Diaries

Gave our second update. The client is becoming convinced that there is pricing dispersion and other types of “profit leaking” behavior. This indicates there is not rigor, detail, and process in pricing, leading to randomness, dispersion, and profit leaks. We’re also showing that transportation rates can be reduced via competitive bidding. Developing a relationship with […]

Preparing for the third update now, bringing in business case elements and demonstrating how much money can be saved. The client is now pushing back a bit as they don’t want to commit to a benefits number. This requires more discussions with client management. Consulting is complex and requires multiple skills ranging from analysis to […]

Delivering our third update and beginning to wrap things up. It’s time for an Accunomics tradition: building the ‘Brown Paper’ (a.k.a. the Horse Blanket). For visual effect, we’re mounting all the key PowerPoint slides from the projects on a wall-sized slab of packing paper. I was a little skeptical at first, but it really is […]

Delivering the final results. Extensive recommendations for moving forward. Have delivered the presentation to the President of the Division. Now, the whole team’s headed to the City for a final dinner and night out.

I’m meeting the Accunomics team at the client site today. About half the team has been through the assessment phase; the rest of us are joining for the delivery portion of the project. I’ll be working on Profitability Modeling along with two other team members.

I will be leading the supply chain work stream focused on developing a strategic plan for the distribution center (DC) assets. The month is spent bringing an expanded client team up to speed on the work stream goals and the overall transformation effort. There is an aura of ‘doubt’ in the air as a result […]

The workstream manager reviews the findings from the first stage of the project. He’s already built out an assessment-grade profitability model for one piece of the business. It’s built in Access, but can be manipulated for greater visibility using Excel pivot tables. One of the tenants of profitability modeling: creating a fully-loaded P&L for each […]

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…