Sourcing, Auditing and Fixing
Whatever relationship you may have with your partner, either a client or a provider, the level of importance of it must be understood by all involved parties. The priorities might be different from both side of the pond, therefore the expected deliveries would differ from what you wish.
This is exacerbated while the contract are either long terms, a strategic factor or represents significant money.
Usual suspects are legions, such as a provider which has been to nice while contract negociation because client is a new logo and is prestigious. Another one is a client seeks costs reductions by all means and do not adopt a transparent number crunching on operational KPis nor on volumes.
Some will think bonus/malus terms are not so important as we are partners, some other says the exit clauses should not be a priority as we are all professionals etc.
The list can be long and in the last 20 years we have seen so many cases of contracts and projects that comme to a bad ends, or even worst after few months gets into such a bad governance mood ending in a complete loss of trust from both side.
The effort of Sourcing and Managing a partner, again can be from client or provider sides, is often neglected and many organisation are convinced they can handle this internally : WRONG
An audit of your contract is definitely a worth spending - hiring a skilled professional stepping back from the day to day operations will understand parties constraints and will and make them happening.
Dig.IT is fully armed with all necessary weapons to audit your contracts and make appropriate quick wins and mid terms action plan.
Experience sharing :
Dig.IT has been hired jointly by 2 major corporations (client & the provider) to audit the IT outsourcing contract they have together. This contract was signed 2 years prior and was a renewal from a previous 3 years contract.
Its annual business revenue is around 15 millions Euros and covers about 80 000 users.
Different interviews bring out the perceptions of the different stakeholders based on their experiences and implications for the IT contract.
The state of mind of the contract is positive on the whole, that is to say the quality of the human relations between the various parties involved in the two organizations is good. Dialogue is established, little is left unsaid, transparency is essential. There is great respect between the two entities. The client is a valuable and demanding customer, the provider is a skilled and innovative company.
However, the points of concern shared by all of the stakeholders are the following: innovation is not seen at all, projects seems not under control, and operational efficiency does not bring CSAT up.
Looks easy ? It is not because problems looks more subjectives than based on facts.
Dig.IT spend several weeks interviewing stakeholders from operations to executives; read hundreds of pages of reports, dashboards, contactual documents etc.
A concise and pragmatic reports was produced by us containing a view of the current situation, plus quick wins and mid term changes and expected outcomes, even new organisation models and contract updates.
Both parties retained jointly most of the recommendations provided and actioned them. It has been nearly 2 years and relationship has improved so much and numbers reflect it : more efficiency and innovative projects, CSAT has never been better.
NOW, it needs to monitored and controled until next round of contract renewal.
