Case Studies
An Offshore Bank: Capacity Modeling
Client contact: Programme Director
Parkwell staff: 2 consultants
Our client, an offshore retail bank, is part of a UK group that had recently been acquired by a European group. The new owners had started a group-wide cost cutting programme which involved rationalising processes and systems. Their strategy was to get the entire group working with common platforms and processes with a view to drive out inefficiencies.
Our client had to achieve a cost reduction target of 40%, largely through redundancies. In order for this to take place, and to prove the business case for the programme, a capacity model needed to be developed that would help the programme director and the board of directors see if the benefits were achievable and to make decisions about how the programme of change should be implemented.
The development of the model took place in parallel with the design of new ‘to be’ processes.
Anticipated benefits
- A thorough analysis of the ‘as is’ processes and current FTE (full time equivalent) head-count.
- Insight into the effects of different options for change.
- Indications for potential courses of action to achieve the benefits, such as optimising the order for systems implementation, process mapping, organisational redesign and so on.
- A tool that can be easily modified and developed into a business planning tool.
Scope and boundaries
Those parts of the business that were in scope for the model included treasury, risk management, operations and customer services, finance, product development and sales. Areas that were out of scope included IT, HR, marketing, executive and secretariat.
These values were then to be mapped in an end-user defined process map to ‘To be’ processes, taking into account anticipated improvements driven by the various initiatives in the programme, adding back time for holidays sick and slack, providing an indication of potential savings based on end-user choices about what would be included or excluded from the programme.
This work involved extensive analysis and liaison with stakeholders working at all levels at the client.
- A completed model
- Documentation fully describing the model in terms of its operation, structure and maintenance.
Project conclusion
The model was exceedingly illuminating and has provided the programme, the board of directors and the parent company with far more indications about their options than they had originally anticipated.
The model challenged many senior business managers because of the nature of the changes that it indicated may be achieved.
The model was passed onto the UK group business planning team for independent validation and has been described as robust, thorough and reliable. It has been accepted by the business and has exceeded its requirements.