Enhancing customer experiences while reducing operating costs and accelerating revenue growth for a Fortune 500 Telecom company.
Customer Background and Context
Over the past ten years, Apex has supported one of the largest telecommunications and mobile telephone services provider in the U.S. to deliver a diverse portfolio of more than 200 engagements focused on best-in-class customer experiences, revenue growth, and cost reduction, engaging nearly 3,500 technical consultants to date.
Service Areas and Capabilities Deployed
- Agile Transformation
- Business Strategy
- Business Process Automation
- Artificial Intelligence / Machine Learning
- Cybersecurity
- Data and Analytics
- Desktop Support and Helpdesk
- DevOps
- Software Development
- Quality Assurance / Software Testing
- Project Management and Business Analysis
- User Experience (UX) Design
- Mobile Application Development
Partnering Model
- Managed Services
- Full and Partial Scrum Teams
- Specialty Resources
- Large and Small Scale Staff Augmentation
- Direct Hire
- Upskilling
Delivery Locations
Apex has a presence in over 70 locations throughout North America, Europe, and India; we have engaged teams and consultants across multiple locations and delivery models (on-site, hybrid, and remote) to meet our client's delivery requirements and business objectives. As an example, we currently have a geographically distributed team of data and analytics consultants developing a machine learning pipeline designed to enhance predictive analytics for service assurance. The team includes Apex consultants working onsite, remote, and at Apex’s Delivery Center in Guadalajara, Mexico.
Commercial Construct
Our primary commercial construct has been Statement of Works (SOWs) with a time and materials fee structure and rate cards for consultants. This construct was established in partnership with the client to enable rapid onboarding of consultants, support a broad spectrum of IT services engagements, and to maintain a known cost structure. Additionally, we have executed SOWs with fixed fee structures to support engagements with well-defined requirements and/or team structures.
Performance Management
Performance management including objectives, metrics, and measurement is an integral component to all Apex engagements. As part of our value proposition, our team structure includes an Engagement Manager (at no cost to the client) that partners with project stakeholders to review business objectives during the Project Kick-off, define metrics, determine methods and timeframes to measure performance, and produce weekly and/or monthly reports. Examples of performance management include Sprint reporting for Agile software development engagements, milestone reporting (e.g. hardware installations), and performance reporting at the consultant and team level. Additionally, Apex assigns an independent Risk Reviewer and Engagement Managing Director to review delivery quality, performance, and outcomes on a regular basis. Data quality, transparency, and reporting frequency are several key success factors for effective performance management and are foundational to our approach. Every engagement includes a performance management component that spans from interactive dashboards to monthly reports to provide a shared view of engagement success.
Impact
Initially engaged to provide surge capacity and talent management in support of mission-critical applications that support service delivery, service assurance, and product development, over the past ten years we have partnered with the client in defining technical solutions and developing long-term roadmaps as well as providing solutions within the Artificial Intelligence, Cloud, Data and Analytics, and Quality Assurance/Testing spaces. We also engaged subject matter experts in the areas of service assurance and Agile Transformation to perform business process optimization, build data lakes, and define value streams. The impacts from our engagements have included significant reductions in operating costs, acceleration of revenue growth, and enhancements to customer experiences. For example, Apex recently completed a strategy engagement focused on enhancing the operational performance of a correlation service for service assurance where we identified up to $50M in cost reduction opportunities by establishing a single data source for metrics and producing actionable insights.
Lessons Learned
- Be Flexible- choosing a scalable and flexible service model that employs the right people at the right price and time is essential to delivering projects on time and within budget. Apex has continued to meet this need by leveraging our consultant pipeline of over 16 million people.
- Build the Right Team- the ability to attract and retain talent is critical to achieving our client's business objectives, building domain knowledge, and maximizing the value of their IT Services partners. This requirement has only amplified with the advent of “The Great Resignation” as demand for talent continues to rise. Apex brings a proven workforce management approach the spans the full talent lifecycle from demand planning through knowledge transfer. Key areas include recruiting and onboarding, training, and development, performance management, and retention. We maximized their investment in talent by converting Apex contract consultants to full time employees of the client at no cost after six months of service.
- Focus on Talent Development- talent development and growth is equally important to our consultants and clients. Apex Talent University (ATU) is our approach to overcoming skill gaps and a changing workforce by aligning resources to our clients' future state visions through customized talent generation and development programs. Through this program, we drive retention and growth of our consultants and provide a talent strategy that optimizes costs.
Risks & Watch-outs, Mitigation Plan
- Roles and Responsibilities- Client and Team Project Kick-Offs conducted; RACI’s established; Weekly/monthly cadences with project leads (Scrum Master, Product Owner, Client Sponsor, etc.) to ensure the flow of communication and quickly mitigate issues/risks throughout the project period of performance.
- Definition of Metrics / Done (all story points are not equal) and Product Backlogs- Common understanding of success, metrics, and done is established upon project start. All scrum ceremonies are scheduled to enable enhanced quality of delivery to both the client and the team. User stories and functional requirements are assessed to ensure proper elements are included and to ensure the development teams have the information needed to properly estimate work and establish their velocity early on.
- Organizational Change- Local presence in all geographies served to ensure we are engaging our teams and communication is continuously taking place. Technical and functional requirements, as well as all processes, are properly documented and stored per security standards to ensure business goals remain on track in the event of any organizational changes.
Current Contracts Following This Model
100% of current contracts with AT&T are SOWs that follow the commercial constructs noted above.
