In my last post, Collaboration in a Command and Control World, we looked at one project manager’s experience trying to guide a technology upgrade where the sponsor focused exclusively on time and costs.
In this post, we’ll look at the steps one project manager took to leverage a promising new technology while avoiding the pitfalls often encountered with new technology introductions. Thanks to reader A.R. for the details on this case.
The Situation
This U.S. based financial services organization managed 401(k) plans for employees of small to medium size businesses. A 401(k) retirement savings plan allows a worker to save for retirement and have the savings invested while deferring current income taxes on the saved money and earnings until withdrawal.
The company’s product offerings allowed participating client employees to invest in a wide variety of popular mutual fund products. The client employees would call the company’s service staff to get quotes on funds and to place orders for new investments or changes to existing ones. The company had a web site that offered similar services but found that the volume of phone calls continued to increase with the growth in their business. It was posing an ever increasing cost burden on the organization.
While interactive voice response (IVR) technology is common today, in the early 21st century it was an emerging technology. However, because it held such promise to address their challenge, the company decided to take the plunge.
The Goal
The VP, Customer Service, the sponsor of the initiative, after discussions with the CIO and senior technical staff, decided to wade into the then largely uncharted IVR waters. She launched a project to leverage the new technology to reduce the current and growing costs of their phone services.
Her goal was to deliver an IVR system that would support the quote and trading functions for client employees across the country and have it fully operational in one year. She was looking for a 50% rate of conversion to IVR.
The Project
The IT organization appointed a seasoned project manager. Because the company had no experience in the IVR arena, he knew trying to estimate the costs of the project would have been a fool’s errand. They talked to a number of vendors and early users to know that an effective solution was possible. But the costs quoted varied widely. So he worked with the VP to figure out what she could afford by looking at the expected reduction in current costs and slowing the cost growth rate while offering the same or improved service levels. Her target - $1.2 million with a 70% IVR usage rate. That would give her a 2 year payback.
Comments