| ||||||
|
Persisting With Transformation Tom Donaher, Executive Director, Consulting Services, Telcordia
However, in the circumstances, the case for scaling back ambitious programs is still appreciable. Some 50% of all revenues still come from voice today, but even service providers heavily dependent on voice must respond with programs to streamline operations and drive out costs. Of more concern for many is the widening gap between the increasing amount of mobile bandwidth demanded by customers, and the incremental price they are willing to pay for it. On top of these, there are fundamental structural factors in play for many operators, with the potential to render strategic initiatives obsolete, such as the separation of retail and wholesale businesses, enforced (or resisted) by governments and regulators, or the opportunity to outsource network and operations entirely. The stakes are high, and so programs of change that are, of necessity, fundamentally challenging are vital to continue to drive through. But when so much can change with a project so quickly, how do we persist? What stops last year’s strategic initiative turning into this year’s “regrettably cancelled” program? The persistence to keep pushing forward with inevitably challenging programs is vital to the evolution of telecom, never more so than now. But persistence is about more than just keeping your head down and sticking to a project plan. It means being aware of the continuously changing business requirements, program structures, and taking inspiration from a long term vision. Keeping the Bases Covered Where there is uncertainty, executive management return to basic priorities: what initiatives can be clearly seen to be eliminating costs? What initiatives will help improve the flow of cash? And from a practical point of view – what initiatives will dramatically increase our capacity for handling data? Cost elimination in telecom remains important, even though you could be forgiven for thinking that telecom was indeed now fully automated. One of the key concepts in the well-documented lean production system is that perfect efficiency and zero waste is an unending aspiration that is still necessary to pursue. This shift in thinking, from acceptable levels of failure to seeking and eliminating the causes of failures and waste (the “five whys”), is a shift that is still required in telecom. In larger or older organizations especially, there is certainly still scope for overlooked savings. One service provider helped by our Consulting group to explore and re-engineer their service delivery process discovered that the resources used had been misallocated by 50%. In other words, the amount of effort actually being used was twice that accounted for in management reports. Persistence means keeping a look out for the opportunity to improve. By optimizing their technology selection and deployment strategy, we helped a European carrier save over 25% of their planned network investment. By maintaining the aspiration of perfection, we can continue to make practical steps towards it, and continuing to identify, automate or eliminate manual effort. Telcordia’s driving vision of 100% flow-through in operations means we’re always looking for ways to improve the manual parts of any process – including seeking out ways to automate the handling of order fallout when it does occurs. Telcordia’s intimate involvement in evolving the telecom operations of the world’s largest carriers over decades has given us a unique insight into not only how individual processes work, but also how they work together. In fulfillment, Telcordia’s persistence to implement a real world “Service Factory,” capable of turning a continuous flow of new product ideas all the way to delivered services, led us to develop much more comprehensive and cleaner design, accommodating the roles of service catalog, order management and workflow. Some operators have reached a critical stage in convergence: merging wireless and wireline operations entirely. Perhaps it is somewhat inevitable that wireless arms spun off from fixed-line incumbents to raise capital are now being merged with fixed line operators again in an effort to gain greater flexibility, efficiencies, and broader range of market offerings. This puts existing programs of transformation into jeopardy, as companies work to restructure, and try to identify the right path forward for common versus distinct systems and processes. The programs worth pursuing are those that clearly articulate how they support the aims of three interdependent domains: Services, Network, and Operations (encompassing IT). The convergence of fixed and mobile Operations and IT groups can present a challenge to established processes. There is in reality a natural sequence of need to these three: the need to offer new or different services drives change in the network, which in turn drives the requirements of supporting systems. And the sort of change that convergence presents is much harder to persist with if the relationships between IT, Ops and Network are not fully understood. Changes to the provisioning process (operations) can be small, but the effect on the network can be dramatic. Revisiting the Business Case One firm we’ve been working with recently were acquired by new owners. This created a degree of uncertainty within the company; especially in one key area with major capital spend requirements: their plans for fiber rollout. In common with the rest of the industry, they knew they needed to be making some commitment on fiber even if the details were not finalized (e.g., access architecture). Although they had carried out limited trials of FTTC, their approach was backed by a clear business case. All the same, on what terms would new ownership persist with the plans? The program already started was based on stepwise progression, and incremental delivery, and is continuing today as trials of FTTH, with more detailed work on the guidelines for rolling out fiber going hand-in-hand with new value being created by the investment. Telcordia’s Persisting Vision We believe that persistence backed by practical business benefits and informed by an aspirational vision -- while being responsive to the interdependent needs of Operations, Network and Services teams -- is a key quality for progress in telecom today. We believe in a future for telecom that is connected, affordable, universal. A future that is secure, enriching and enabling. With imagination, focus and persistence, the potential of telecom can be realized. For more information, please contact Tom Donaher, Executive Director, Consulting Services, Telcordia at tdonaher@telcordia.com or visit our website. Tom is part of a team of experts that have helped plan, design and build the world's largest, most complex telecom networks for nearly three decades. That experience gives Telcordia a unique perspective on the challenges you face, so you can avoid common pitfalls, seize opportunities quickly, and realize the potential of telecom.
Email Tom |
||||||
|
| ||||||
Telecom still has to change. Almost all operators need to make significant change to the way they do business in order to avoid losing control of their own destiny. The transformation programs underway – many initiated or funded by governments – expect to deliver multiple percentage point gains in Gross Domestic Product. Individual companies are looking for transformations to improve free cash flow. A figure of a $100m increase is typical among firms working with Telcordia.
