With the advent of multiple new technology platforms and dwindling business knowledge due to reductions in staffing, this Australian electricity distributor was struggling to comply with its regulatory market mandates.

The market regulator had issued a compliance breach, and at the same time the business was being instructed by the energy regulator to reduce its operating costs. Their operations team was overstretched and unable to cope with the volume of issues generated in their business workflow queues created by the market compliance problems. These problems were growing as the business moved to three-month meter read cycles, exacerbated by a large meter replacement program.

DB Results assisted in resolving the compounding issues and helping them achieve critical compliance.

How we tackled compound business problems

We approached this business issue from two directions. The distributor needed to become market compliant and de-risk its trading position. They also needed to transform their business operations to continue to meet the market needs whilst increasing productivity to reduce costs.

Finding a solution meant addressing the distributor’s immediate needs while setting them up for long-term success.

We created clear lines of responsibility and accountability. We inserted a rapid response control and co-ordination function across the distributor’s business and technology operations to report to the executive.

We helped establish recovery goals for the executive, market and program teams to achieve.

A comprehensive and integrated business process, market and technology measurement and analysis function was established to enable root cause and impact analysis.

We stood up a data management team to repair errant data on the run to give the technology the time needed to be fixed.

Transforming the business for a secure future

Our work with the executive to define the end goals for our client involved defining the operating processes. As a result, we built new and automated business processes which integrated the end to end workflow. We ran the operations and trained staff in these processes.

The distributor was able to regain market compliance within four months. They adopted the new operating model and culture and now have the right size workforce for the size of their operation.

Find out how DB Results’ strategy services can help you transform your business for success.