OPERATIONS & STRATEGY
CLIENT CASE / Project Quarterback
Examining Workflow Redundancies to Drive Faster Progress and Innovation
Whether you’re a big or small organization, working bandwidth is a real and limiting factor. Outside of employees’ day-to-day business, how do you ensure their additional efforts are focused on things that will actually move the needle forward?
For a large organization, taking a closer look at ordinary project redundancies didn’t seem like a priority — until they realized that doing so could save them millions of dollars.
We hire great talent for a reason. By aligning key priorities, identifying redundancies that are tolerable versus intolerable and streamlining efforts toward targeted objectives, we can create an opportunity for that talent to pay us back in dividends.
+ Execution, Organizational Design & Development, Workflow & Communication Design
At a Glance
THE PROBLEM
A large organization lacked the strategy on how to efficiently manage project work across teams. Duplicated efforts and lack of transparency ate into employees' time, creating stagnation and burnout. The organization had a desire to make things better, but they were repeating work and often working on things which were not aligned with the organization’s immediate objectives.
THE MISSING PIECE
By determining and communicating objectives and identifying the differences in tolerable and intolerable redundancies, work was able to be organized, prioritized or pivoted to align with the organization’s objectives. The need for open communication channels to highlight the organization’s priorities and maintain clarity of workflow redundancies became a crucial point of focus.
THE SOLUTION
Transparent communication channels were created, driving clarity around key organizational objectives and allowing for better employee alignment. New responsibilities and workflows were established to reduce intolerable redundancies, translating into greater cross-collaboration among teams, more opportunity for contributors and faster progress toward project and organizational goals.
OBSERVED CHALLENGE
A large organization faced challenges of redundancies, inefficiencies, misalignment and a lack of coordination in workflows and review periods. The organization comprised 300 employees engaged in multiple work streams that were not well aligned with overall organizational objectives, resulting in duplicated efforts and wasted resources.
Program Managers were overseeing large-scale workflows without sufficient input or collaboration from the wider organization, leading to limited effectiveness and discontent among teams working on individual projects. The absence of a coordinated and effective means for employees to contribute value created a sense of ambiguity during review periods, causing misalignment and diminished impact of project work.
There was also a lack of visibility into past workflow attempts and their outcomes, hindering progress and learning. Collaboration opportunities were missed as employees interested in similar areas were unaware of others sharing their interests.
The opportunity identified was to distinguish between tolerable and intolerable redundancies within the organization.
Tolerable Redundancies refer to duplications or repetitions in workflows or processes that, while present, do not significantly hinder or impede the overall performance or outcomes of the system. Tolerable redundancies may actually be encouraged so that multiple parties explore the same challenge from a different perspective and approach (Ex. A/B testing).
However, there also must be awareness, insight and data cross-comparison at some point in the process between these redundant workflows for the purposes of examination and progression in order for them to be defined as tolerable.
Intolerable Redundancies denote duplications or repetitions in workflows or processes that have a detrimental impact on efficiency, productivity, or resource utilization. These redundancies result in wasted time, effort, or resources, leading to increased costs, delays, or confusion within the system.
Intolerable redundancies hinder optimization efforts and need to be identified and addressed to enhance overall operational effectiveness. This may be due to engaging in efforts which have already been examined or implemented without the awareness of the party in question or efforts which are currently being engaged in without the parties knowledge, awareness or data cross-comparison.
OUTCOME
After a 6-month process, the organization successfully achieved clarity in its objectives for qualitative workflows. Three main areas of opportunity were identified and prioritized by senior leadership, and strategic “quarterbacks” were appointed to coordinate efforts and catalog all historical and ongoing workflow activities related to these objectives.
Through systematic reviews of historical and current workflows, redundancies and overlaps were identified. Efforts were combined or paired off for data comparison, fostering cross-collaboration and accelerating learning across workstreams. The decision was made to provide selective transparency by reporting major projects in monthly meetings and through digital communication channels, avoiding stagnation without overwhelming employees.
A balance was struck regarding workflow initiation. While mechanisms were put in place for project work to start freely, monthly reviews ensured alignment with organizational objectives. Workflows meeting the necessary criteria were either combined, added to the catalog, or identified as intolerable redundancies. Over the 6-month period, dozens of workflows were created, combined, or eliminated.
These efforts resulted in significant time savings, equivalent to 270 hours per week, which translated into approximately $1,100,000 in annual employee expenditure savings. Clear value creation for the company was achieved through standardized practices and focused objectives.
Employee satisfaction with the review cycle increased by 21% in the first year, attributed to the organization's improved ability to prioritize and focus on project work. The introduction of strategic overseer roles provided leadership development opportunities and deepened the organization's leadership bench.
Increased transparency positively impacted employee perception of leadership, raising perceived transparency by 29% and building trust in direction and leadership as a whole. The organization experienced greater unity and alignment as clarity around objectives increased, leading to increased workflow creation and cross-organization collaboration. The review period became more objective, empowering both leaders and individual contributors.
Redundancies are inevitable.
How you prioritize identifying and reducing them will determine how successful your organization will be — and how motivated your employees will be to progress in a meaningful way.
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STRATEGIC ALIGNMENT | Prior to any strategies being formulated, it was necessary to clearly define what the top objectives were for the organization. In identifying the 3 key areas of focus, we were able to quickly align resources across all channels toward the things that mattered — in this organization’s case: Hiring Velocity, Diversity and Candidate Experience. Once the organization was clear on what was important, plans were able to be put into place to move more efficiently toward objectives.
OPERATIONS & WORKFLOW ASSESSMENT | Before starting, it was critical to understand the work that had been completed in the past over these three areas in addition to all the work that was currently being done in the organization. This allowed for a thorough determination of what redundancies were able to be eliminated in order to move more effectively. Additionally, this meant that the organization could combine resources from different areas of the business — together creating better cross-collaboration among teams.
ORGANIZATIONAL REDESIGN | Organizing new channels of communication allowed for oversight of all projects across all teams. Additionally, appointing functional leaders over each of the three key areas gave senior leadership access and insight into progress in real time. The crucial secondary effect of this decision was that we were able to create a deep bench of future leaders by understanding how individual contributors lead scalable programs and executed on mission critical tasks.
OPERATIONAL REVIEW | The decision of how much access to the work being done across all channels was a difficult one. Weighing speed over real-time transparency, we implemented a monthly report of all projects being worked on and their progress so that employees at every level could check in on all efforts being made and potentially join in on various project teams. This solved for maintaining coordinated efforts without slowing down new projects starting. Balancing transparency with efficiency was important in the success of this new operational model.
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The opportunity in this case was to define clear objectives, catalog historical workflows, scrutinize active workflows for redundancy, transform intolerable redundancies into tolerable ones and streamline value creation by merging employee efforts.
SMARTWORK APPROACH
Visual Summary
KEY TAKEAWAYS
Strategic Alignment Drives Efficiency
Clear objectives and strategies aligning with organizational goals provided a foundation for coordinated efforts, eliminating redundancies and optimizing workflows.
Unified Focus Empowers and Saves Costs
Focusing on shared objectives enhanced employee satisfaction, built trust, and unified the organization. Streamlined workflows and cross-collaboration resulted in substantial cost savings and increased operational effectiveness.
CASE RESULTS
Selective Transparency Balances Innovation & Focus
Transparent reporting of major projects while avoiding overwhelming details struck a balance that encouraged innovation without stifling new ideas and fostered collaboration.
