Digital and Process Transformation for Nigeria’s Fast-Growing FMCG Company

Workforce Transformation: Digital Enablement and Process Optimization

Our client is a fast-growing fast-moving consumer goods (FMCG) company in Nigeria with a mix of over 1,000 employees working off-site and on-site. To continue on its growth trajectory, the client needed to get past the inefficiencies caused by several fragmented and manual processes. By reimagining the processes and technology relevant to the client’s operations, Pointton was able to streamline and automate relevant processes which were critical to the future state ways of working. Part of this journey was a tailored change management which seamlessly prepared the teams for process and new technology adoption, with the goal of improving efficiency and building resilience into the client’s operations.

Situation

The operating model of our client was largely manual; hence, not tapping into the efficiency delivered by process optimization and automation. The major issues include:

• Very low technology appetite and skill gaps, as employees were both critical of how to adopt the new technology and how their jobs may be negatively impacted.
• Limited insights and process visibility, as employees lacked real-time visibility on task progress, as well as insights needed by business leaders for decision-making.
• Manual processes across business operations, leading to delays, effort duplication, and inconsistencies in service delivery.
• Outdated and unstructured knowledge repository: many knowledge articles, standard operating procedures (SOPs) and other documentations meant to provide guidance on process execution are either outdated or do not provide a seamless guidance on end-to-end process completion; hence, this creates inconsistent experiences and too many process clarification requests.
• Employee burnout from too much workload with little business impact.
• Increasing employer cost; i.e., hiring more people to do more manual work.

Our Solution

Recognizing the client’s need to transform their workforce and processes, we designed and implemented a digital and process transformation program designed to align people, processes, and technology around measurable business outcomes. The project spanned four (4) major phases, delivering improved process efficiency, automation and adoption, including an average time-saving of 0.15 FTEs annual hours per employee, while delivering a solution built on agility, resilience and future-readiness.

1. Discovery and Current State Assessment

As part of this phase, we mapped existing workflows and conducted process audit to determine current ways of working, their efficiency, accuracy, compliance and overall value-add. By taking a holistic view at these processes, including their dependencies and downstream impacts, we were able to understand how value is being created within the business. This also led us to identifying automation opportunities within each process and between linked processes to create a seamless experience for employees and leaders. In addition, we assessed the capabilities and readiness of our client’s workforce (including the business units) to embrace the new ways of working which is significantly technology-enabled. Our approach during this phase was to partner with all stakeholders (including employees) to gain their buy-in into the current challenges, as well as the solutions. This partnership/collaboration subsequently helped us in driving more efficient change management and adoption.

2. Design

During the design phase, we developed a workforce transformation roadmap aligned with our client’s business priorities. Part of this phase is the design of the future state processes with efficiency, automation, resilience and agility in mind. It captured the end-to-end processes; showing how value is realized, as well the role of all stakeholders in the future state and how performance is measured to ensure future state goal realization. Going into the future state where various automations would be leveraged means bridging the gap between current and future state digital skills of employees; hence, during the design phase, we developed a competency framework which will help employees transition to the new ways of working.

3. Implementation

We executed the workforce transformation project using agile and scalable method by deploying the automation solutions as part of the end-to-end process improvement, ensuring we capture process-related SLAs and risk management controls (i.e., escalation, support request, etc.). We also delivered structured and role-based workshops, training programs and demo sessions to more than 1,000 employees, with focus on overall digital literacy and tool-specific learning. This ensured that employees became more technology savvy, while also gaining the required knowledge to use the new tools being introduced as part of the automation. Part of this implementation phase was the creation of knowledge articles and SOPs detailing the new processes and technology, as well as the creation of a central repository where these materials can be accessed by all employees. We also introduced a comprehensive change management strategy which involved targeted and continuous communication, ensuring stakeholders are informed, coached and supported as we transition to the future state.

4. Ongoing Monitoring and Optimization

We set up a feedback process, as well as support channels to ensure that we capture and manage concerns and recommendations needed for ongoing improvement. One of Pointton’s methods involved ongoing workflow and performance tracking; hence, we set up performance dashboards for KPIs visibility (including any accompanying SLA), as well as custom reports that could be generated for various processes. The goal was to gain insight necessary for decision-making, and for this, we provided ongoing coaching to team and business leaders on how to make data-driven decisions using the dashboards and reports. By continuously monitoring performance, we identified gaps (areas of inefficiency or opportunity) and supported our client in managing continuous improvement in partnership with client’s employees whose capacity to deliver value and sustain/manage the new ways of working is continuously enhanced.

The Impact

Through parallel process redesign, digital enablement, as well as very efficient and tailored change management, Pointton delivered a solution that helped the client achieve higher levels of efficiency, knowledge internalization, resilience and agility needed to grow in the digital era. Within one (1) year, our client recorded:

• 70% reduction in process clarification email requests, achieved through process simplification and visibility to all employees. This was an additional time-saving for those who responded to such requests, allowing them to focus on their core responsibilities.
• Improved organizational effectiveness, including service consistency and customer satisfaction, achieved through process standardization, knowledge management and ongoing tracking of process adoption.
• Increased employee satisfaction scores for processes efficiency, standing at 72% compared with 30.5% before the Pointton-led transformation initiative. This was achieved through process optimization and simplification, digital enablement (including digital skills), as well as co-ownership with employees in the entire transformation journey.
• 68% of employees now feel confident about process knowledge, including the usage of the enabling technology, achieved through well-documented and clarified processes, demo sessions and ongoing support on the usage of the new technology.
• 35% reduction in process cycle times, meaning faster process completion, time-saving and increased workforce productivity. This was achieved through simplified process workflows, automation and change management.
• Enabled a culture of continuous improvement across the business; ensuring that every employee is a co-owner in the innovation and efficiency journey.

The Client’s statement in a nutshell

The project with Pointton was a gamechanger for our operations, bringing with it a very structured approach and expertise in workforce management and process efficiency. They did not only digitize our processes, they also simplified the workflows and reshaped how our employees work. We are now more empowered, efficient and purposeful with the way we approach our work.