The Challenge

A Western European telecom operator was undergoing changes in strategy and ownership. New owners and management needed to quickly review current network performance in terms of service levels, quality, cost and productivity and set priorities for the next stage in the company's development. They also needed to determine the best network organizational structure going forward.

The Solution

The operator needed an outsider's opinion about its performance and direction, from telecom professionals experienced enough to be able to quickly assess the situation and offer immediate and practical suggestions. Therefore, the Telecom Expert Group formed a small team, comprised of some of its most experienced operations and engineering personnel, to perform an informal operational and organizational review in close cooperation with line management.

The Results

Following an intensive round of management interviews, site visits and reviews of results and projects, TEG separated its findings into commendations and recommendations. In many areas, TEG was able to commend and confirm the value of management's plans and simply suggest fine-tuning steps to enhance their impact. In several key areas, however, TEG recommended that significant issues and performance gaps needed further attention, and suggested programs and priorities best suited to the operator's situation and capabilities.

Key recommendations addressed issues such as:

-Expanding the current focus of network fault prevention to become a more multi-faceted program of quality improvement and re-work elimination.

-Revising the network forecasting and engineering procedures to improve network utilization and reduce capital expenditures.

-Implementing performance management to improve productivity and quality.

-Organizing the access network and switching/backbone network work groups in such a way to enhance management effectiveness.

For each of these recommendations, the TEG team identified the industry best practice, how that could be translated into practice within the company, the benefits to be gained, and the key steps involved in forming an integrated implementation plan.