| Majority of UK organisations ignore collaboration risks
This is according to new research commissioned by IT services provider Steria. Whilst intended to maximise customer satisfaction (49 percent of organisations claim this is their key success factor), the anticipated benefits of joining forces with other organisations in both private and public sectors are consequently compromised because of ineffective planning and processes, warns Steria. The survey, conducted by Benchmark Research, revealed that many organisations involved in collaborative activities are found lacking in areas such as business process re-engineering (BPR), effective benchmarking and support from an integrated technology system. A business process review, designed to simplify collaborative processes between two disparate companies given their existing systems and cultures, is an important first step to take before collaboration actually begins. Over three quarters of organisations (78 percent) were found to conduct business process reviews in connection with collaborative activity, but a surprisingly low number, only 45 percent, conducted this beforehand, with 48 percent of organisations conducting BPR when collaborative activities were already underway. John Torrie, CEO, Steria Limited, comments, "Pre-planning and assessment is a must for effective collaboration and transparent customer support thereafter. It is encouraging to see that many of those who did not conduct a full business process review the first time around would, on reflection, conduct one before embarking on their next collaborative project. At Steria, we advise all our clients to conduct a BPR before collaborating with another organisation - how else can you prepare the ground and ensure that your processes will combine with the minimum possible pain for employees or customers?." Most organisations are not supported by an integrated IT system when collaborating with another - only 31 percent of respondents had a supporting system in place. Of this group, the public sector leads the private sector, with 36 percent of organisations having an integrated IT system, as opposed to only 16 percent of the private sector. Furthermore, the majority of respondents in both sectors (two thirds) do not plan to introduce an integrated information handling system to support their collaborative activity in the future. Of the third that do, the public sector once again leads the private sector (39 percent versus 23 percent). Some organisations are also falling short on benchmarking success - just 32 percent have set and published any formal benchmarks to measure the success of their collaborative activity. However, other assessment methods, particularly gauging customer satisfaction, are more commonly used by organisations, with 59 per cent carrying out customer satisfaction surveys to track success. In addition, 66 percent also rely on informal feedback from all parties involved to monitor progress.
•Date:
16th Dec 2004 • Region: UK •Type:
Article •Topic:
Operational risk |
