Straight from the Client

Consulting Experiences and Observed Trends

Carsten Fabig, Alexander Haasper, Vineyard Management Consulting GmbH

• Publisher: Books on Demand
• Year: 2017
• Print ISBN:
  9783746036670
• Edition: 1
• eBook ISBN:
  9783746003962
• Topic: Business
• Subtopic: Management
• Index: Business

The challenges of our customers are more and more diverse. A couple of strong trends like digitalization and cyber security issues are facing the daily life of all of us. This is true for our business and private life. That "People make a difference" is a strong Vineyard belief. Therefore, in this book the Vineyard consultants are interviewed in order to present their individual consulting experiences.As a starting point the current customer challenges and consulting trends are summarized. A contribution towards the GDPR deadline and approaches how to deal with these changes is following. The next article is suggesting how to handle the need in the pharmaceutical industry to communicate with business partners beyond the firewall. Based on Vineyards long experience in the IT Cyber Security world the following article is emphasizing why security is priority zero and how IT Security standards and frameworks can be used in a beneficial and lean way.The following two articles have a strong technical focus. While the first one is introducing the new technology "Summarizer" which is capable to compress existing files from a content perspective the following is about what an agile methodology can deliver in the field IT Service Management.The benefits of a focused eDiscovery approach for litigation processes are discussed in another contribution. How transitional changes for companies as a result of Brexit for example can be managed is following. Risk management in the cyber field for the banking industry and leading in projects are two interviews that reflect typical customer challenges. How to set-up an electronic archive as part of a digitalization initiative is outlined in an expert interview for the insurance industry. The benefits of a focused eDiscovery approach for litigation processes are discussed in another impulse. An interview about knowledge management is closing this book. As a key component for the customer in a knowledge society it is discussed how this can be approached for a consultancy.If you focus your deep dives you can also see the little things in a broader context.We wish our readers inspiring insights and new impulses to find the individual balance between the right deep dives and the ability for the helicopter view. Many thanks again to all Vineyard colleagues contributing to this new Vineyard book.

Alexander Haasper

Consulting Trends

I. Consulting Trends

1 Customer Challenges

The European consulting market is a growing business as the last 5 years are showing an increase of more than 5 percent per year. The 2016 turnover increase of 7,9% in Germany is an outstanding segment with a total market size of 9,3 billion (Mrd.) EUR. The stable economic environment and the digitalization across all industries are the main market drivers. In particular, the market as well as strategy consulting is also growing continuously. This is still a huge heterogeneous segment where the customer is supported by consultancies in various roles to drive the implementation of their strategic programs. The IT outsourcing business is of course growing as a result of cloud technology.

Looking from a customer perspective there are some major trends that are important to characterize the current customer situation. This should also inform consulting companies as to how they should enhance and sharpen their portfolio.

Digitalization means business model transformation

Digitalization has become a game changer. New competitors have already entered markets that have been stable for decades. Of course, the most prominent example is Google, an internet age company that has entered the automotive sector with their mobility services and autonomous driving competence. However, the majority of the companies have only just started to restructure as a result of digitalization. Across all areas of digitalization change management and business model transformation are required as this has a huge impact customer interaction and service delivery management from an organizational point of view.

The true potential for digitalization does not lie in one singe business line as today the majority of the organisations are in a near optimum state regarding the specific business line processes. The potential is in the orchestration and automation across business lines. Therefore, digitalization requires organisational transformation. The promises of artificial intelligence (AI) are high. But the implementation of this technology will take much longer as many of the protagonists are currently forecasting. The main reason are the risks related to applications of AI. As a consequence, all decisions supported by AI require a clear organizational setup and rules how to deal with risks and critical situations when the human staff needs to stepin for AI.

Data protection requires to manage the business records

The General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) in the European Community requires companies to manage their records and enable deletion of individual data, based on pre-defined retention periods and, in certain circumstances, at customer request. The challenge is that the majority of the IT systems has never been designed to fulfil deletion requirements. Also for unstructured data e.g. on Microsoft SharePoint sites and file share systems the amount of data is a big and growing issue that companies need to get under control. The requirement to manage business records is not new one as a lot of regulated industries need to be compliant with law and regulation demanding minimum retention periods, some requirements of which date as far back as the 50s. The big challenge today is replication and copying of data to other contexts which has increased the amount of data tremendously. Besides the sheer volume of data there is also an issue with old or historic systems. There is often a lack of available know-how with these systems.

IT security needs to defend the company against cyber security threads

IT security is getting rising up the CEO’s and CISO’s agenda in the majority of companies, even those that are not heavily regulated. Security awareness has increased over the last couple of years due to the potential impact of malware like WannaCry or the risks related to direct hacker attacks. The main challenges for the customers are to deal with the different business stakeholders and regulatory bodies regarding cyber risks as well as manage a variety of relevant technologies and their operations effectively around the weakest links in the chain. The big challenge still facing the CISOs of the Mittelstand (Small and Medium sized Enterprises – SMEs) and the traditional industrial companies is that IT, and in particular IT Security, often does not have the appropriate importance in the organisation compared to Sales, Sourcing and Production.

Project management at high maturity level is a must-have transformation skill

In the majority of the companies the maturity of project management has increased significantly in the last decade. Even in industries where project managers have been hired from the external market there is a trend to staff projects more and more from the internal market. However, when it comes to strategic projects it is still a struggle to find the right people. The agile project hype is still relevant, however the companies are currently learning in which areas the agile approach is feasible and where it has to be combined with more traditional methods.

Although discussed for more than a decade, complexity management is a consulting topic the majority of the companies still do not want to buy or integrate in their day-to-day project management business. However, any organization has to deal with increasing complexity in a world becoming more and more digital and meshed.

Summary and Recommendations

Overall, the need for strong, solution orientated, including reliant, project delivery for consultants and companies is greater than it has ever been before. All strategic projects and disciplines require very skilled and experienced staff that harder and harder to find. On the one hand, more and more standard IT solutions help to not reinvent the wheel. On the other hand, the more complex topics require end-to-end and cross-organizational solutions which involves managing a variety of stakeholders and the interdependent aspects of strategic projects.

The majority of well established companies have not yet changed the organizational structures and daily work culture significantly: Agile approaches are mostly project or program specific, IT oriented projects are more open minded for the working environment for young talented software engineers, but often have missed to adjust the next management level, customer business attitude and parameters for a successful working relationship with these new IT teams.

The lack of skilled resources as a result of the high demands of the trends above is both an opportunity and a risk. As it is unlikely to find a perfect team from a subject matter skill perspective, the opportunity is to develop the relevant skills on the job and drive team and organizational development through long term partnerships and cooperation with consultancies that support new successful ways of working.

2 Question and Answers

Vineyard: Alexander, what has been the point in your CV when your fascination for consulting started?

Alexander: As a computer scientist with business administration focus from my studies I have started my career as a junior consultant in a small IT management consultancy in Wiesbaden in 1999. From the beginning with my more technical focus at that point in time I have been more than surprised and impressed that the efforts to create transparent concepts that can fly and finally get implemented in the customer organizations are so huge – and sometimes consulting seemed more like an art than fact based analysis. So I was very keen to take a much broader approach to develop my skills beyond IT management starting with process management and eBusiness development focused on projects in the financial sector. Of course, I was fascinated by the promising business models in the internet 1.0 age and on the other hand sceptical regarding the development of the consulting sector.

And then, yes to be honest it was more or less a biographical accident. In 2001 that company went bankrupt mostly as a result of the hard landing of the internet hype and a lacking ability for a quick change in the organization. Due to my fascination and a couple of inspiring colleagues I was convinced to continue as a self-employed consultant to set-up a new company for Management Consulting.

Vineyard: What has changed in general over the last 20 years in the consulting business?

Alexander: When I look back at the last nearly 20 years of my consulting experience there are a couple of new drivers and new parameters significantly influencing the consulting business. However, when thinking about what remains the same I can say: overall the nature of the business to effectively communicate with customers and help them with their strategical focus and orientation, conceptual problems or even operational setup.

As Vineyard is serving customers of various industries I think besides the classic industry culture and attitude the market pressure varies significantly across the branches with deviating profits and very different capabilities to change the organisation and business models. While the firms in a destructive competition market like telecommunications and banking need to focus more and more on cost reductions, the more Mittelstand or niche players can develop more focussed, flexible models by combining their way and intense of working together with consultancies. In particular the cost saving companies have learned to be more and more strict to push day-rates down for the senior and junior consultant skill level.

Overall the market is getting more and more transparent with increasing power for the purchasing departments compared to the customer line businesses. Last but not least to mention is the increasing dynamic: although it is even harder to find the right people the customers are less likely (?) to exchange consultants or stop projects where there is inappropriate project staffing.

Vineyard: What has been for you as a Management Consultant the most significant change?

Alexander: The answer is not so easy because as I mentioned there are a couple of game changers, although the key to consulting success and benefits for the customer remains the same. But overall a short answer really depends on my role. As a managing director of Vineyard Management Consulting the most significant change is to find the right people. That topic has always been a hard business but the current employee market and trends like the expectations of the so-called generation-Y is making it even harder. The solution is to be more open-minded for a diverse approach and to make people a top management priority.

As a Management Consultant in our customer projects the most significant impact has come of course a result of the increased experience. On average the responsibility to deliver has increased over years in terms of the management level I am working with or the complexity of the concepts or solutions we design and deliver has significantly increased.

Vineyard: Digitalization is happening in these days with increasing velocity. But a lot of the buzzwords seem to be old friends. So what is really new from your perspective?

Alexander: As business models and the patterns how the business value chains fit together are changing with increasing speed based on internet technologies digitalization is more than a trend. What happened to Kodak for example in Stuttgart can be seen directly besides the Daimler headquarters on the other side of the Rhine River. Instead of thousands there are only dozens of employees. The old film business for cameras in the affordable segment in the consumer market has been mostly replaced by smartphones. And at Daimler the fear not to compete with the new competitors like Tesla has of course already started the fight for new products and the transformation of the organization. The most significant drivers for the next waves of digitalization are the increasing number and reachability of industry 4.0 internet devices e.g. as part of new smart-homes and the more mature artificial intelligence solutions. The impact as well as the opportunities for new services and business models are tremendous. You can say that there is nothing new as over the last 25 years internet capabilities and business models have reached our daily life in all branches and also with new business models. However, the big model change is now that after the long phase of building technical connectivity and reachability it is now the data in terms of information and ability of automated decision making that will make the big difference.

Vineyard: If so many aspects are relevant how should organisations drive digitalization?

Alexander: The majority of the projects and transformation with strateg...

Table of contents

• Hinweise
• Preface & Acknowledgements
• Inhaltsverzeichnis
• I. Consulting Trends
• II. Past and Future of Data Management – GDPR-Deadline (28.05.2018) introduces new challenges in the IT landscape
• III. Secure Sharing and Collaboration beyond the Firewall in R&D Life Sciences - A necessity for New Product Innovations
• IV. Information Security is Job Zero
• V. Too much information is wasting money - Summarizer
• VI. Usage of agile methodology in IT Service Management
• VII. How can the IT department create added value in a litigation process?
• VIII. Transformation programmes to manage changes like Brexit
• IX. Risk Management – Cyber Risk
• X. People & Management: Leading laterally in projects
• XI. Digitization of Insurance Companies
• XII. Knowledge Management
• XIII. Literatur
• Danksagung
• Über das Buch
• Impressum