Diaries

One of the more challenging pieces of profitably modeling involves investigating variances and gaps between the transactional data and the reported P&L figures. Generally, if the variance exceeds 1%, we’ll look into what’s driving the difference. This week, the focus is on revising our model to account for these variances.

The Accunomics team assembled at the client site today. Reviewed our objectives, deliverables, workstreams, and the client’s business. Attended presentations from the client. The team went out to a drinking dinner (!) with the entire client management team (traditional Chinese/Korean/Japanese way of getting to know each other) – great fun, although we tried our best […]

After we’ve built out an initial cut of the model, it’s time to focus on client input and validation. This will involve socializing the profitability model with key stakeholders on the client team, collecting feedback and revising the model accordingly.

Conducted interviews with client leadership. Varying levels of support for the work we’re about to do, making for some challenges we’ll need to address and overcome. Consulting is never straightforward and this engagement will not be.

It’s time for our kick-off meeting with the validation team. After reviewing the profitability modeling process with everyone, we begin to demonstrate the capabilities of the model. The client seems impressed at the detailed visibility that the model provides. They’re able to select specific sites, customers and products and view the associated P&L right down […]

We’re going to be analyzing the entire business, including marketing, pricing, discounting, contracting, as well as operating expenses and transportation. Our first step was to establish a profitability model and tie it to their historical financials as well as begin the analysis of their overall performance. The initial analysis seems pretty clear: operating expenses are […]

We meet individually with each member of the validation team to gather feedback. Each team member represents a different business area and provides specific insight into the minutia of his or her operations. We learn of more one-off adjustments that we’ll need to make in order to improve the accuracy of the model.

After the ‘blitzkrieg’ 15 week assessment the team is enjoying the down time before the implementation phase begins. We spend the majority of the week mapping out work plans and identifying dependency points between work streams. The quiet before the storm…