THE BACKGROUND
Our client provided a post-sale interface between the end-users of large aircraft and the supporting engineering departments of the manufacturer. When end-users exhaust their performance concerns as addressed in maintenance and repair manuals and FAQs, they would contact one of the operations centers for advanced support.
The client had multiple engineering business units throughout the organization that focused on providing clarity to advanced concerns and questions in the commercial and defense industry. The available support services, work processes, and assets differed throughout each unit, creating unnecessary friction and complexity in work processes.
Our client determined that they wanted to consolidate the scattered business units into fewer “Operations Centers of Excellence”. It presented an opportunity to integrate the best of all existing units, which would deliver improved services to end-users, and allow their engineers to cover more platform issues in the same amount of time.
As in many projects, the primary challenge was developing a cohesive solution that addressed all the business needs and could deliver on the goals.
THE QUESTION
Could we design a business model, including standard workflow, assets, and key performance indicators that improve the end user’s experience and reduce operational costs for our client’s post-sale engineering support services?
THE APPROACH
The first phase of the project focused on exploring existing documentation of the engineering process, assets, and requirements. It was the first time that someone from outside of the organization could conduct an independent analysis and deep-dive.
The initial analysis was followed by a series of workshops with all internal constituents focused on gathering deeper insights, leveraging advantages, and developing specific requirements. The sessions were instrumental as they enabled subject matter experts and their leaders to articulate the problems and needs at a much deeper level.
Freya Systems collaborated with the client’s team to dive deep into the end-users concerns and specifically identify where enterprise software integration and advanced analytics would be more effective.
RESULTS
A complete revamp of exsisting workflow architecture focused on creating an Operations Center that provided new situational awareness, intelligence-led decisions, increased efficiency, and an overall better customer experience.
THE RESULT
Our deep-dive analysis enabled the team to develop a business case that was broken down into tiers and with an entrepreneurial focus.
Freya Systems delivered an organizational design, workflow, and service architecture that would produce an advanced level of service to the client’s end-users.
The business case recommended consolidating the client’s multiple engineering support units into three operations centers of excellence that could service all end-users globally.
Several of the solved problems included:
- Providing a more consistent level of service.
- Increasing the breadth of knowledge across the entire organization.
- Leveraging the depth of expertise among some subject matter experts across all operations centers.
- Gaining the efficiency of resources.
The business case also identified opportunities for the client to provide an advanced level of service that was not available in their previous organization. As recommended in the business case, the system software integration would support advanced analytics of the aircraft as reported by end-users.
The analytics would enable engineers to predict end-users of potential problems and make proactive recommendations on maintenance and repair.
The business case projected that the client would save over $100M across ten years. In addition, they would gain operational efficiencies that were projected to save the company 10% in year one and an extra 5% in subsequent years.
