International beverage manufacturer

An international beverage manufacturer hires Involve for support in an internal restructuring. Because their Digital Integration team, responsible for all IT connections between systems worldwide, was at a significant turning point.

In recent years, this team has grown rapidly from 25 to over 110 members. This growth has led to a strong focus on daily operations, leaving little room for long-term development and innovation of their integration platforms.

Question

The organization decided to reorganize the international team. The request to Involve was:

Support us with project management and change expertise, and guide us in decision-making regarding the new structure and ways of working.

The goal: a smooth transition to the new situation without disrupting daily operations. After all, if an integration platform shuts down even for a brief moment, it can cost the business a good amount.

Approach

It is usually not a simple drafting exercise to designa new organizational structure and way of working.It is a process of progressive insight, where each choice raises many other questions that need to be addressed. This can quickly lead to vicious cycles, as the same topics keep coming up.

Therefore, it is important to structure such a process well. This includes a carefullythought-out back-planning, clear documentation and to keep track of all decisions made along the way, together with clear communication about the process with all stakeholders involved. Naturally, this also involves a careful HR process. And, since the team works for all business units worldwide, the service processes need to be restructured as well. Our contribution is to help piece together this complex puzzle coherently and bring the restructuring to a successful conclusion.

Weekly meetings are held with the most involved team members, for them to participatein the decisions being made. This in itself ensures alignment and good preparation for the transition. Additionally, we work with the team in interviews and workshops to further develop the future way of (collaborative) working. One of the questions is, for example: if people will be dedicatedly working on the long-term development of integration platforms, what does that concretely mean for them? What will they do? What does this role look like, and how do you ensure that time is actually allocated to look for trends and developments, analyze requests, etc.?  All roles have been defined, aligned with each other, and documented as the team’s new ‘manual’.

Result

Within four months, we managed to assist the manager, leaders, and the team in piecing together the puzzle. Involving team members ensures support and alignment. Through careful communication with all stakeholders and partners, the transition proceeds smoothly, without disrupting daily operations, on the agreed-upon day. And, perhaps most importantly: the goal of this restructuring is achieved. The team has more focus on the long-term development and innovation of the integration platforms.