Professional Service Performance Acceleration

A Service Performance Insight White Paper

Service Compass: Charting the Course to Professional Service Excellence

Professional Service Performance Acceleration™ Program

For Breakthrough Performance

September 2012

Service Performance Insight

6260 Winter Hazel Drive 25 Boroughwood Place Liberty Township, OH 45044 USA Hillsborough, CA 94010 USA

Telephone: 513.759.5443 Telephone: 650.342.4690

[email protected] [email protected]

www.SPIresearch.com

mailto:[email protected]


i

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Professional Service Challenges ................................................................................................. 1

Symptoms of Poor PS Alignment ................................................................................................ 1

Why is Benchmarking Important? ............................................................................................... 1

Professional Services Performance Acceleration Program ..................................................... 2

Goals and Benefits of the Performance Acceleration Program ............................................... 3

Representative Client Engagements ........................................................................................... 4

Proposed Engagement Approach................................................................................................ 5

Introduction to the PS Maturity Model™ ..................................................................................... 6

Service Maturity Levels ................................................................................................................. 6

Project Overview............................................................................................................................ 8

Recommendations for the PS Maturity Model™ ........................................................................ 9

Getting Started ............................................................................................................................... 9

Representative Service Performance Insight Clients .............................................................. 10

About Service Performance Insight .................................................................................... 11

Service Compass Professional Service Performance Acceleration Program™

Service Performance Insight Page 1

PROFESSIONAL SERVICE CHALLENGES

Professional service organizations (PSOs) provide one of the highest

leverage business models to quickly grow revenues and profits, but can

be the most difficult organizations to transform and change. Think about

the once great dot.com eBusiness integrators (the ants…Scient and

Viant) who launched new methodologies and penetrated the Fortune 50

almost overnight and then quickly succumbed as victims of the dot.com

bust. More recently the demise of Satyam and Bearing Point serve as a

grim reminder of the high price of failure caused by a lack of strategic

alignment.

Professional Service organizations are under tremendous pressure to

drive continuous improvement and achieve revenue and profit growth.

Running a PSO often feels like a balancing act between increasingly

challenging clients, constant financial pressure and a highly skilled but

demanding workforce.

SYMPTOMS OF POOR PS ALIGNMENT

∆ Unclear strategy o Inability to capitalize on market opportunities

o Lack of alignment

o Lack of employee engagement

o Leadership and cultural issues

∆ Poor financial performance o Revenue and margin below targets

o Poor forecasting accuracy, predictability, risk

∆ Unclear service value proposition o No leverage to drive repeat sales

o Limited competitive differentiation

o Poor sales execution

o Unclear go-to-market strategy

∆ Immature processes o Disparate systems, processes, tools

o Lack of project methods, quality, repeatability, IP

∆ Poor quality and customer satisfaction o Failed projects

o Cost overruns

o Difficulty securing references

∆ Skills imbalance o Not enough or too many people

o Excessive non-billable headcount

o Sub-par utilization, revenue per person

o Difficulty in recruiting, ramping, retaining

o Inability to quickly, easily staff projects

WHY IS BENCHMARKING IMPORTANT?

Service Performance Insight’s 2012 PS Maturity Model™ benchmark

provides a unique and quantifiable view of the profit and growth



potential that exists within every PSO, given the ability to confront

market realities, focus strategic efforts, align the full organization and

follow through with operational excellence.

Organizations begin a service transformation because they want to:

∆ Accelerate revenue and margin growth either through mergers

and acquisitions or internal process improvements;

∆ Drive alignment between the service organization and other

departments, or improve internal service organization alignment;

∆ Assimilate new groups, companies or functions;

∆ Capitalize on new markets and create new solution offers;

∆ Implement new systems and processes to improve effectiveness

and efficiency;

∆ Improve quality and client satisfaction; and

∆ Optimize sales and marketing effectiveness.

PROFESSIONAL SERVICES PERFORMANCE ACCELERATION

PROGRAM

Objective Business Planning for Breakthrough Results — in Just Six Weeks

Service Performance Insight’s Professional Service Maturity™

acceleration program will help your company align around a common

view of the highest impact areas for the PS business by helping your

executive team prioritize and focus on the most critical improvements to

drive immediate and sustained productivity and profit growth.

The PS Maturity Model™ is a strategic planning and management

framework that is used by over 6,000 service and project-oriented

organizations worldwide to align business activities to the vision and

strategy of the organization, improve internal and external

communication, and monitor service organization performance against

key performance measurements and benchmarks.

SPI’s “outside-in” industry-standard assessment helps organizations

create a strategic plan to lay the foundation for sustained productivity

and profit improvement in the years to come. SPI Research brings more

than 100 years of combined experience transforming service, sales and

marketing organizations—we are confident we can help you accelerate

your organization’s business success.

Our senior consultants will work with your leadership team to provide a

quantitative and qualitative assessment of overall service organizational

maturity. The performance acceleration program will include

recommendations for improvement and an executive workshop to

identify your company’s highest impact initiatives and establish

leadership alignment around how to get started implementing them.



GOALS AND BENEFITS OF THE PERFORMANCE ACCELERATION

PROGRAM

Given the importance of developing a high quality growing, profitable

service business, your company needs an unbiased industry-recognized

Maturity Assessment™ to give an accurate view of your company’s

service strengths and weaknesses.

∆ Provide a comprehensive assessment of your company’s service

business, using the objective PS Maturity Model™ and 2012

benchmark to diagnose areas of strength and weakness

∆ Conduct an employee engagement survey to gauge the level of

employee engagement and satisfaction while uncovering Talent

Management issues and improvement areas

∆ Use insights gleaned from confidential leadership and

stakeholder interviews to surface hidden issues and disconnects

to facilitate alignment around a shared view of PS priorities

∆ Provide recommendations for priority improvement initiatives,

based on experienced third party insight and analysis

o Quick-Start initiatives to begin immediately

o Create a short-list of strategic priorities

∆ Ensure executive support and alignment around the PS charter

and strategic business plan

∆ Facilitate executive alignment and commitment to recommended

improvements



REPRESENTATIVE CLIENT ENGAGEMENTS

Typical client projects start with a rapid PS Maturity Assessment™,

followed by in-depth strategic initiative consulting support.

Comprehensive Maturity Assessment and Employee Engagement Survey for large (over 1,000 consultants) embedded service organization formed from over 15 acquisitions. The goal of the project was to assess overall and individual practice maturity to lay the foundation for efficient integration of acquisitions. Developed a formal, prioritized PS improvement roadmap. Increased revenue from top customers. In three years the organization has gone from maturity level 1 in all areas to level 4 or 5 in all areas. Maturity advancement has translated into net profit improvement from break even to 18.1% while revenues have grown from $100M to $200M with the same size staff.

Annual Maturity Assessment of large (over 1,000 consultants) embedded service organization within a Global Fortune 20 product company. Created initial baseline global organizational maturity model in 2008 followed by comprehensive assessment of 21 global and regional business units in 2010. The global service organization used the assessment to create a 10 year strategic business plan based on advancing overall maturity by at least one level every two years. The PS Maturity Model™ forms the basis of the “balanced scorecard” for services. Within three years the organization has dramatically improved revenue, profit and strategic alignment and has implemented a global Professional Service Automation solution which has improved visibility, resource management effectiveness and billable utilization.

Annual Benchmark, Assessment and Employee Satisfaction Survey for medium size (over 400 consultants) federal government consulting firm. Developed a comprehensive assessment including an annual employee satisfaction survey to drive executive team alignment and position the firm for growth. Laid the foundation for priority improvement areas and strategic acquisition plan resulting in the successful acquisition and integration of several privately-held consulting organizations. The strategic assessment was instrumental in securing on-going investor funding.

Business Assessment to Support Venture Capital Investment in large, global 1,300 person consulting firm. Conducted stakeholder and client interviews to uncover risks and opportunities. Developed comprehensive global pricing study to uncover pricing and utilization issues and opportunities. Conducted Maturity Assessment Benchmark of four geographic practice areas. Assessment included a comprehensive technology evaluation to support IT investment. Developed comprehensive business assessment to support Venture Capitalist financial investment in the firm.

Comprehensive PS Maturity™ Program to support improving the consulting capabilities of a large, global partner network. Program includes: individual custom PS Maturity™ reports for each participating partner. Development of individualized improvement roadmaps based on PS Maturity™ reports with web-based training on all five service performance pillars. Business planning and direct SPI consulting support for top 10% of partners.



PROPOSED ENGAGEMENT APPROACH

∆ Use the PS Maturity Model ™ to assess all five Service

Performance Pillars™:

o Vision, Strategy, Leadership and Culture

o Client Relationships

o Human Capital Alignment including Employee

Engagement Survey

o Service Execution

o Finance and Operations

∆ Comprehensive review and assessment using qualitative and

quantitative techniques

o PS Maturity Model™ Diagnostic Survey

o Key Leadership Interviews compiled in Leadership

Insights workbook

o Employee engagement benchmark comparison

showcasing strengths and weaknesses

o Operational and Financial Performance Data Analysis

o Review of current strategic and operating plans

∆ Facilitate an Executive Workshop to review findings and drive

alignment around Quick-Starts and key improvement initiatives

∆ Deliver a comprehensive maturity report with benchmark

comparisons and recommended priority focus areas



INTRODUCTION TO THE PS MATURITY MODEL™

The PS Maturity Model™ benchmarks, segments and analyzes a PSO

into five distinct areas of performance that are both logical and

functional.

The five Service Performance Pillars™ which form the foundation of all

service-oriented organizations are:

1. Vision, Strategy, Leadership and Culture: (CEO) a unique

view of the future and the role the service organization will play

in shaping it.

2. Client Relationships: (Marketing and Sales) the ability to

communicate effectively with employees, partners and

customers to generate opportunities and win deals.

3. Human Capital Alignment: (Human Resources) the ability to

attract, hire, retain and motivate high quality employees and

subcontractors.

4. Service Execution: (Engagement/Delivery) the methodologies,

processes and tools to effectively schedule, deploy and measure

the quality of the service delivery process.

5. Finance and Operations: (CFO) the ability to manage services

profit and loss — to generate revenue and profit while

developing repeatable operating processes, IT applications and

management controls.

Each of these pillars defines core functions and operating processes

within a billable professional services organization. For each service

performance pillar, we have defined approximately thirty-five key

performance measurements as the basis of the PS Maturity Model™.

SERVICE MATURITY LEVELS

The PS Maturity Model™ is based on the PS industry’s leading

performance benchmark which combines financial and operations



measurements with qualitative information around the strategic vision,

strategy and alignment of the organization. It helps organizations not

only compare their current performance but also provides guidance to

move to the next level of maturity based on a balanced and focused

investment in leadership, customers, employees, processes, technology

and management controls. In order to determine the relative operational

effectiveness of each pillar, SPI Research created five maturity level

definitions:

Level 1 — Initiated "Heroic": The PSO is in its early stages;

operating processes are ad hoc and fluid. The business

environment is chaotic and opportunistic, and the focus for the

PSO is primarily new client acquisition and reference building.

Employees wear many hats and serve many roles. The primary

goal is growth.

Level 2 — Piloted "Functional Excellence": Core operating

processes have started to become repeatable. The company may

demonstrate best practices in separate functional areas or

geographies, but they have not yet been documented and

codified for the entire organization.

Level 3 — Deployed "Project Excellence": The PSO has created

a set of standard processes and operating principles for all major

service performance pillars, but renegades and hold-outs may

still exist. Systems, measurements and controls are in place.

Level 4 — Institutionalized "Portfolio Excellence": Management

uses precise measurements, metrics and controls, to effectively

manage the PSO. Each service-performance pillar is supported

by a detailed set of operating principles, tools and measurements.

Level 5 — Optimized "Collaborative": The PSO focuses on

continual improvement of all elements of the five performance

pillars. A disciplined, controlled process is in place to measure

and optimize performance through both incremental and

innovative technological improvements. Management has

Level 1 Level 2 Level 3 Level 4 Level 5

Initiated

Piloted

Deployed

Institutionalized

Optimized

Heroic

30%

Ad-hoc

Processes

Functional

Excellence

25%

Processes

start to

become

repeatable

Project

Excellence

25%

Set of

Standard

Processes

Created

Portfolio

Excellence

15%

Metrics &

Controls

are used

Collaborative

5%

Focus on

Continuous

Improvement



established both quantitative and qualitative process-

improvement objectives, and continually revises them to reflect

changing business objectives.

The maturity level definitions allow PS firms to discover areas where

they are underperforming compared to their peers. In some cases this

performance may be a result of the organization’s strategy, for instance,

de-emphasizing service margin to accentuate business growth and new

market entry. Regardless of the motives, understanding each pillar’s

relative maturity can help PS executives implement an improvement

strategy to move their organization forward.

PROJECT OVERVIEW

SPI uses a proven approach to rapidly provide qualitative and

quantitative insights and effectively identify key areas of improvement.

We will work collaboratively with your leadership team to uncover

quantitative and qualitative insights. These insights lay the foundation

for a facilitated leadership workshop to develop a shared view of

strengths, weaknesses and business plan priorities.

Following are typical activities:



RECOMMENDATIONS FOR THE PS MATURITY MODEL™

“We participated in the PS Maturity™ Benchmark survey and I must say this is

really fantastic material. The data is great but the insights are even more

valuable. I have been in PS for 30 years and run a 3,000 person organization

and this is the most comprehensive analysis of our business segment that I have

seen. Great work!”

David Klumb VP Global Professional Services Teradata

"This report is invaluable for any PS person who is responsible for either initiating a PS business or operating one at any stage of the maturity life cycle."

Alan Waitt, CABM Director Professional Services ASI Consulting North America

"Great questionnaire – just filling it out gives me many things to think about and many ideas for how to improve my business. You’re providing a great service, and I thoroughly enjoyed your report."

David Suydam President Architech Solutions

“I have read and studied the PSMM and have found it to be an extremely valuable document. I am using the 5 service performance pillars to measure our progress along the path. For us, the PSMM is an immensely valuable tool.”

Ken Simpson VP Services ACI Worldwide

“This is an extremely comprehensive study of the Professional Services industry. It provides incredible insights into the key metrics, trends and demographics of PS practices that allow you to compare you practice against others in the industry. This body of work is invaluable to anyone leading a Professional Services practice.”

Chad Williams Vice President, Services and Renewals Advent Software

GETTING STARTED

To get started, contact [email protected] or call (650)

342-4690.




REPRESENTATIVE SERVICE PERFORMANCE INSIGHT CLIENTS


Service Performance Insight (SPI Research) is a global research, consulting and training organization dedicated to helping professional service organizations (PSOs) make quantum improvements in productivity and profit. In 2007, SPI developed the PS Maturity Model™ as a strategic planning and management framework. It is now the industry-leading performance improvement tool used by over 6,000 service and project-oriented organizations to chart their course to service excellence.

SPI provides a unique depth of operating experience combined with unsurpassed analytic capability. We not only diagnose areas for improvement but also provide the business value of change. We then work collaboratively with our clients to create new management processes to transform and ignite performance. Visit www.SPIresearch.com for more information on Service Performance Insight, LLC.

© 2012 Service Performance Insight Page 11

About Service Performance Insight

Jeanne Urich, Service Performance Insight Managing Director, is a renowned author, speaker and thought leader focused on the global service economy. She is a trusted advisor and transformative and operational change consultant to senior executives of leading services organizations, helping them navigate the journey from business-as-usual to business-as-exceptional.

Prior to co-founding Service Performance Insight she was a corporate officer and leader of the worldwide service organizations of Vignette, Blue Martini and Clarify, responsible for leading the growth of their professional services, education, account management and alliances organizations.

She is the co-author of the ground breaking Professional Service Maturity Model™ benchmark used by over 5,000 project-oriented organizations to diagnose and improve their performance. She is a featured speaker and author for major software solution providers and industry associations.

She has a Bachelor’s Degree (Magna Cum Laude and Phi Beta Kappa) in Math and Computer Science from Vanderbilt University. She is a contributing author of Tips from the Trenches: the Collective Wisdom of over 100 Professional Service Leaders. Contact Jeanne at [email protected] Phone (650) 342-4690.

R. David Hofferberth, PE, Service Performance Insight Managing Director, has over 25 years’ experience in information technology (IT) serving as an industry analyst, product director and consultant. Hofferberth’s research is focused on the services economy, and in particular, on white-collar productivity issues and the technologies that help people perform at their highest capacity.

Hofferberth’s background is extensive in services performance beginning in the early 1980s, where he conducted studies on white-collar productivity in the banking, technology, energy and construction sectors. In 1999 he introduced to the market the solution area now known as Professional Services Automation (PSA), when he published the seminal report: Professional Services Automation: Increasing Efficiencies and Profitability in Professional Services Organizations.

Prior to founding Service Performance Insight he was a Senior Director at Oracle and Aberdeen Group. Hofferberth earned an MBA from Duke University and a BS in Industrial Engineering from the University of Tennessee. He is also a licensed Professional Engineer (PE). Contact Dave at [email protected] Phone: (513) 759-5443.

Carey Bettencourt, Service Performance Insight Managing Director is a management consultant who specializes in improvement and transformation for project-driven professional service organizations. She is an experienced change management leader, expert in helping clients develop high performing teams that deliver increased utilization, profit and customer satisfaction. Carey also helps PS organizations identify, clarify, and create integrated communication, marketing, and product offerings that drive market differentiation and increased sales.

Carey has over 20 years domestic and international experience with leading software companies. She was a corporate officer and the senior vice president of the customer solutions organization at Accruent, the top-ranked professional services organization for three consecutive years according to the SPI Research Maturity benchmark. Carey was also a vice president at software firms ChannelPoint and Vroom Technologies responsible for professional services, education, support, strategic alliances, and hosting services. She previously held consulting practice, business development, and strategic alliance leadership roles at Oracle and J.D. Edwards.

Carey earned a Bachelor of Arts in Economics from UC Berkeley and an MBA from Pepperdine University. Contact [email protected] Phone: (949) 521-3830.




Date post:	20-May-2015
Category:	Services
Upload:	jeanne-urich
View:	208 times
Download:	6 times