Organizational Design
An entertainment company was centralizing its European financial teams and systems. They went from about 10 separately managed entities in Europe to a single team supporting every site using one set of processes and a single system. This was an incredibly complex undertaking, as each country has its own very specific labor laws that we had to navigate. We needed to keep the current employees for as long as possible to train the people who were taking their jobs while simultaneously setting up the completely new organization in a country where the company had never had operations previously. We were able to keep over 80% of the current employees in-seat through the transition period, blowing away the original estimate of 30%. We had the new office leadership staffed, trained and ready to begin work in their new office building well within project targets.
GTC's role
- As head of GTC I (Lailani) was the internal communications lead for the program. This included C-level partnership, coordination with consultants, vendors, external media and employees. I also supported some training for new team members when we got a bit pressed for time and needed the extra push.
- Sometimes, a transformation is not great for everyone involved. This one was rough for the folks who were let go from their jobs even though their performance may have been great. It was a difficult balance between being sensitive to their journey while getting the new folks ramped up. I was grateful to be able to lean on legal and human resource experts to guide me on content, tone and delivery of communication throughout the project.
Other organizational design projects where GTC was the internal change or communications lead
- Set up a new centralized strategic sourcing group which took control of major purchases throughout a global company
-
Created an SAP shared service center, led primarily by Enterprise Resource Planning program team members who moved to a new location and then hired and trained local talent
-
Built a new master data team which governed all changes to data types, rules, methods of entry and upgrades for an Enterprise Resource Planning solution