Our Client had achieved stable revenue streams, but was looking for substantial growth, and had set ambitious targets for its already stretched salesforce. Following an initial assessment of capabilities and current processes, OCTANE worked in partnership with the client’s key stakeholders -- including management, customers and the salesforce themselves -- to develop practical solutions to increase Salesforce Effectiveness.
| Our project design was structured to incorporate all possible salesforce optimisation opportunities, including: | ||||||||||||
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| Our operational approach was based on in-depth on-site analysis of process productivity across the Network, intensive structured workshops with salesforce staff, and a bespoke customer satisfaction survey. | ||||||||||||
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| Our deliverables included an Implementation Plan to standardise Best Practice processes and a Productivity Improvement Plan incorporating re-engineered processes. |
We found that the Salesforce was spending less than 20% of their time on direct client interaction, drastically below European best practice figures. The remaining portion of their valuable time was spent on a variety of administrative tasks, a substantial proportion of which could be streamlined, automated, or re-assigned to less expensive resources.
Our recommendations, which our Client is currently in the process of implementing in full, are expected to save over 60 hours per Salesforce Officer per month to re-focus on direct client sales activity, as well as an expected increase of up to €10 million in increased sales per annum.
| Our Client had achieved solid growth over the past years, but saw his operating margins and return on investment slowly decrease over time. He required a 3-year strategic plan that would essentially change the company, developing concrete initiatives that would significantly improve profitability while maintaining a solid growth path. | |
| Working together with BLANCHARD HELLAS, and based on our discussions with top management, our evaluation of the strategic positioning of the company, and our analysis of the market and the competition, we generated a 3-year strategic plan which: | ||||||||||||
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| Our deliverables included a detailed Strategic Plan which was approved unanimously by the company’s Board of Directors, and a very specific Transformation Roadmap with detailed targets and Key Performance Indicators for every managerial position in the company. |
We estimated that through a clear change of direction in its marketing and sales processes, the company can improve its sales per outlet by more than 15% over the next years, thus significantly improving its return on current investments. Also, through a process of network segmentation, we identified those types of outlets that are the most beneficial and profitable, and that need to be targeted for future growth.
Our recommendations, which our Client is currently in the process of implementing in full, are expected to improve its Return on Capital Employed by more than 10 percentage points over the next three years, while at the same time maintaining a growth rate almost double than the Greek oil retail market.
Our Client is a top-10 industrial company with more than 4,000 employees across four discrete facilities. They employed OCTANE to work closely with their HR department in order to identify productivity improvement opportunities, to estimate the potential benefits from a major restructuring effort, and to develop a comprehensive HR strategy outlining this restructuring.
OCTANE generated a clearly mapped out HR strategy which identified the various competitiveness issues facing the company, benchmarked current performance levels and identified specific broad initiatives that needed to be taken in order to achieve productivity improvements across the different functions of the company (back office, production, distribution etc.).
In order to develop this HR strategy, we executed the following actions:
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Benchmarking of employee cost, productivity and staffing levels against international studies and data obtained from several different studies; |
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Estimation of the specific productivity gains that could be expected by the company if it executed a wide-ranging restructuring plan;
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Assessment, through interviews with all key managers, of the skills gap, managerial weaknesses and performance and motivation issues the company needed to address; and
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Determination, together with the HR Director, of a specific restructuring roadmap which addressed all the above points and dramatically improved productivity
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Based on our estimates, the company stood to save over €70 million in employee cost by renegotiating its collective bargaining agreement and by implementing an extensive restructuring program which focused in improving employee productivity and skills while simultaneously reducing headcount.
Based on our recommendations, our Client launched a more extensive study of the different restructuring initiatives which detailed the actions that needed to be taken. They have now begun launching this restructuring effort, with specific transformation goals for all key divisions, and with a target of achieving the savings mentioned above within five years.
Our Client is one of the top Greek retailers with a leadership position in their sector and a steady growth over the past several decades. In order to address the different market needs of the New Europe, they decided to design and implement a radically new, re-branded store concept which would be tested first in Greece and then rolled out to several countries across Central and Eastern Europe.
OCTANE supported the client in the detailed design, planning, and pilot execution of the new concept, throughout a period of eight months. Our support incorporated the assessment and design of all aspects of the store concept, including:
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The branding, layout and design of the new stores; |
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The assortment and category management of the new stores, in collaboration with the client’s purchasing and planning staff;
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The detailed marketing and communications plan for the launch and ongoing operations of the new store, with emphasis on local media and micro-marketing at the store level;
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The determination of the store pricing strategy and gross margin levels; |
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The planning of store staffing, IT infrastructure, and other operating issues in collaboration with the client’s technical experts; |
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The development of detailed Key Performance Indicators and reports that would track the store’s pilot operations and determine its performance;
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The creation of a pro-forma profit-and-loss statement which estimated store profits and return on initial investment
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The project team, which consisted of client and OCTANE staff, worked closely together for the implementation of two pilot stores located in selected Greek locations (a total investment of € 4 million).
Based on the initial concept plan and our recommendations, the store concept is estimated to have the potential to generate more than € 35 million in revenue across several Greek locations. Depending on the success of the pilot stores, it will also be launched in several Eastern European countries, where its market potential is significantly higher.
