The interim manager's client was an international group of companies from the furniture and toy manufacturing sector with other companies in the shipping and retail sectors. His task was to temporarily manage the project and process management division as well as a project for the introduction of an ERP system that had been running for several years.
Uncontrolled project portfolio and major ERP project that had been running for years
At the beginning of his work, the interim manager found an extensive project portfolio that was commissioned and managed decentrally. There was no central project prioritization, no resource management and no controlled software delivery process. More than 20 employees from the project and process management department were deployed as sub-project managers or in a project management office (PMO).
The large-scale ERP project consisted of a separate project and development team with numerous external service providers. The ERP team defined its project scope without consulting the specialist departments. Since the start of the project five years earlier, neither costs nor deadlines could be met. There were contradictory statements regarding the status quo of the scope of services.
ERP project identified as an example of structural errors in corporate management
After analyzing and evaluating the ERP project, the interim manager first initiated workshops with the specialist departments of the corporate group, the project team and internal IT. As a result, it became clear to everyone involved that there were neither uniform business processes nor a coordinated scope for the ERP project. It also became clear that IT had not defined its role in the company. As a result, IT was unable to guarantee either the application landscape (architecture) or quality management for the development and operation of software.
The ERP project was an example of structural misalignments in organizational development and corporate management. The interim manager therefore convinced the management to first fundamentally reorganize the business model, the organizational structure and the IT landscape. The ERP project and all existing portfolio activities were specifically stopped.
Business processes designed to be reusable - governance and software delivery processes introduced
In the next step, the interim manager developed a qualitative portfolio assessment and derived a roadmap for the central change project. Here too, the interim manager initially had to overcome resistance, as the functional division heads had to hand over responsibilities to central governance. At the same time, he worked with IT management to define a delivery process for the group's software. In order to ensure the optimal transfer of knowledge to all companies in the group, the interim manager formed an overarching core team consisting of employees from IT and specialist departments. This team acted as a multiplier for all change processes and was later permanently anchored in the organization as the Operational Excellence division.
Business model and process organization of the corporate group revised
In a further step, the interim manager revised the business model and process organization of the corporate group in direct coordination with the company management. To do this, he first systematically documented all relevant processes from planning to sales and marketing. He then researched and presented suitable best practices and coordinated them with the departments involved. In workshops, he trained core areas such as purchasing, product development, scheduling, sales and IT. In addition, he defined performance sections for clear roles and responsibilities within the company.
Central project initiation and portfolio processes prove to be well established
An important goal of the assignment was achieved when the Operational Excellence department was able to take over the central governance for the company-wide optimized business processes. The training and courses in the specialist divisions had sufficiently qualified the employees for the new processes; from then on, they were installed as internal multipliers. In addition, the knowledge transfer for the IT processes was established in the form of a standardized software delivery process. The central project initiation and portfolio processes proved to be practicable and well-established.
Finally, the interim manager was instrumental in drawing up a qualified specification for a new tender for the ERP system before successfully completing the mandate after twelve months as planned.
