Market entry for a multi-year managed service
Market entry for a multi-year managed service
The Challenge for the Client
Nearing the expiry of a 5-year IT comprehensive managed services agreement, the POA wanted assistance with market entry and scoping of replacement services, as well as a chance to compare the incumbent provider with current market offerings.
Structured Approach
Acert was 
recommended to the senior executive team and a meeting was held, resulting in Acert’s proposal to establish POA requirements, review the market for suitable providers and undertake an RFx process to help the POA find the best and most suitable solution provider. Workshops, interviews, documentary and financial analyses were all undertaken to develop the scope of services; a long-list of potential vendor partners was then created for receipt of an explanatory RFI designed to help the POA qualify a shorter list of potential RFP recipients who were invited to meet with the POA team for Q&A. Formal evaluation and scoring aided the process of down-selection in the Rfx process and eventually three finalists (including the incumbent) were invited to present their solutions and revised pricing proposals. We then presented joint findings to the POA National Executive Committee for the final decision.
Value to the Client
With our help, the POA has conducted a scrupulously fair and in-depth process to lower the costs of IT service provision, improve efficiency and security, and open up the opportunity for systems development and service improvement for its end users.
Market entry support for a major IT managed services procurement
Market entry support for a major IT managed services procurement
Building on Success
Analysis of the IT services and infrastructure landscape at the TUC as part of our strategy development had revealed the opportunity for a broad and holistic upgrade approach, involving consolidation of several service elements. Our recommendations for market entry were endorsed by the new vCIO and sanctioned by the TUC management team. The desired outcome would be a ‘one-stop shop’ covering WAN, secure hybrid hosting, Office 365 with Skype for Business and a managed backup/DR solution in a three to five-year agreement, with built-in benchmarking, renegotiation and termination options.
Core Strength
Managed services procurement is a core strength for Acert; we were retained to support the development of a scope document for the TUC and the vendor screening and selection, together with support for the RFx documentation and overall process. This was later extended to include a leadership role with final negotiation and contracting.
Approach
The initial vendor long-list was reduced with the help of an RFI and formal evaluation toolset that we developed. RFP participants were invited to Q&A and introductory sessions at the TUC. Final RFP responses and associated pricing were formally scored to achieve the final shortlist. We developed an ROI model to track the savings benefit through final negotiations and then supported the final negotiation and contracting process. Due to the number of service components and the varying individual terms provided by the vendor, contract negotiations were complex and highly interactive. Nevertheless, an all-encompassing agreement was made ahead of the necessary transition deadlines.
Fast, Tangible Benefits
This complex engagement process was completed over a short period at the end of 2016 and early 2017, with the transition schedule set to deliver the intended benefits over the remainder of the year. The collaboration effort across the TUC end-user base, management and IT team that we have supported and encouraged to date will soon see this large change programme delivering improved efficiency, resilience and security, together with significant first-year savings and an even larger cost reduction benefit beyond.
IT Strategy delivery projects for a national trade unions body
IT Strategy delivery projects for a national trade unions body
Building on Success
Following Acert’s strategic consultancy report for the TUC in Summer 2016, the senior executive team were keen to establish the IT steering group and appoint a part-time (virtual) Chief Information Officer, as well as to commission work on the IT risk register. Earlier analysis having revealed some onerous service agreements no longer fit for purpose, there was also an appetite to negotiate early savings where possible.
Practical Support
We established four concurrent and related projects to address the required deliverables.
First we prepared a Charter for the Steering Group, negotiating its constitution and recruiting its members.
Next we wrote a brief for the role of part-time Chief Information Officer (vCIO), researched suitable candidates, invited applications and facilitated the short-listing process for final interview by the TUC senior management team.
To manage some of the risks we identified in the earlier consultancy work, we developed an IT risk register and led the first Steering Group meeting to assign ownership of risk management and mitigation tasks to individuals. To identify and drive savings, we met with suppliers responsible for the highest spend to discuss the options and begin the process of renegotiation.
Enduring Benefits
The vCIO was appointed and is providing clear direction and leadership for all core initiatives. The Steering Group is functioning well as the IT change agency, with strong programme management underpinning its strategic and tactical decisions. The Risk Register remains at the heart of programme prioritisation and is contributing significantly to readiness for the GDPR deadline of May 2018. In-year savings were obtained from targeted key suppliers, all of whom were also invited to participate in the comprehensive managed service and Office 365 procurement resulting from another workstream in the strategic proposals.
5-year IT Strategy for a national trade unions body
5-year IT Strategy for a national trade unions body
The Challenge for the Client
As with many corporate bodies, IT at the TUC facilitates all aspects of operational organisation including infrastructure, communications and learning support. Significant change bearing on the TUC infrastructure in 2015/16 included space consolidation and office remodelling programmes, reduced government funding for Unionlearn and its associated staff shrinkage. With data security a prime driver, TUC Management Services and Administration were also keen to find improvement opportunities across the infrastructure spectrum, and benchmark the value of current support agreements.
Our Engagement
Acert was recommended to the TUC and after initial discussions and a market review by the Head of MSAD, we were invited to propose a strategic consultancy exercise to develop a three-to-five year strategy. On engagement we ran a series of workshops and an analysis of IT expenditure, looking at the key areas of value, risk, continuity, collaboration and opportunity. The resulting report was presented to the senior executive team in Summer 2016; it contained four major recommendations and seven specific project proposals, designed to address The Challenge to the Clients discovered.
Value to the Client
The report was well-received and four of the recommended projects were commissioned immediately, with two more following later in 2016/2017. The benefits of improved strategic leadership, collective working, risk mitigation and operational modernisation are already visible, together with a large £six-figure saving over the next three to five years of a comprehensive managed services engagement and Office 365 deployment.
Sales improvement in IT managed services
Sales improvement in IT managed services
The Challenge for the Client
Our client is a £100m pa managed services business. While their responses to formal RFP documents were solid and demonstrably successful, they had identified that a proportion of their sales teams often struggled to structure and write ’freeform’ sales proposals.
Building on Success
Based on successful previous engagements to update areas of their Service Catalogue and draft boilerplate proposal materials, the client asked Acert to provide training on sales writing to their regional sales teams.
We started by reviewing a number of their successful and unsuccessful sales proposals. Based on our findings, we then formulated a tailored version of our proposal training. The training itself was delivered as a half-day session added to regional sales meetings. Additional time was allocated over the following weeks to review proposals before they were published– facilitating one-to-one coaching and further developing the competency of individuals.
Value to the Client
The syllabus focussed on the practical skills required to formulate proposals that are easier to write, easier to read and that contain a clear and persuasive business case. Feedback from the client confirmed that the training has improved both the speed, quality and success of the sales team’s output.
Improving the speed to contract for CNS Group
Improving the speed to contract for CNS Group
The Client
CNS is a leading UK provider of Information Assurance and IT Security services and solutions. Its clients vary in size, from FTSE 100 and large public sector organisations to SMEs. Following significant period of growth in the size and scope of the services that it offered, CNS realised that its standard agreements needed a comprehensive overhaul.
Our Appointment
Acert was recommended by one of CNS’s business partners and was engaged to develop a completely new set of standard contracts to enable rapid business take-on for new clients, without compromising the risk profile of any party.
Four new main agreements were drafted:
- Standard Terms and Conditions
- Statement of Work for Managed Services
- Statement of Work for Professional Services
- Non-Exclusive Marketing Agreement (governing the promotion of CNS’s services by third parties)
Enduring Business Benefit
Ultimately, as a result of our engagement, the new contract model and boilerplate contract library has greatly increased the speed at which CNS is able to formally conclude commercial terms with new customers.
Cloud automation solution for a leading IT managed services company
Cloud automation solution for a leading IT managed services company
Strategy into Action
Our client needed specialist procurement help to acquire a cloud automation solution that would enable them to offer their own clients faster and more agile hosting solutions – with speed to revenue as a primary driver.
With a track record of delivering value for this client, Acert was engaged to drive the procurement project; from definition of requirements, vendor long and shortlisting, RFx content development to project management, vendor presentation and evaluation.
Value to the Client
The client’s service operations and product management teams were able to make an informed choice on the preferred solution having had the benefit of intensive exposure to the solutions in a consistent and highly comparable process.
Interim commercial management for a major international outsourcing organisation
Interim commercial management for a major international outsourcing organisation
The Challenge for the Client
Our client was struggling to find sufficient resources to provide commercial support for an influx of new bids and recent successful sales.
Based on previous successful engagements with this client, Acert was selected to provide an interim commercial manager to augment the existing commercial team. Our consultant was embedded into a series of bid teams (the majority of which were to prove successful) and was then retained to manage the contract drafting and negotiation of a £40m+ IT outsource engagement.
Retained Support
Following the success of that negotiation, our consultant was further retained as an embedded team member providing commercial oversight of the outsource transition and early stages of steady state delivery, going on to further assignments with the client thereafter.
Driving telecom savings from market aggregation
Driving telecom savings from market aggregation
Building Consensus
A key business partner made us aware that a number of organisations in the hospitality sector were in the market for new telecoms provision. We knew that there was an opportunity for significant savings improvement through collaborative aggregation. We therefore approached each organisation with the savings proposition and established the core membership of an ad hoc procurement group.
We ran a short recruitment campaign and attracted more clients to bring their requirements to the project, eventually resulting in a combined annual spend of £1.2m. Our expert associates ran a solid RFx process and bid summit negotiation over the next two months, resulting in individual agreements , with each client benefitting from the collective negotiated outcome.
Tangible Savings for all Participants
The successful bidder was a national telecoms provider with a high-quality service, excellent references and highly competitive pricing. Resulting savings ranged between 19-32%, with an overall average saving of 24% of the aggregated spend.
Transforming CEVA’s Outsourcing Model
Transforming CEVA’s Outsourcing Model
The Challenge for the Client
CEVA is one of the world’s leading logistics and supply-chain management companies and has over 40,000 employees spread across more than 160 countries. With a long history of outsourcing its IT Infrastructure and applications support services in a piecemeal fashion, CEVA wanted to transform all its arrangements into a single global managed services agreement. In addition, it sought to move away from all existing input-based charging models, replacing them with an outcome-based, solution oriented contract.
Complex Scope
Acert was selected by the Global Infrastructure CIO to drive the commercial aspects of the project.
Working closely with the global infrastructure central procurement teams we supported the development of the initial business case and obtained a green light to effect the reform. Using the agreed design principles, we then developed the global outsource support agreement. Detailed RACI matrices were developed across all key service areas for inclusion in the contract, along with comprehensive governance processes, a detailed Service Level and Service Credit regime, continuous improvement obligations, and audit and benchmark processes.
Tangible Business Benefits
Acting as commercial lead, Acert directed supplier negotiations leading to a successful outcome for all parties. The contract model and negotiation process secured an improved quality of service from the supplier together with substantial business efficiency improvements derived from centralised visibility and control, delivering close to €1m savings per annum.