is developed and managed across the business.

Recommendation

SMS produced detailed report of current status and roadmap for delivering the recommendations.

Thorough research and deep industry domain experience enabled SMS to develop a strategy for change management. An organisation restructure was presented as an effective solution and included recruitment to fill identified resource gaps. Processes that were deemed prohibitive to ongoing success were also highlighted. An integral part of this strategy, SMS made key recommendations on business critical functions, including:

• improving operational standards in line with global leading best practices
• closer monitoring of intranet content lifecycles for the organisation
• improving the Human Resources framework to ensure effective hires in key areas

Outcome

SMS’s organisation change management plan was implemented immediately and ongoing results show a measurable increase in overall performance.

The retail chain utilised internal resources to implement SMS's recommendations in their entirety. As part of this, staff in key management areas have been recruited into high profile positions to champion and implement the recommended change management strategies and tactics.