BUSINESS CONSULTING DIVISION
PROJECT EXAMPLES

ACCESSIBILITY OF FINANCING FOR SME'S

We worked in conjunction with three international accounting bodies, CGA Canada, CPA Australia, and ACCA (UK), to identify the impact of the recession of 2009 on the access to financing for small and medium sized enterprises. With the support of research firms, we explored the access to finance and the impact of any changes both to SMEs worldwide and to SMEs in Canada. Much research has shown that SMEs are critical to the sustained growth of any economy. If SMEs do not have access to financing, they are unable to help pull our economy out of the recession. Our project concluded with the production of a report to be used by policymakers in Canada.

PRODUCT AND CHANNEL PROFITABILITY

Our client, a large multinational leader in its industry, wanted to assess the profitability of one of its core products. In order to compete effectively with its rivals, it began selling some of its core products through non-traditional distribution channels a few years ago. The sales volume obtained from these alternate channels has grown significantly but profits have not followed suit. Working with the organization's staff, our team analyzed the costs and profitability from the alternate distribution channels and compared them to the main sales channel. Although the costs associated to the alternate channels should be lower, we found that the costs were in fact much higher than anticipated and that the average customer retention was significantly lower than that in the main distribution channel. Based on our analysis, our customer was able to modify some of its business processes in order to positively improve profitability.

DEVELOPMENT OF PROFITABILITY SYSTEM

Our client, a large multinational selling a portfolio of diverse products, only knew the profitability of each of its business lines once a year. They could not use these annual financial statemnents to make timely strategic business decisions. Knowledge Plus analyzed the methodology used to develop the annual income statements and developed a similar methodology to report results on a monthly basis. Working with core organizational staff, our team developed a computer system to obtain monthly profitability results by business line.

TRADE FINANCE PROJECT

We completed a project with a major financial institution to identify domestic and international Trade Finance revenues by product. Knowledge Plus met with great success and laid the groundwork for future collection of data which is likely to have a major impact on the future strategic direction of the organization. We developed a database model to automate some of the manual processes and streamlined processes significantly. We were also instrumental in developing strong relationships between international regional offices and the corporate head office. The project was completed very successfully in only 6 months.

SYSTEMS PROJECT MANAGEMENT

Our client in the public sector is responsible for overseeing various organizations to ensure that their practices adhere to government regulations. Prior to our involvement, they planned their review of these organizations in a manual fashion. Working with a combined team of our Knowledge Plus and key client staff, we developed a computerized planning system to enable them to plan their workloads, their staffing, and their workplans appropriately.

CAPITAL MARKETS INFORMATION TRANSPARENCY

Our client, the Capital Markets division of a major North American financial institution was looking to improve the transparency of its internal reporting of I/T costs. Business units were being charged for their use of internal services. However, as is commonly the case with internal cost allocations, the business units did not fully understand the source of their costs, nor did they understand how they could impact them. Our team created and obtained buy-in on a methodology and implemented a financial system to improve the transparency of the costs. At the end of the project, business units could better manage their business and improve overall organizational profitability. The project was so successful that it was rolled out to the entire financial services institution.

PRICING PROJECT

Our client prices its product differently depending on its customer. Many sales representatives are involved in the sales process and each has a fair bit of flexibility in determining the ultimate sales price during customer negotiations. In order to ensure a standard process whereby sales representatives have enough discretion to close the sale without eroding profitability, our team developed a pricing model to identify the amount of discretionary margin the sales representative can give up.

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