How this large retailer redesigned their org structure, improved efficiencies and clarified role expectations using Beamible

Results

• Role clarity 
• Visibility to pinpoint workload risks for each role
• Increase in productivity and time savings
• Prevention of psychological safety risk, with some employees reducing risky workloads of 55+ hours down to 38 hours
• Creation of time for innovation and process improvement, by eliminating wasted work
• Identification of 2 major ineffective processes, and creation of a plan to re-engineer them to provide better outcomes for key stakeholders

“Valuable insights from the data gathered and clear recommendations of quick wins, medium term process improvements and realignment of effort to achieve performance expectations. Appreciated the range of organisational design options to address the risks and insights developed from the Beamible interview.”

- CEO, BETA

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Background

Due to an acquisition and new CEO, BETA* launched Project A** to redesign the organisation, confirm accountabilities and grow revenue. The current-state operational model was no longer fit for purpose.

An organisational review was initiated in August 2022 with an option to move to a matrix structure to ensure efficiency between the Corporate Office and the Front Line. Challenges in front line staff turnover from a high of 74% in 2021 to 56% in 2022 drove a focus on the employee experience, capability and training.

Senior leaders were keen to deep dive into their teams to understand roadblocks and levers to pull, to accelerate revenue growth and retention. With no additional headcount, no additional budget and a new operating model to deliver, change was needed.

Using Beamible, BETA interviewed the Senior Leadership Team on their ‘current state’ roles and possible changes for their ‘future state’ roles. As senior leaders were engaged, they then did a deep dive into their teams. 

This uncovered mismatched performance expectations, broken processes and lack of accountability leading to time and resource wastage, and confusion from the Support Office to the front line.

The solution

Using Beamible, senior leaders were individually interviewed to understand their core purpose, their performance expectations and their strategic priorities. By breaking down their daily plan to identify how much of their time & focus were related to strategic priorities, they were able to identify opportunities for productivity and efficiency savings. 

They were also looking for opportunities to refine performance outcomes and adjust, reducing waste of time. The new CEO also had a vision in mind as to a new way of structuring the organisation to more closely align to the revised strategy. After persuading the CEO to wait until we captured and analysed the current state, the collected insights were shared with the Senior Leadership Team and scenarios were created within Beamible for the future org design.

“Engaging process to clearly identify issues in our current state org design. Data collected in Beamible is essential to craft realistic Job Descriptions and set performance expectations.”

- Head of HR, BETA

How they did it

1. The new CEO supportively communicated with the SLT on the use of individual interviews by a consultant using the Beamible tool. 
2. These 60 minute interviews were used to collect data on the ‘current state’ of their roles, with challenges and risks identified. In the interviews, roles were created in the Beamible app using a time-based breakdown of core role activities and a corresponding tagging system.
3. The resulting data was then analysed and insight developed with risks and mitigants provided. These key outcomes were then shared with the CEO using ‘scenarios’ of optional organisational structures to elicit discussion and weigh up the pros and cons of the changes. 
4. The SLT found the initial interviews and subsequent data and insights valuable, so they did a deeper dive into most of the Corporate Office teams - Operations, Sales, Brand and Marketing. 
5. Data was analysed for intact teams and across the organisation too.
6. Options for team structures were presented, discussed, decided on and actioned by the leaders.

Value created

Additional value created through using the Beamible tool included:

1. Enabling leaders to hold role expectation meetings with their team members to clarify activities of focus and alignment to the strategic priorities. 

• In one case, an incumbent who had been in-role for 5 months had developed their own interpretation of their role and outcomes, causing significant additional hours worked (over 55 hours per week).
• This was a surprise for the leader and immediate action was taken to reduce the hours and stress, thus reducing burnout and psychosocial safety risk. 

2. Issues raised with administration and internal meetings. 

• Internal ways of working were causing significant hours wasted with little outcomes delivered. A reset was required to adjust work practices that were required during the pandemic (e.g. cc all Support Office staff into email for inclusion, with some staff receiving over 200 emails per day,  inviting all Corporate office to meetings for ease of sharing information when working remotely).
• The value created from identifying these distractions and frustrations were:
  • in time saving
  • agendas set and actions minuted from meetings
  • meetings reduced from 30 mins to 25 mins and 60 mins to 45 mins to allow for reflection and preparation
  • freed up time that was reallocated to innovation and process improvement work 
• internal teams identified 2 major processes that were to be re-engineered to provide better outcomes for the Support Office and the customer.  

What’s next for BETA?

BETA plans to use Beamible for leaders to conduct 1:1 check ins, intended to maintain the focus on strategic priorities to increase delivery of outcomes. 

BETA will also continue to roll out role reviews in other parts of the business. They’ll also dig deeper into roles flagged in the initial interview process. Manager roles are currently slated for review. 

• Note - A sample of these incumbents were interviewed in the initial round and insights showed great inconsistencies in the expectations and activities performed in these roles. The level of capability varied across each state.

A subsequent focus on the Front Line Manager role analysis is to be completed to again gain understanding of the performance expectations and outcomes delivered from the incumbents across Australia and New Zealand.

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* Pseudonyms used to protect the privacy of the individuals involved.