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Case Study

Oper­a­tional Excellence

Dri­ving Oper­a­tional Excel­lence: The Pow­er of Man­age­ment Sys­tems and Cul­tur­al Transformation

2023/05/25

INTRODUCTION

In util­i­ty indus­tries, the sig­nif­i­cance of robust man­age­ment sys­tems, process­es, and con­trols can­not be under­stat­ed, par­tic­u­lar­ly for very large util­i­ty com­pa­nies serv­ing mil­lions of cus­tomers. These com­pa­nies are respon­si­ble for pro­vid­ing essen­tial ser­vices like elec­tric­i­ty, water, and gas to a mas­sive cus­tomer base.

Opti­mal resource util­i­sa­tion, adher­ence and con­trols to uphold strin­gent reg­u­la­to­ry stan­dards and ser­vice reli­a­bil­i­ty are crit­i­cal to main­tain and grow cus­tomer sat­is­fac­tion. As the demands of mil­lions of cus­tomers con­tin­ue to grow, invest­ing in com­pre­hen­sive man­age­ment sys­tems and strin­gent con­trols becomes indis­pens­able for large util­i­ty com­pa­nies to excel in deliv­er­ing excep­tion­al ser­vice and dri­ving sus­tain­able growth.

RESULTS

15% to 25% 

Reduc­tion in breakdowns 

30% to 50% 

Reduc­tion in WIP/ out­stand­ing projects Cus­tomer Services 

30% to 60% 

Reduc­tion in non-technical losses 

10% to 20% 

Reduc­tion in debtors 

£15M+

Finan­cial benefits 

THE CHALLENGE

The Client, a major nation­al elec­tric­i­ty util­i­ty com­pa­ny in South­east Asia, had record­ed loss­es and its image was tar­nished because of sup­ply reli­a­bil­i­ty prob­lems and inef­fi­cien­cies in cus­tomer man­age­ment. The asked Renoir to analyse the sit­u­a­tion and imple­ment solu­tions that would dri­ve real results fast.

ANALYSIS & PROJECT APPROACH

Renoir car­ried out an Analy­sis that iden­ti­fied the fol­low­ing issues:

  1. Break­downs: The sup­ply net­work and main­te­nance sys­tems were not ade­quate to pro­vide sat­is­fac­to­ry lev­els of sup­ply reliability. 
  2. Project Work In Progress: There were too many con­cur­rent infra­struc­ture projects.
  3. Debtors: There was a sub­stan­tial debtor problem.
  4. Non-Technical Loss­es: A sub­stan­tial amount of mon­ey was being lost from theft and faulty meter readings.
  5. Lack of rel­e­vant infor­ma­tion: Affect­ed deci­sion mak­ing, par­tic­u­lar­ly at mid­dle man­age­ment level.
  6. A lack of accountability/ownership: par­tic­u­lar­ly at super­vi­so­ry level

Fol­low­ing a one week, off-site, task force train­ing pro­gramme, the project team, com­pris­ing 8 Renoir staff and 60 task force employ­ees, set about tack­ling these issues, hav­ing com­mit­ted to the fol­low­ing targets:

Net­work Services:

  1. 25% Reduc­tion in breakdowns.
  2. 15% Reduc­tion in WIP.

Cus­tomer Services:

  1. 15% Reduc­tion in non-technical losses
  2. 15% Reduc­tion in debtors

“I like the ‘dis­ci­pline’ that the sys­tems and process­es that you (Renoir) have put in place has achieved. Peo­ple now know exact­ly what it is they have to achieve, and how they should go about achiev­ing this.”

GM Cus­tomer Service

IMPLEMENTATION

The Renoir method­ol­o­gy imple­ment­ed new Man­age­ment Con­trol Sys­tems, process and con­trols. Goals, KPIs and results were set and were trans­par­ent and avail­able to all employ­ees. Full adop­tion of the changes were achieved by the behav­iour­al audit­ing process­es which taught, guid­ed and coached employ­ees in the new ways of work­ing in their roles. This was a key suc­cess fac­tor, because the aver­age employ­ee tenure was high, and the pri­or work­ing cul­ture was deeply engrained in the organisation.

This helped the com­pa­ny achieve con­sid­er­able oper­a­tional and finan­cial ben­e­fits and played an impor­tant part in help­ing the com­pa­ny reach record prof­its in sub­se­quent years. With direct finan­cial ben­e­fits from the project of £15m and an ROI of near­ly 7:1, the project was acknowl­edged as a resound­ing success.

Beside the con­sid­er­able tan­gi­ble ben­e­fits that were achieved, the cul­ture had changed towards a results-oriented per­for­mance dri­ven work­force. The 60 employ­ees who had been sec­ond­ed to the project team, learned new method­olo­gies first-hand to define and devel­op sys­tems and process­es to achieve tan­gi­ble and sus­tain­able results. These employ­ees now form the core of the new Strate­gic Unit (Dis­tri­b­u­tion).

“ The cul­ture of staff is evolv­ing to become results focused, per­for­mance indi­ca­tor dri­ven, and action ori­en­tat­ed. Wher­ev­er you go with­in the com­pa­ny peo­ple are talk­ing about their KPI’s, their tar­gets, their Man­age­ment Con­trol Sys­tems (MCS) and their Action logs. This is a new company. ”

A com­pa­ny vet­er­an employee

KEY RESULTS

15% to 25% 

Reduc­tion in breakdowns 

30% to 50% 

Reduc­tion in WIP/ out­stand­ing projects Cus­tomer Services 

30% to 60% 

Reduc­tion in non-technical losses 

10% to 20% 

Reduc­tion in debtors 

£15M+

Finan­cial benefits 

CONCLUSION

In con­clu­sion, while the cor­po­rate results achieved through the imple­men­ta­tion of robust man­age­ment sys­tems, process­es, and con­trols are unde­ni­ably impres­sive, it is cru­cial to recog­nise that true suc­cess goes beyond mere numbers.

The case study of this nation­al elec­tric­i­ty util­i­ty com­pa­ny high­lights that these tan­gi­ble ben­e­fits were found­ed in a fun­da­men­tal shift in organ­i­sa­tion­al cul­ture. By fos­ter­ing a results-focused, performance-driven mind­set and empow­er­ing employ­ees to take own­er­ship of their roles, the com­pa­ny expe­ri­enced not only finan­cial gains but also a deep­er cul­tur­al transformation.

This cul­ture shift cre­ates a sus­tain­able foun­da­tion for con­tin­ued suc­cess, ensur­ing that the pos­i­tive changes dri­ven by the imple­ment­ed sys­tems and process­es endure in the long run. Ulti­mate­ly, the real­i­sa­tion that busi­ness results stand on the shoul­ders of suc­cess­ful cul­tur­al change is key to dri­ving last­ing and mean­ing­ful impact in large companies.

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