Supporting cultural change by empowering people to make a difference using Web 2.0 Enterprise modelling environment
Sydney, Australia, November 20, 2009 — Leading Australian enterprise modelling software provider, Holocentric [www.holocentric.com], today announced that Western Power, the Western Australian Government owned networks business responsible for the distribution and transmission of electricity across one of the largest isolated networks in the world, has chosen the Holocentric Modelpedia hosted Web 2.0 enterprise modelling environment as a software platform to assist in transforming its business.
Western Power will use Modelpedia to empower all its stakeholders to participate in improving how the organisation works. Modelpedia personalises views of model information such as business processes so people can see, comment on and improve the way work is done. With Holocentric, Western Power will capture business process models, develop and publish standard operating processes via the Web and gather feedback from its employees to drive continual improvement — all within a single software environment.
“It is all about creating a paradigm of continuous change in the business,” said Neil Canby, Program Manager, Strategic Program of Work at Western Power. “In the next 10-20 years we face fundamental change at an industry level. Smart meters and smart grids, self generation, renewable energy sources, and electric cars will all turn network distribution on its head. We need to create a culture of change so we have the flexibility and nimbleness as a business to deal with whatever comes our way.”
Western Power has used Holocentric’s existing modelling tools to capture standard business processes developed around Accenture’s High Performance Utility Model — an exercise taking 20 staff five months. Over the next 12 months, a team of five will publish these standard business processes using Modelpedia via the Web and make them available to all 3500 employees. Following the Lean Six Sigma methodology for continuous business improvement, Western Power will use Holocentric’s tools to maintain visibility of processes, manage change control and support cultural transformation.
“Modelpedia captures ideas and gives people the ability to make a difference,” said Canby. “If you haven’t agreed with a process in the past, who do you go and tell? How difficult is it for you to do that? In Modelpedia you can just add a comment to the process model saying, ‘I don’t think this makes sense — can we do it differently?’. That goes back to the process owner and they can proactively think about making an improvement. It encourages a constructive feedback loop in all of our processes. Modelpedia adds a new dimension that we typically don’t get from workshops and meetings.”
While the primary driver to adopt Modelpedia is to drive business and cultural transformation, Western Power also expects to see benefits in accelerated delivery times and to derive cost savings and quality improvements in staff training.
“The overall benefit is about having efficient and effective processes, embedded in efficient and effective systems, used with ease by staff and partners that know how to use them,” said Canby. “From a business process improvement standpoint, our Six Sigma Black Belts won’t have to map the ‘as is’ processes, so it avoids the cost of mapping these processes and it accelerates the delivery time. It also allows us to accelerate the communications back to the affected user group.”
The cost savings derived in staff training alone will pay for the investment in Holocentric. “Our enterprise of 3500 staff hires close to 350 people a year and they all need training. If that is not documented people learn by sitting next to someone — and they don’t necessarily learn the control process. Holocentric creates a knowledge repository that removes that risk. It makes it easier to train people and you can reduce your investment in training support over time.”
About Holocentric
Holocentric, founded in 2003, is a privately-owned Australian software company which provides a platform for continual improvement. Holocentric helps organisations to better understand, manage and reduce the risk of organisational change. Holocentric Modeler enables organisations to create a comprehensive model of their people, systems and processes, and all the interdependencies between them. Modelpedia is a Wiki-style platform that serves as a reliable reference for organisational information and provides a means for all employees to provide feedback and improve performance.
With offices in Sydney and Canberra, Holocentric has customers in government, financial services, retail, infrastructure and distribution, including the ATO, Centrelink, NSW Police, Qantas, United Group, NRMA, RailCorp, IP Australia, ComSuper, DIISR and Resi Mortgage Corporation. Holocentric’s partners add consulting capability and skills to Holocentric products to assist organisations to better understand their complex businesses. Holocentric is a Microsoft Certified Partner, HP EMAP Partner and winner of development awards. For more information about the company, please visit www.holocentric.com.
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Contact:
David Sanday
Bowes Communications
Sydney, Australia
+61 (0)2 9387 2333
[email protected]
http://www.holocentric.com
