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Team Based Management Structure
Case Study
Client:
- Industry:
Financial Services Industry
- Business units affected:
Business Units Affected: All units providing ‘client services’ and
one of the Company’s Owners (Family Held Corporation)
Description of the problem situation:
The strategic focus and mission of the organization, was to be the “Gold
Standard” in their industry. The competition consisted of a number
of financial institutions with better name recognition. Therefore, in order
to compete, the client company made it a point of tailoring all services upon
request, a passion for quality control that tolerated “no errors”,
prompt response time, and personalized service.
The problem had at least three components:
- First, they were being extraordinarily successful. However, their
ability to manage the data, comply with legal and Internal Revenue Service
requirements (on behalf of their clients), and ease of access to and the
ability to manipulate information for investing and reporting requirements
became cumbersome and the current information management system needed to
be replaced. However, before that could happen they needed to refine
core operating practices and processes, and they needed to clarify document
and information flow requirements.
- Second, being the “Gold Standard” for every client and in every
situation, translated into an inability to maximize profits. Simply
put, some clients were profitable and some were not. The company’s
growth had focused upon the acquisition of ‘market share’, rather
than growth through profitability.
- Third, the company was traditionally organized by function. Because each
customer required a combination of services, each coming from a different functional
unit, communication and customer service were negatively impacted, coordination
was time consuming and thus expensive, and information management was cumbersome.
Steps used to resolve the problem:
After determining the project scope, we worked with the client to identify
an appropriate ‘project team’ making sure that the various disciplines
were represented. This, of course, included corporate ownership. The
project was a typical change management project with four primary steps:
- Collect: The first step was to collect information regarding current
practices and relevant performance data.
- Reflect: After analyzing the information the team identified their
primary targets of opportunity. They then began to document current
processed by analyzing the steps involved, roles and responsibilities, associated
regulations, laws and policies, forms and other documents used in executing
that activity, and any relevant performance data relating to time, cost and
quality.
- Decide: The team then began to reorganize and redesign. They
decided that a “Team Based” management structure gave them numerous
advantages, including the ability to better target customer service requirements
by grouping clients into specific categories and developing a corporate team
for that particular customer classification. In addition, the company
would realize better profitability while at the same time improve their access
to and management of relevant data.
- Do: Once the re-design was completed, the team developed a transition
strategy that included identify current best practices, which were then incorporated
into the re-design.
Benefits realized by the client:
The client was able to address all three areas of need. They established
new procedures and processes that helped them identify the new information management
system that would work best for them. They continued to provide the highest
quality and most targeted services to their clients. In fact customer service
improved because the team based management structure improved communication and
coordination because the various functions were clustered around client needs
rather than functional differences. Profitability improved because services
could be tailored to client needs. They also improved their ability to
sell and contract, because they had a better understanding of the associated
cost benefit ratios.
Case Studies
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