Improve Decisions :: Impact Relationships :: Transform Businesses
Mercor Consulting is an analytical business consultant that provides business analytics in four broad areas, all of which are strongly related to organisational and project success. These services are often employed in alliances and other forms of relationship contracting as they are as key to success in projects just as they are key to organisational success. Our aim is to improve decisions, impact relationships, and thereby transform businesses.
Good Governance and Leadership is essential for the success of any organisation. In addition to organisational governance and leadership, any process, initiative or project undertaken by an organisation should be carried out within a structured governance framework and under strong leadership.
Historically management level initiatives have had a poor success rate with implementation and sustainability within an organisation. The failure of management initiatives can often be attributed to poor Governance and Leadership, similarly poor project outcomes can regularly be attributed to poor Governance and Leadership.
Good Governance and Leadership is a critical foundation to every human and business endeavour. Good Governance and Leadership requires the right people with the right skills including, vision, influence, ownership, decision making, accountability & responsibility, processes & systems, risk management, etc.
The role of governance is to provide leadership for a project or initiative within a framework of prudent and effective controls which enables risk to be assessed and managed. Governance and Leadership is responsible for setting strategic aims, ensuring that the necessary financial and human resources are in place to meet objectives and review management and initiative/project performance. Governance and Leadership is responsible for setting values and standards and ensuring that obligations of stakeholders are understood and met.
We all understand how critical Governance and Leadership is for an organisation or a nation. What we have often failed to recognise organisationally is that every major initiative, whether it be a project or a new business system requires good Governance and Leadership for it to be successful both in its implementation and its continuance. When Governance and Leadership is absent initiatives fail and projects deliver poor business outcomes. Good management and good leadership are not the same. Initiatives and projects with good management can still fail if they are not conducted under the auspices of good Governance and Leadership.
Good Governance and Leadership is required at every level of the organisation, for example, board, executive management, senior management, major project, and business initiatives and systems. Our work in Governance and Leadership is most often associated with major project and business initiatives that we are engaged in by our clients.
Mercor works with its clients to develop appropriate governance structures and frameworks to ensure the success of organisational initiates and projects. We assist in the development of vision which is the essential element of leadership. We work with our clients to formulate and implement effective communication frameworks to communicate vision in a compelling way. We facilitate the development of the key requirements for good Governance and Leadership being ownership accountabilities responsibilities processes and systems.
Some of the services that Mercor typically provide in this area include: Facilitating strategic and business planning activities, to assist clients to develop a clear direction for the business or business unit. Designing governance frameworks for corporate initiatives and major projects. Facilitating vision development and communication. Facilitating governing values and principles development. Assisting with strategic decision making using decision making processes and tools. Assisting with defining roles, accountabilities and responsibilities. Designing and developing governance processes and systems designed to manage risk and performance. Facilitating risk management studies. Providing coaching and mentoring for young leaders and fledging businesses. Providing leadership training.
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Improving the levels of collaboration and enhancing teamwork leads to exceptional performance.
Improving the levels of collaboration and enhancing teamwork in any environment is essentially a transition management exercise. It is stating that we want to move individuals and teams away from the current level and approach to working and transition them to a new level and a new way of doing things. If we define culture as the way we do things around here, then clearly we wish to modify or institute a new culture as 'we want a new way of doing things around here'.
Mercor views collaboration as a process of participation through which people, groups and organizations work together to achieve desired results, whereas teamwork is the joint action by a group of people, in which each person subordinates his or her individual interests and opinions to the unity and efficiency of the group.
The most effective teamwork occurs when all team members harmonize their contributions and work towards a common goal. Individuals are important however, effective and efficient teamwork goes beyond individual accomplishments. Teambuilding is about getting people to work as a team rather than as individuals.
Mercor works with teams and organisations to enhance and improve their levels collaboration and teamwork. We use structured transition management frameworks and processes, teambuilding, and collaboration tools. In every instance these tools are applied in an environment where context and purpose is clearly articulated and understood to provide a basis and purpose for the transition or change desired. We provide the knowledge and expertise to guide, strengthen and sustain positive outcomes. We use structured analytical processes and techniques to map and then transition a team from its current state to its desired future state.
Change is a shift in the external environment. Transition is an internal, three-phase, psychological re-orientation people go through in coming to terms with change. It starts with an ending, goes through a neutral zone, and finishes with a new beginning.
Transition Management refers to the people side of the change process. It involves:
- Helping people let go of old behaviours, values, procedures, mindsets, etc. that are no longer relevant or appropriate;
- Developing strategies to successfully navigate through the chaos and confusion between the old and new; and
- Ensuring the new way of doing things is successfully engaged throughout the organization.
Our work typically involves commencing with a ‘culture print’ survey to understand and define the current levels of collaboration and teamwork. We then develop the vision of the desired future state, (change) and then map the processes that will be employed to transition the team’s behaviour.
Mercor also employs tools such as the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI) assessments to identify how people perceive the world and make decisions, Blue sheets to aid in the process of problem framing and other tools and methods to fully understand team dynamics, the people in the team, and create a cohesive environment that creatively harnesses the collective thoughts and energy of the group.
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Strategic relationships are built whenever important products and services are procured.
Strategic Procurement exists whenever an organisation seeks to acquire a project, a service, a product, or a commodity that has strategic significance or importance to it. The need to procure a strategic project or service gives rise to a challenging business exercise. Such exercises should be approached with rigour and well structured processes.
Strategic procurement encompasses any procurement activity of significant importance to an organisation, for example, supply chain management, delivery strategy development for major projects, relationship contracting mechanisms and processes.
The process used for Strategic Procurement is designed to ensure that the organisation’s needs, issues and risks are effectively managed and that the best qualified supplier is selected for the supply. Strategic Procurement often gives rise to strategic relationships. A strategic relationship may exist either within an organisation or between organisations. They exist whenever a product, service or commodity is being supplied that has significant potential to damage the organisation in some form if the supply is delayed, not affected or increases in cost.
Our services span the full spectrum of activities required by strategic procurement. Mercor works with its clients to plan, design, implement and manage strategic procurement and contracting processes. We work with project teams to design selection processes and prepare selection process documentation. We have extensive experience in alliance contracting for projects and operational and maintenance requirements. Our extensive experience also extends to ECI and other forms of relationship contracting as well as more traditional forms of contracting.
We regularly work with client organisations to design and implement strategic procurement processes and with contractor and service providing organisations to prepare winning proposals for the strategic procurement needs of client organisations.
We regularly assist our clients by facilitating the selection of suppliers, contractors and partners using innovative face-to-face work-shopping techniques designed to kick-start relationship development and project understanding. We assist in planning the selection process, including, the detailed schedule for managing the procurement process.
We develop and establish a strong sense of alignment in readiness for an integrated team approach for strategic relationships. We work with executive and management teams to develop commercial models, values, principles and goals that will be used to align all parties and personnel. We coach senior managers in their governance role, aiming to establish a thorough and mature understanding of the commercial arrangement. Often these arrangements employ open book target cost concepts with carefully crafted risk and reward sharing components.
We continuously work with integrated client/supplier or client contractor teams to analyse joint processes, measure process performance and improve processes, and where necessary, provoke ‘breakthrough’ thinking to explore innovative solutions that go far beyond Business as Usual. We assist with implementation and work with project teams as facilitators to ensure that working relationships are developed and maintained. We encourage clients to conduct continuous ‘Health Checks’ and ‘Lessons Learned’ activities to facilitate problem solving and team development.
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Rising to the challenge of business excellence ensures sustainability and competitive advantage.
Mercor’s approach to business excellence is to facilitate an integrated approach to leadership and management that is based on proven practices for delivering outstanding outcomes and long-term sustainability. Business excellence is an enterprise-wide concept and embraces core business capabilities and processes in the areas of: leadership; strategy and planning; data, information and knowledge; people; customer and market focus; innovation, quality and improvement; and success and sustainability.
Mercor works with clients that have embarked on the journey for excellence and assists them to develop the systems, processes, culture, environment, measurement and reporting requirements for delivering sustained business excellence over the long-term. Organisations embark on the journey for excellence for a number of reasons including:
- Establishing visionary and inspirational leadership;
- Ensuring organisational sustainability;
- Developing a competitive edge;
- Improving financial performance;
- Driving innovation in products and services;
- Enhancing the organisations capacity to deal with change;
- Improve organisational effectiveness and capability;
- Improve systems and processes;
- Increase productivity and reduce costs; and
- Focus on customer satisfaction.
Business excellence is driven by the desire to achieve specific strategic outcomes. It is underpinned by performance measurement and continual improvement. It operates through a framework that is comprehensive. Commencing the journey is a change imposed on an organisation. This change necessitates a transitioning of people from the current way of doing things to a new way of working.
Organisations embracing business excellence understand that their approach to delivering products and services is not sufficient in itself. They are also concerned with the deployment of their approach and the results achieved through the approach and its deployment. Further, they are vitally interested in how they can continually improve their approach and its deployment so that their results will continue to improve.
Implementing business excellence is not an all or nothing endeavour. It can be applied in parts to suit an organisations needs and budget. Mercor works with its clients to understand their most pressing needs and then design and implement the processes, management and measurement systems to support the initiative. We also work with the people to educate and transition them from the old to the new. In short, we provide a comprehensive business excellence and transition management undertaking to support organisations that are on the business excellence journey.
Our approach to delivering business excellence initiatives is to:
- Develop organisational knowledge of the business excellence framework and principles;
- Understand the organisational need and the extent of the business excellence journey required;
- Assess organisational performance;
- Design and implement improvement initiatives; and
- Facilitate transition management and provide training.
Mercor values creativity and innovation and explores avenues for creative problem solving and innovative enhancement for organisational needs. Mercor is a leading innovator in setting up procurement processes, selecting proponents for major projects, and establishing cultures that promote excellence and outstanding outcomes in projects. One of our recent creative and innovative successes was to develop contractor selection processes for major projects that incorporate business excellence elements in the selection process.
We deliver significant quantities of services to major projects for clients, contractors and to alliances. Mercor is committed to continually raising the bar, improving, and finding better ways of delivering exceptional project and business results. Business excellence frameworks and principals are one element that facilitate achievement of these objectives. We pioneered the use the Business Excellence Framework (BEF) principles in alliances for performance management and measurement. We have pioneered the use of BEF principles in more traditional contracts and linked the outcomes of performance management and measurement to real financial outcomes with outstanding success.
When business excellence frameworks and principles are adopted in an alliance, everything that the alliance does will be geared towards excellence, it is imperative that the alliance has a thorough understanding of the things that promote organisational excellence in the longer term. These things need to be embedded in the alliance culture. This will give the alliance the best possible chance of achieving its objectives and the outstanding outcomes that it is working towards.
Mercor provides self-assessment tools and health checks that can be customised to suit the requirements of the alliance to monitor its performance in key result areas, its cultural success and its overall health.
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