An ambitious TechOps transformation in generics yields cost savings of $200m+

Vision

A destination with purpose

The new Executive Committee of a leading global generics and consumer health pharmaceutical company envisioned an advanced high-performing manufacturing and supply chain (TechOps) organization. With its purpose centered around making care affordable for patients, it set its ambition on saving $200m over the course of just three years.

Challenge

Disagreement on direction

The committee engaged a top-tier strategy consulting firm to conduct an external benchmarking and identify improvements in procurement, supply chain, and manufacturing. Executives initiated a three-year TechOps transformation spanning 150+ initiatives across multiple functions. But this top-down approach resulted in pushback from those leading day-today operations. They questioned the validity of the benchmarks and the reality of delivering the on-paper targets.

With investment on the line, stakeholders wanted immediate bottom-line impact, additional cost savings, and speed. But cross-functional teams did not buy into the benchmarks and key enablers to deliver the goals. Without alignment, there was no clear ownership to drive the project forwards.

On the road without a map

In the initial momentum to get initiatives up and running, they bypassed the necessary pre-work planning to agree on an overall project plan. And while the team tracked project spend, savings could not be mapped back to the P&L and validated. Lacking the bandwidth and capabilities for this degree of cross-functional planning, the project quickly veered off track.

With much at stake, initiatives in varying stages, and a lack of ownership, the Head of TechOps turned to Genioo as a trusted partner in strategy realization and TechOps transformation, to work alongside its internal team and regain control fast.

SOLUTION

Finding a way forward

We invited 30 senior executives to our Top Team Alignment workshops to get them all on the same page. They came away with a deep understanding, belief, and ownership (UBO) of the vision and the tangible benefits and returns.

Aligned on direction, we switched to a bottom-up approach, setting up a transformation office led by the internal team and supported by Genioo’s highly-experienced project management consultants. This provided an effective conduit between the Executive Committee and the team on the ground. And it ensured cross-functional strategic and operational viewpoints were captured throughout the planning and decision-making process.

Initial assessments identified a capability gap to link transformation savings back to the P&L. Beyond F&A qualifications, they needed specific experience and expertise in financial tracking of large-scale transformations. We tapped into our pool of Independent Professionals to strengthen the transformation office with two transformation finance specialists. Our agile resourcing model enabled us to leverage their expertise at targeted moments in the project while remaining cost efficient.

Diagnostics also uncovered that project initiatives would not deliver the desired $200m savings. But with the clarity, visibility, and financial expertise we now had, we identified opportunities for additional cost savings and were better placed to predict and mitigate risk.

A well-planned journey

Our team partnered with the internal team at transformation office and workstream level to stress test initiatives and prioritize them based on factors like speed to value, level of impact, ease of execution. With key enablers crystallized and project outcomes validated, the team co-created a master project plan – mapping back from the end goal to define roles, responsibilities, project phases, deliverables, and milestones. And with well maintained financial and operational tracking, the transformation office confidently took the lead updating key initiative stakeholders and embedding change with delivery teams, knowing we were behind them every step of the way.

We engineered the three-year program with a detailed 12-month plan designed to embed new processes and technology and stabilize all initiatives. And from the outset, we gradually upskilled the transformation office and TechOps teams to phase out our support and hand over the program to our client.

Impact

Beyond our destination

Our combination of team alignment, program management, deep functional expertise, and agile resourcing help put our client’s internal team in the driving seat and accelerate their journey from vision to realization.

Together we:

• Built and executed a project pipeline to realize $235m+ savings
• Delivered $120m savings in the first year against a targeted $100m (120%) – confirmed by an external auditor
• Delivered $225m+ against the final three-year savings target of $215m

Our true collaboration and One Team approach heightened the team’s overall program experience, and they comfortably took the project back over empowered to deliver its full value. The success of this transformation led to further partnerships with Commercial and R&D.