Has your BPM project delivered – please lets open this debate up and comment below?

If you would like a copy of the white paper ‘Too much BP but not enough of the M’  just complete the form below.

When I ask “How near are you to achieving this?”, the answer is always “We’ve always got so much more training to do!”  But the real answer is also nearly always “We don’t know!”

Without a way to measure skills and competence, linked to business need, this can only ever be guesswork.  Users of the eg operational intelligence® suite know that these measures provide the missing link to managing demand, planning capacity and making sure there is a real need for any time diverted to training or development and then crucially, making sure the time is well spent.

Tell us how you measure, manage and improve your people’s skills and competence by commenting below.  What is the top tip that makes a real difference to your operational results?

eg are pleased to provide operational management training and development programmes, endorsed by the ILM, to help you address this key area.

Here’s an excerpt…..

Bloor Research identified that there were a number of solutions that organisations may have already purchased or are thinking of purchasing to solve the issues involved in gaining control of operations management.  Bloor identified that there were two key approaches of IT solutions built to support operations management.  The first is based around Business Intelligence which requires significant effort to tailor an appropriate solution.  The second approach involves the use of specialised applications consisting of a variety of automated components, including workforce management, capacity management, customer management, process management.

If you would like to be the first to receive this paper please complete the short form below.

Other associated link that may be of interest:

Linked in groups:

eg operations management http://bit.ly/cq6Egd

Operational Intelligence http://bit.ly/acZvOV

Blog: http://bit.ly/b6fVQ9

Many sources seem to suggest that there are benefits for both the employer and employee with working from home, the employer gaining from higher productivity and reduced long term costs; the employee, greater flexibility and the great feeling that they wont have to fight the rest of the world on the road, train or bus in order to get to work on time.

If working from home is going to be successful, managers must expand their styles of management beyond traditional face to face methods. They need to develop a different approach as well as understanding what good looks like to enable stretching yet achievable targets to be set and progress monitored remotely.

Managing someone you seldom see is difficult.  The big challenge for managers comes with developing a suitable system to effectively communicate, motivate and monitor home workers with to ensure that targets are being understood and being met.

As my colleague referenced in an earlier blog employee engagement and the right behaviours will deliver the right results http://www.eguk.co.uk/blog/remote-working-and-employee-engagement/

I feel one of the key issues is a lack of effective management and the lack of social interaction which often lead to feelings of isolation.

I’m interested to know if you are a manager with team members working from home.  How has your management style had to change and how do you monitor your staff at home? What system do you use and have you developed it in-house or purchased it off the shelf? How successful is it and at what cost?  We can then get some views on your specific experiences.

Please email me to share your experiences at chrisfryer@eguk.co.uk

intelligent operations management

I refer to a blog post Colin Whelen, Senior Contact Plannning Specialist at the Professional Planning Forum from who discusses a four step process for planning.

Whilst there are mountains to be climbed, good operational management practices will drive efficiency gains – so lets share some of the learning and ideas we practice daily and maybe the pain of change will be made easier and deliver a better service for all.

I am interested to know if you are running a process improvement programme within your organisation. If so please email me to tell me about it.  How successful is it and why?  What are your challenges and what are you doing in response to them?  What is missing or what would make your project more successful?

Please contact me at chrisfryer@eguk.co.uk with your views and experiences and I look forward to sharing with you what’s recommended.

If you complete your details below we will send you a white paper on ‘Supporting Performance Improvement in Service Organisations’

As part of getting this balance right, many Clients we work with across the globe want to ensure the quality of what they deliver to their customers (internal or external) is as good as the speed or turnaround and is achieved in conjunction with measures to improve team member capability and people satisfaction.  (All these things we will be looking for when judging the ‘best of the best’ at our forthcoming annual eg operational excellence® awards).

“It’s true productivity when we deliver something correctly, right first time – rather than spending more time later trying to make good something we got wrong the first time” one Client told me.

Paul Cooper at the West Bromwich Building Society shares more insights: see “Quality vs Quantity” and whilst you are there, check out Janet Ridley’s comments too.

eg operational intelligence® helps our Clients to bring quality and quantity together into a balanced scorecard for daily operations, so rewarding and recognising “what good looks like”.  But whatever your measure for quality, how do you know the amount you verify, check, inspect or audit is enough?  And what can you do to build quality in before the event, rather than find out after?  Finally, how do you ensure the learning is shared in a good way – if things do go wrong?  Let me know your thoughts!

Contact me via:

andrewbaker@eguk.co.uk

sms: +47 91 83 30 30

IM: andrew.baker.eg (Skype)

http://twitter.com/egsolutions

http://www.linkedin.com/companies/eg-solutions-plc

We’ll publish more of your views on delivering great operations management.  I look forward to hearing from you.

Research has demonstrated*1 that 45% of all calls in the UK are unnecessary, they equate this to £1million per annum per 250 agents within the UK.  With an estimated 900,000 agents in the UK this equates to a staggering £3.6 billion per annum spent on unnecessary calls.

The majority of these calls are known to be caused by actions of the business itself.  Analyse your own operation and calculate the potential for savings if you could identify and reduce these calls and subsequent back office administration.  Every operation’s unnecessary calls are different in content, what are yours, have you even thought about it?

ContactBabel’s full report ‘Getting Call Avoidance Right’ is available White Paper – Getting Call Avoidance Right

If you could achieve even a 5% reduction in your unnecessary calls and back office administration think of the savings you could achieve.  Next time you are negotiating with your contact centre operation about headcount, think about how their operation would look with less calls – something you could help them achieve.

If you would like a free review to fully understand the reasons why customers call and make guaranteed operational savings, contact me spenceroleary@eguk.co.uk

View the short video how others have achieved guaranteed operational management improvements (hyperlink)

*1 Source: ContactBabel 2006

Projections I heard about on a recent webinar show a major jump over the next 15 years in remote working.  The benefits could include more time on ‘tasks’ as there is less social interaction but does less face-2-face contact impact employee engagement?  From the evidence I have seen, working with many clients over the years, employee engagement is critical for effective teams.

My thoughts on how to address this is that emphasis should be put on real-time communication – goals, expectations, achievements and leadership.  Management information is key to recognise performance and engage team members.  It should be regular and effective.

Whilst technology can facilitate remote working it is behaviours that will deliver the right results.  See Andrew Baker’s blog on what gets measured gets better http://www.eguk.co.uk/category/blog/client/and Tim Becker’s ‘Managing our People Performance’  http://www.eguk.co.uk/category/blog/operations-management/

The mantra of coach, challenge, cheerlead combined with regular management information on performance will keep employees engaged whether working from home, another office or another country.

I have some specific case studies I can share with you, just email me – ask@eguk.co.uk

You can even take a free ‘health check’ to see where employee engagement would deliver bottom line results

http://www.eguk.co.uk/about-eg/sign-up-for-your-free-site-survey/

Further reading on this subject can be found in the ILM research article – ‘20th Century Bosses Hold Back 21st Century Working Practices’