Driving Digital Transformation and Innovation for a Multinational CPG Manufacturer

As companies grow, diversify, and evolve, their IT infrastructures are challenged. Many organizations don’t realize how inflexible their digital ecosystems are until they’ve outgrown them. Such was the case for a large consumer packaged goods (CPG) manufacturer.

After struggling to respond quickly to spiking customer demand during the COVID-19 pandemic, the household products manufacturer did a deep dive into its digital operations. What it found was a severe “watermelon effect” — positive (green) reporting of superficial service-level metrics like uptime and availability covering up negative (red) sentiments about functionality and user experience (UX). 

Seeking transformative digital change from the inside out, the manufacturer turned to Windsor Group to develop a purposeful approach.

The Challenge

In assessing the struggles of the existing IT strategy, Windsor Group pinpointed several critical problems. After years of mergers, acquisitions, and operational restructuring, the organization was left with substantial technical debt, including redundancies and antiquated systems. A deeper financial analysis revealed a large portion of the IT budget was spent keeping the lights on and refreshing old technology rather than investing in innovative technologies.

Vendor consolidation was also a significant concern. The manufacturer had active service-level agreements (SLAs) with nine enterprise-level vendors and a fragmented scope of services spread across those agreements. Many SLAs were outdated or no longer competitive, and the company had no experience-level agreements (XLAs) to define their relationship with either users or customers.

The sheer scope of IT operations presented a challenge. This particular CPG manufacturer is active across 100+ sites in 60+ countries, which meant considering localized factors when formulating a digital transformation plan — all with a newly hired chief information officer (CIO) at the helm.

Engagement

From the start, Windsor Group established itself as a collaborative partner. It recognized the client’s need for technical stewardship and positioned itself as a firm capable of communicating their goals to prospective IT vendors — in full alignment with the company’s expectations. 

The engagement began with a full benchmarking of IT operations. This involved a comprehensive overview of all current vendor roles and SLAs, the budget, the organizational chart, current technologies, and more. From there, Windsor Group identified opportunities to optimize speed and costs while improving the user experience.

Rather than issuing a traditional request for proposal (RFP) to evaluate potential vendors, Windsor Group invited the customer’s IT leaders to participate in a competitive, collaborative, co-design effort with industry-leading providers. This strategy put the onus on vendors to address specific IT challenges faced by the client and outline potential solutions. Windsor Group then fielded the best solutions and assessed each vendor’s ability to execute them. This multi-round approach reduced potential IT partners from nine to three best-of-breed options.

Besides this innovative vetting of IT service providers, Windsor Group also offered internal guidance about digital transformation best practices. This included on-site meetings across the world to assess local challenges.

Results

Two years into the five-year digital transformation, the CPG manufacturer is already seeing incredible results. Through the co-design process, Windsor Group was able to provide a short list of recommended IT service providers, from which the client selected one highly qualified partner to manage the entirety of its fragmented IT operations. The new SLA — complete with a well-defined XLA — replaced the nine previous vendors to consolidate everything under one cohesive, competitively priced management structure. 

While the benefits of the transformation won’t be realized until the pivot is complete, estimates put the initial cost savings at 20%. With unrealized return on investment (ROI) still to come, this amounts to millions of dollars annually. More importantly, the company has effectively shifted from a stagnant IT budget to one focused on driving innovation and transformation across its digital operations. 

Insights

IT infrastructure can’t be an afterthought in the scheme of a business’s evolution. Instead, it must evolve in tandem with the operational landscape — growing, changing, and improving to accommodate synergies across the organization. Companies with an IT environment that’s piecemeal and spread across a handful of expensive vendors should recognize it as a call to action to transform their IT approach.

To learn how Windsor Group can help your organization with your needs, connect with us today at windzr.com/contact-us.