Every day, organizations have the opportunity to make decisions. That daily opportunity also presents people with the chance to make bad decisions. When individuals make a bad decision, it curtails organizational growth and success, and potentially impacts careers. TAC clients utilize our Expert Decision Support Network to ensure that they make good decisions by receiving the advice of our Experts in order to achieve the best decision outcome possible.

The results on this page highlight some of advice and consulting that we have provided to our clients, and the benefits they derived. Click through on the link to see a more detailed explanation of the circumstances that were affecting the organization and results from utilizing TAC’s expert advice.

Multi-Channel Distributed Inventory and Order Management
IT Subject Area #51

Issue: The client is a nationally know retail company whose organization was split into three separate sales channels (web, catalog, and retail stores). While each channel shares the same product offering, they operated with separate P&Ls and order management systems. This had led to significant inequities in inventory, saddling the organization with extra costs and some unhappy customers.

Question: They were evaluating order management and warehouse management applications to support the business, and wanted to ensure they had the correct vendors on the short list.

Solution: Through a series of two phone calls, TAC Thought Leader Beth Cohen provided them with feedback about what systems integrated across functions to provide an “end-to-end” solution. While the organization was looking for an out-of-the-box solution to solve their issues, Beth made clear the reality that a significant portion of companies were performing large customization to the applications which they had selected.

Client Action: The client took our advice and selected an inventory management solution which resulted in a savings of $225K.

Benchmarking a Hospital IT Organization
IT Subject Area #870

Issue: TAC’s client is a midsize regional hospital which has a new CIO. Immediately upon starting the job, it was apparent that the IT organization was challenged in meeting the ongoing requirements demanded by the hospital.

Question: How do I know that I am staffed appropriately based on all the requirements we have for IT?

Solution: TAC Experts discussed various approaches with the CIO on how to move forward with different levels of benchmarking services offered by TAC. Based on the discussion, TAC recommended a quick benchmark analysis that would assess the overall organization and would highlight areas where there are problems. Once the areas were identified more detailed benchmarks would be employed to examine where the issues are and how to resolve them.

Client Action: The client was “extremely satisfied” with the initial high-level benchmark. The results indicated that the distributing computing and wireless networking areas performed poorly. This initiated the more detailed benchmark studies in both the distributing computing and wireless networking areas that provided benchmark comparisons against similar healthcare IT organizations. The results of the detailed benchmarks clearly provided the information the CIO needed to request additional staffing in both distributed computing and wireless networking. Additional recommendations were provided around best practices for consolidating the server environment as well as upgrading the desktop environment which would eliminate a variety of problems that were uncovered during eh benchmark studies. Wireless networking focused in on a temporary consultant to come in and implement a network configuration and management tool, as well as enhancing existing configuration management processes that helped eliminate unnecessary work and complexity of the environment.

Vetting a Project Risk Assessment Methodology
IT Subject Area #856

Issue: Our client, a leader in the life sciences equipment industry, was seeking advice on implementing a project risk assessment methodology for their Project Management Office.

Question: How does our methodology compare to leading industry practice for ranking projects based upon criteria that are as objective as possible?

Solution: TAC Thought Leader Doug Hubbard, who has authored two books on IT risk management, wrote a Personal Advisory Report (PAR) in response to their question. He recommended against implementing their proposed methodology because their assessments would have overlooked risk factors that could have led to a significantly different outcome than what their model would have predicted. Click Here to Read the PAR.

Client Action: The client was dissatisfied with our initial advice, to which TAC responded to by convening a conference call — at TAC’s expense — to discuss the issue further. The conference call included the TAC Personal Advisor assigned to the client, the Expert, the client employee who requested the PAR, and the client CIO. At the conclusion of the phone call, all parties agreed that not implementing their methodology was the correct decision for the company.

Security and HIPAA Compliance
IT Subject Area #939

Issue: TAC’s client is a major health-insurance company. Although frequent security and compliance reviews are conducted internally and external compliance audits are performed, the client was looking for an independent determination of how their security and compliance policies and procedures compared with industry peers and best practice.

Problem: The client staff had many commitments and time was limited for a detailed analysis. With much of the technology located a significant distance from the administrative offices, physically visiting key areas was impractical.

Solution: TAC Experts provided the client with a series of assessment documents with clear descriptions of how to evaluate each component of an information security and compliance program. The client was then able to distribute the assessment documents to the responding dispersed groups for completion of the total of more than one hundred review points. The completed assessment documents were returned to the TAC Expert for review and analysis, and after some clarification, the client security and compliance program was compared with peer groups and best practices. Areas that were rated lower than desirable were identified and remediation programs recommended.

Client Action: The client was “extremely satisfied” with the security and compliance assessment. The results provided by the TAC team added emphasis to the security and compliance improvement programs already underway and identified several areas where the planned data center architecture could provide for improved security and reliability.

Performance Management
IT Subject Area #919

Issue: TAC’s client is a midsized international retailer with primary operations in North America and Europe. Client’s current standard of operational performance management is utilizing spreadsheets, formalized written operational business plans and bi-weekly status calls to review performance against those plans. Performance against the plans have been significantly off for the past two years, and there seems to be disagreement at the management level on how the company is going to get back on plan.

Problem: How do we improve our ability to meet/exceed operational business plans?

Solution: TAC Experts provided the client with an initial set of performance management workshops with key senior management of the company to establish a foundation on operational performance management. As a follow on, additional sessions were focused on establishing key performance indicators (KPIs) that were aligned with the strategic plan of the company. Following this approach, KPIs were then developed with each of the operating units to meet/achieve the goals of the corporate KPIs and ultimately the strategic plan of the company. TAC went on to implement the KPIs, underlying metrics and measures into a web-accessible performance management dashboard that was then used as an integrated tool to manage/communicate performance on a real-time basis, accessing business information from a variety of sources.

Client Action: The client was “very satisfied” with the consulting work TAC had provided, and operational performance at the company has been achieved almost every month. The work TAC has performed has brought the organization together to drive towards corporate goals while also achieving business unit goals, and fostering a better working relationship among business units.

Very Niche Event Management Software
IT Subject Area #210

Issue: TAC’s client is a world-renowned arena with multiple venues to manage; booking everything from professional and college sports, to graduations, meetings, concerts and more. They were searching for software to effectively manage the various events they were scheduling at various facilities. However, when they went to identify vendors, they found a lot of information on hotel conference-center software, which did not fit their needs.

Question: We are interested in anything you may have or know about event and venue management software.

Solution: TAC Expert Ron Gandiza delivered a PAR that outlined the “marketscape” of the players highlighting the strengths and weaknesses of the various solutions. Click Here to Read the PAR.

Client Action: The client was “very satisfied” with the PAR we had delivered. While they had identified a couple of vendors on the list, they had not identified all that were there including the one they ultimately selected. Their feedback to TAC was “Gartner had nothing.”

SAP Optimization
IT Subject Area #3

Issue: TAC’s client (a manufacturing company) has run a midsize SAP system for the past 10 years, using four of SAP’s products — Customer Relationship Management, Product Lifecycle Management, Supply Chain Management and Supplier Relationship Management. Client had a significant amount of ABAP code written to work with existing systems and processes as well as problems with previous upgrades of SAP.

Question: How do we know we are running SAP efficiently? Executive management feels we continue to add staff without any benefit? Are we overstaffed?

Solution: TAC Experts provided the client with an initial scan of their SAP system, evaluating a month’s worth of SAP internal systems data. The resulting evaluation provided comparisons in the following four areas: cost, productivity, performance and quality. A detailed report was provided to the client identifying significant cost savings, areas for productivity improvement, system performance and quality improvements. The consulting analysis was presented to the senior management of the company who clearly saw their concerns identified. Senior management then engaged TAC Experts to create a detailed action plan to remedy the problem areas identified in the initial study.

Client Action: The client was “very satisfied” with the initial consulting analysis TAC had provided on their SAP system, and initiated an implementation project with TAC Experts to detail an implementation plan in each of the areas that were identified as underperforming. After implementing the detailed action plan in two months, the client has streamlined their SAP environment, reduced amount of maintenance on the system, improved the overall quality of the system, and increased productivity. Overall costs have been reduced by more than $400,000 annually.

CIO and CSO [Chief Security Officer] Role Definitions
IT Subject Area #439

Issue: The client’s enterprise, a health-care organization, was undergoing some pressure to establish a chief security officer to oversee the wide variety of HIPAA and other regulatory privacy and security issues affecting their patients. As the new role was being crafted, the proposed structure would have created a difficult reporting structure for the IT organization. The situation was creating a difficult political situation for CIO and others on the IT team.

Question: What is the current thinking about the CIO and the CSO roles? Are these viewed as two separate roles or does the CIO typically assume the CSO responsibilities.

Solution: The Expert delivered a PAR which outlined the roles of the CSO and how they diverge from that of the CIO. It also included specific examples of when it is important to separate the roles and the ideal reporting structure for similarly sized organizations.

Client Action: With a physical report in hand, the client distributed the information to those involved in crafting the new role. They utilized the information to describe the responsibilities of the CSO and it defused the political situation.

Implementing IT Workforce Planning
IT Subject Area #835

Issue: Our client — a Fortune 100 technology company — was looking to kick-off a workforce planning initiative. Workforce planning is an HR-type function of ensuring that the workforce you currently have will meet the challenges of tomorrow. The organization had done some work towards implementing the project, but recognized that it would be very complex in their enterprise.

Question: Before they did that, they asked TAC: What enterprises are doing it? How are they measuring it (costs, career impact, etc.)? What are the trends?

Solution: TAC set up a phone call with on of our Experts, Steven Venokur, who is well versed in workforce planning and benchmarking issues. At the conclusion of the 60-minute phone call the client determined that the project would be huge in scope and would consume a considerable amount of resources to implement. More importantly, the client recognized during the discussion that they did not yet have the top-management support aligned to successfully execute the initiative.

Client Action: Because of the scope and lack of management support, client decided not to green light the project. The organization had been prepared to commit significant funds, in the seven-figure range, to the project for software, training, and processes to support their effort.

Assessing the Appropriateness of a Vendor’s SLA
IT Subject Area #807

Issue: Client (a government agency) was outsourcing their data center operations, and during the negotiation with the selected vendor, the vendor proposed a three-month SLA for any new technology brought into the datacenter. The client thought that this was too long, and had spent considerable time searching research databases and speaking with various analysts to quantify their objections. They received nothing concrete and then turned to TAC.

Question: Is vendor XXX’s SLA appropriate?

Solution: TAC provided a phone consultation with an Expert who had worked for the vendor, and who had first hand knowledge of the systems and processes used to order new equipment. The vendor determined that based on their knowledge, the SLA was too long, and it was a “under-promise / over-deliver” scheme which would always make the vendor look good.

Client Action: Client was able to take the knowledge of the vendor”s processes back to the vendor negotiations and craft a more acceptable SLA.

Identify Vendors to Support the IT Needs of State Public Health-Care Providers
IT Subject Area #224

Issue: As a vendor-management group responsible for managing the state procurement schedule, our client wanted to ensure that they were providing the right mix of offerings for the state’s public health-care providers.

Question: The State needs to better understand the IT needs of our public health-care customers and their potential IT spending. The department’s customers include hospital districts and university health-care systems.

Solution: The TAC Expert delivered a PAR that outlined the “marketscape” of the players and solutions that are typically needed to run public health-care organizations.

Client Action: The client matched the identified products and service offering suggested by the Expert against that of the state’s procurement schedule.

To learn more about The Advisory Council and how we might assist your organization in making good solid IT decisions, contact us.