Question

  

Consulting: INITIAL INTERVIEW

You are a CEO (Michelle Royal) of Goodwill Industries of Boston, which serves twelve locations in the greater Boston area.  Overall, the stores are doing very well but you know they can be more successful and productive.  For example, you have experienced positive retail revenue growth over the past three years; however, the growth was still lower than the average and your donor volume is down. On the other hand, your sales per square foot outperformed the national average.

Consequently, you called Headquarters (HQ) and investigated the possibility of having a consultant come to Boston to review your situation and give recommendations for improvement.  You were talking to the CEO in Chicago and she explained that she found the consulting to be a very helpful exercise.  The contact at HQ asked you a few questions and said that Jane/Joe Reynolds, an inhouse retail consultant, would be giving you a call.

You have been in your position for one year.  You did not have any previous retail experience before taking the Goodwill position.  You have pretty much continued the work of your predecessor and have tried to remain very independent and creative.  For example, you and your staff like to create your own signage as opposed to using the standard Goodwill prototypes. Your expertise is finance and you have been able to implement and maintain excellent financial reports.

You suspect that improvement can be made through increased efficiency and production.

Some areas that you think might need attention:  merchandise layout, pricing, sorting and processing, transportation.  Furthermore, your new Retail Manager thinks one of your store managers might be ineffective. Your style has been rather formal.  You tend to work one-on-one with your key managers and supervisors.

Though you want help (you really want to surpass all Goodwill averages), you are concerned about having a consultant come and "snoop around."  You realize that this is the only way, however, so you decide to talk to the consultant and see what he suggests in terms of coming to Boston.  You are very concerned about how he/she is going to go about the project.  You would like to keep things very quiet, not involve too many people, and not stir things up.  After all, it seems to you that things are going generally well.

Background info: The mission of Goodwill is to provide work for underprivileged and to do that through retail stores. The underprivileged are trained for a period of time by working in the stores and then sent out into the broader marketplace. Consequently, the Goodwill Stores (collecting old stuff and selling it), is only a means for the real mission.

Goodwill HQ has a team of internal consultants, each with different areas of expertise, who are available to travel to the different locations when they need help. The individual Goodwill locations are independent and are “loosely” tied to HQ, more as nonprofit associations, not industry. Consequently, the CEOs of the various Goodwill locations want assistance but also want to remain independent—the classic “push-pull” that consultants encounter.

Assignment:

You are the Goodwill HQ Consultant that Michelle calls. Since she is in Boston and you are in D.C., you decide to conduct the conversations (which you two have formally scheduled) through visual WEBX so you can see one another faces.

Brainstorm and jot down how you would go about the interview. Following the information in your consulting packet on how to conduct the exploratory phase of formulating an intervention, what questions would you ask? How would you explain your role and the parameters of the consulting arrangement? How would you gain Michelle’s trust? What kind of resistance do you think she will demonstrate? How will you handle that resistance?

Then, actually write out an entire conversation, making it up as you go, demonstrating the skills sets that you know you have to demonstrate. Have Michelle challenge you and deal with her resistance and getting through all phases of the exploratory phase. End the session by summarizing next steps.

You:

Michelle:

You:

Michelle:

Etc.

Answer 1

As a formal face to face meeting is not possible, we will be scheduling a WEBX meeting where I will be able to see Michelle through the software and interact with her. As this is the first meeting, I would like to probe Michelle and understand the specific reasons, where she wants consultation. Moreover I would like to have an insight about the current performance of the Goodwill stores in Boston area and the specific areas of improvement where Michelle may want my assistance.

The specific questions which I may ask Michelle are as follows:

· What is the prime objective with which you want my consultation?

· What is the long term and short term goals of Goodwill stores in Boston area?

· How do you assess the performance of the stores? Which specific metrics and methodology are used?

I would share insight about my role as a consultant in the starting of the conversation. A brief detail of my team, the way we work, the methodology we follow and how we help the organizations will be shared with Michelle.

To gain Michelle’s trust, I would share a brief overview of the projects which have been handled by my team. I would also share an annexure of customer feedback with her. In my views, work speaks for itself. Michelle will be able to trust us based on the past work which we have turn. Michelle may have hesitation in opening up. I would assure her that the discussed matter is confidential and will only be shared with my team, after Michelle gives her consent for the project.

Conversation Overview with Michelle:

Jane: Hey Hi Michelle, Thank You for giving us time. I am Jane Reynolds and I will be assisting you in this project.

Michelle: Hi Jane. Nice Talking to You.

Jane: Michelle, I would like to start this meeting by giving you a brief about my team. We are a team of 6 people, who work as in-house consultants with Goodwill Industries. We have been associated with the company for past 6 years and have handled various consultancy projects for the company. Every member in my team has a specialization. I, myself, have retail specialization. As you have concerns with the retail performance of the company’s outlets in Boston, I will be helping you with it.

In the last quarter, we were working with the CEO of Goodwill Industries in California. There was an operational issue and we collaborated on solving the same. In the past, my team has handled various retail oriented projects.

I would now like to know the specific objective with which you want our assistance.

Michelle: I had went through some of the work done by your team, Jane, and was quite impressed. I head Goodwill Industries in Boston area. There are 12 stores in the location. Overall the performance of the stores has been quite decent. However I want the stores under my purview to emerge as benchmark performers. I want to come up with interventions which facilitate the operational efficiency as well as customer responsiveness of the stores. I am looking for your assistance in this specific area.

Jane: Well, I hope we live up to your expectations Michelle. Before this meeting, I was going through the performance overview of Goodwill stores in Boston. I must commend you that the stores are doing quite well. There are certain aspects, however, where I feel, there is need for improvement. But first I want to know the short and long term objectives of Goodwill stores in Boston.

Michelle: The short term objective of the stores across Boston is to reduce customer complaints by 15% in a year’s time. The long term objective is to come up with interventions which enhance the operational efficiency of the stores by 25% and customer responsiveness and satisfaction by 25%, in a time span of 5 years.

Jane: Woa.. The goals are quite specific and ambitious. I hope, my team and I will help you in this regard. I would also like to know one thing. What are the primary metrics on which the performance of each store in Boston is evaluated?

Michelle: Well.. The performance of the stores is evaluated every quarter. However the annual performance assessment is done in the month of March. The primary metrics which are used for performance evaluation are as follows:

· Revenue generated by sales

· Number of customers catered

· Number of customer complaints

· Customer satisfaction percentage

· Number of stockout instances

Jane: Ok Michelle. The metrics seem quite functional. I would like to have a performance snapshot of the stores in last 3 financial years. If you could mail them, I will assess the same and come up with a plan for meeting your objectives. Also I would like to share the methodology which my team follows.

· You are our client in the project. All information shared by the client is kept confidential.

· Based on the client’s requirements, a plan of action is developed

· If the plan of action is approved by the client, an onsite meeting is conducted. Here the primary stakeholders of the project are met and a comprehensive discussion on the project is conducted

· Based on the stakeholder meeting, implementation plan of project is conducted

· Based on the scope and purview of the project, the implementation can be divided into phases

· Client’s feedback is taken at the end of each phase, so that the project outcomes are aligned as per client’s satisfaction

For now, I would like you to share the performance snapshot of each of the 12 stores for the last 3 financial years. I will be sharing the plan of action by Tuesday EOD. If we get the approval from your end, we can go ahead with the project.

Do you have any questions, Michelle or we are good to proceed?

Michelle: No no.. we are good to proceed. I will ask my assistant to share the snapshots with you by EOD. I am quite impressed with your proposal and will be looking forward to the plan of action.

Jane: Then we can conclude this meeting. Thank You Michelle for your time

Michelle: It was nice talking to you. Looking forward for our association, Jane.

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