The in-house teams at a top benchmarking firm were facing increased workloads due to unpredictable surges in knowledge management and ad-hoc project requests. This was resulting in increased costs and reduced operational efficiency.
Objective
The firm needed to improve operational efficiency, reduce costs, and enable faster and more informed decision-making, as well as enable their internal teams to focus their attention on more strategic tasks.
Our Solution
The firm engaged the On-Demand Research Support team at Phronesis Partners as a dedicated extension of their team to:
- Minimize the operational load of the in-house teams
- Lower operational costs
- Boost the productivity of the internal knowledge management team especially during periods of fluctuating workloads and increased ad-hoc projects.
On-Demand Research Support service offering
Phronesis initially embarked on a pilot phase, concentrating their efforts on delivering knowledge management and support services. Throughout this initial stage, the On-Demand Research Support Service team diligently addressed a consistent influx of knowledge management inquiries.
As the project progressed, the scope organically expanded across additional support and ad-hoc research services, including:
- Topic Identification: Analysis of knowledge management requests’ themes and topics
- Information Collection: Data collection from secondary research such as information on KPIs, research surveys, and analysis, with results structured for further processing.
- Expert Interviews: Identification and sourcing of contact details of relevant contacts and thought leaders, across topics, themes, or ideas.
- Analysis & Synthesis: Analysis of information from a range of sources such as qualitative information, survey data, secondary research, and expert interviews.
- Information Visualization: Visual presentation of final deliverables incorporating data visualization tools such as Tableau or Power BI for surveys, and including motion graphics, and infographics.
- Providing support during U.S. business hours
- Maintaining an average response time of just 15 minutes
- Conducting weekly governance calls to monitor agreed KPIs and SLAs, with the inclusion of daily project pipeline tracking and project feedback forms to enhance workflow management
- Offering additional support from Phronesis’ pool team at a daily rate, as needed
- Executing custom research projects and opportunity assessments to explore new revenue streams
Outcome
Working with the Phronesis On-Demand Research Support team, the firm optimized its knowledge management and ad-hoc research services, and refocused on its core competencies, achieving:
- 25% improvement in operational efficiency, based on a reduction in time spent on research and knowledge management tasks
- 30% reduction in operational costs related to knowledge management activities
- 40% increase in the number of analyzed trending topics based on workflows recorded by Phronesis, enhancing its market responsiveness
- 20% increase forecast in revenue over the next two years, driven by a new income stream Phronesis’ research support service
- 15% increase in project engagement diversity, enabling a broader range of research and support services
- Decrease in average response times to 15 minutes for ad-hoc research requests,
