Facing a downward spiral

Recently, a leading global manufacturer of specialist consumer products found itself facing seemingly insurmountable challenges: sales were stagnant and profit levels had dropped significantly in all of the company’s key geographic markets. The pressure mounted as the manufacturer’s shareholder value declined due to intensifying competition from low-end manufacturers and competing technologies, and soon the company lenders showed increasing concern.

In an attempt at enhancing its competitiveness and returning to previous profitability levels, the manufacturer set out to boost operational efficiency, improve its commercial standards in key regions, re-examine its selling, general and administrative (SG&A) expenses, and launched a Value Creation Programme to address issues facing the company.

Although these efforts made some headway, progress remained slow. So, the company’s incoming CEO called on a-connect’s expertise and human resourcefulness to accelerate the company’s progress.

Turning the tide

At a-connect, our first measure was to implement the ‘a-connect effect’: drawing on our unrivalled global talent pool, we identified the perfect match for the company and project—an independent professional with extensive turnaround consulting experience and consumer durables line experience who would serve as the programme lead

Under the programme lead, the client’s progress was then reviewed in order to design a high-level turnaround programme and to identify quick wins. With this dynamic approach, we were able to detail prioritised opportunities, identify key blockages, and deliver quick wins along the Commercial Excellence and SG&A Optimisation workstreams.

We ran the turnaround across the client’s European organisation, ensuring that every action had maximum impact and yielded exceptional results in the quickest possible timeframe.

The bottom line

Thanks to his matchless stakeholder management and communication skills, the programme lead was able to seamlessly collaborate with the client and significantly contributed to the company’s stabilisation.

Importantly, a-connect helped the client to achieve its former profitability levels by identifying and implementing cost-saving tactics, and seizing revenue opportunities.

For more information on how a-connect’s human resourcefulness expertise could help transform your company’s future, contact us today.