CASE STUDY: Alaknanda Business Corporation Ltd

SHREYA DESHPANDE, D14021

1. Identify the reasons which led to the poor state of affairs regarding
performance of ABCL.

Based on the feedback of ABCLs 10 key clients, the following has been established:
a. Shortage of competent staff: It is not known how many employees ABCL has but
with comments from all 10 clients there isnt anybody sane in the office to answer
queries. Once client went to the extent of saying that the Delhi office doesnt have an
idea of the products/parts produced. ABCL needs to be able to hire the right kind of
individuals, steel rods manufacturing, is a complex process, involving the production
of multiple parts or components. Staff in in-house sales, field sales and operations
need to be experienced to understand the workings of the same.
b. No Relationship Management: All of the clients harp about none of the sales
people visiting them at regular periods of time.
c. No direction in terms of supply chain management: Most clients give ABCL a
score of 70/100 for being flexible in accepting orders of one or any size. What good
is this score if ABCL doesnt meet delivery and logistics timelines.
d. Incorrect application of TPM: With the number of erroneous orders delivered and
mix ups reports, most clients say that inspite of having TPM tools in place, ABCL
seems to be making more mistakes. They however got delivery timelines and
accuracy of inventory right for smaller players. This improvement took place after a
year.
e. Non responsive to customer queries/issues: Lack of daily status updates, non
responsiveness towards problems faced by customers, even the lack of feedback
taken from clients all boils to a heavy lack of interaction with clients and the lack of a
customer support team.
f. Lack of inventory management: Inventory and supply chain management go hand
in hand. If ABCL is unable to keep a track of inventory, even with the use of an ERP,
the tool is of no use. The mix up of inventory will alone be the reason of a heavy
damage in reputation.
g. Lack of quality management: A lot of customers though give ABCL an above
average score for product quality, that simply isnt enough to stay afloat. Clients like
Vandana Fasteners, the biggest in the market are most likely to want parts in 100%
perfect condition without any deviation whatsoever. It is also because Vandanas
clients are also large ones with SLAs of the highest kind.
h. Unable to learn from industry practices and competitors: With a small market
having only two secondary steel producers, it is easy to keep a track of what and

i.

j.

k.

l.

how competitors work and improve their business. The top 5 ones being Tata Steel,
SAIL, Vizag Steel Plant, and Mukund Steel, hygiene and best practices are generally
made public.
Lack of understanding of customer persona: It doesnt look like ABCL has made
an effort to understand whats critical for each of their customers. Its shocking as
60% of their sales is reliant on these customers and this number may also diminish
with these clients making ABCL a secondary back-up supplier.
Lack of managerial direction: There doesnt seem to be a clear path or a direction
for the entire company. Independent leadership is only a small component of a
successful management. Participative management is lacking because Mr. Gupta
clearly has no idea whatsoever of what his customers want or his employees want.
Putting up tools and doing one survey (that too because the consultant wanted to
conduct one) does not ensure the loyalty of customers or help you ensure critical
things of the company, regularity in communication with employees does.
Lack of internal communication: Mentioned in the above point, there is a lack of
internal communication between branches and within people in each office,
especially the head office.
Warehouses at important locations: If a majority of ABCLs end clients are in
certain locations, eg: Hyderabad, setting up a warehouse makes more sense and it
will improve logistics and meet delivery timelines of ABCLs clients and their
customers.

2. What recommendations and suggestions you would make to improve the

situation?

a Organization wide survey: Senior management should conduct three types of

surveys:
o Senior level employee survey
o Mid-level employee survey
o Base level employee survey
The survey needs to come from the top leaders of the company broadly inquiring
about the following:
o What do you think the company is lacking?
o How can the company improve?
o What ideas do you have?
o Do you think youve been informed enough about products?
o How can we improve training on products, processes and operations?
o What is their vision of the company? What does the company according to
them stand for?
o What in the opinion of employees is ABCLs USP, weaknesses?

SHREYA DESHPANDE, XLRI 2014, D14021

o What is the culture of the company? What do you think it should be?
o How are your leaders? Do they lead well?
o What is the work environment like?
b. Data Analysis: Outsource a data analytics company to conduct a detailed
data survey, retrieve important data to be able to strategize and have heads of
each division present this data in a board meeting that should be conducted on a
regular basis. Have divisions have their own internal huddles to be able to rectify
issues and gaps. A gap analysis is a must here to understand constraints and
bottlenecks.
c. Hiring and Human Resource: This is an exhaustive exercise, but it is
imperative as it seems like customers/clients do not have executives of ABCL to
speak with. Hire experienced key account managers and conduct a pulse check
within existing employees of why they arent motivated enough to do their jobs.
HR should also:
o Set expectations along with division heads for employees and chart out
criteria for bonus and salary raises.
o Improve on job descriptions so employees know what their KRAs are.
o Set the ground and the message for innovation. A culture of collaboration
must be fostered and that can only be done if everyone in ABCL is on the
same page. For instance, Alan Mulaly, ex CEO of Ford established a plan or
a program called One Ford to establish the message that everyone needs to
work and participate together, which also meant that information needs to be
cascaded to every employee of the company, to ensure transparency. It is
no known secret that collaboration ensures the flourish of a company.
d. Product Knowledge Transfers: Every person in the organization should be
taken through a product walkthrough to be able to understand the organizations
purpose of manufacturing steel rods. The composition, the use, etc and sales
personnels must be given the opportunity to go for industry events to network and
learn more about industry trends. This imperative as it seems like ABCLs
employees do not know how to answer client queries and hence as a result lose
these clients.
e. Status updates/Delivery partners: In addition to providing daily reports
through tools, ABCL should establish delivery touch points and partners to
improve its delivery cycle and turn-around time. Establishing delivery touch points
and also renting out spaces to ensure timely delivery and stock maintenance is
imperative for the business to grow. Ofcourse, warehouses and spaces can finally
be bought instead of rented when clients in that region grow.

SHREYA DESHPANDE, XLRI 2014, D14021

GPS Delivery devices with truck riders/delivery personnels can give a real
time status update on the delivery of goods making it trackable for ABCLs clients.
These devices can also be integrated into CRM/ERP/Inventory Management
softwares.
d. Bi weekly client visits: Account managers need to meet with clients to
understand their requirements and log those details in these softwares. They
must always carry an update of what organization is upto. This is especially
important in understanding what out of their product line is most purchased. This
is the crux of the entire issue. Non responsive sales team is no good because
B2B Marketing, B2B clients care about relationships. They work well, when
there are points of contact they can rely on to sort issues. ABCLs team is known
to be friendly, the company must use this to strike a better rapport with clients by
meeting with them more often. B2B sales is built on relationships. Key
accounts and sales should also have reports with them to show delivery
timelines, quality rates, etc.
e. Branding, Design & Marketing Collaterals: Product catalogues need to be
revised and made more detailed for clients to have a good idea of who their
dealing with and what ABCL has to offer. Have a tag line and position ABCL as a
company that cares about clients.
f. More internal meetings to ensure transparency.
g. TQM: Have an expert visit ABCL to audit the implementation of TPM AND
TQM because it looks like ABCL isnt getting this right. An experts opinion
matters a lot. Have industry experts also give a talk to senior management on
how to manage their teams and how to work on data to strategize.
h. Set competition for branches: Have ABCLs branch heads compete on a
healthy fashion on upselling, meeting quality and delivery timelines with their
clients.
i. Less IS more: Shave of product components that you are not deriving any sale
out of and focus on those that are required by your clients big and small.
j. Inventory Management: Through data, assess the predictability of the
demand for different products, assess when it reaches minimum inventory for the
purpose of replenishing the same. This is NOT difficult considering
manufacturing companies pretty much go through set delivery schedules of
predicted and set quantities.
Conclusively, softwares and tools only work when your employees know how to
use it. It seems like ABCLs core is that there is no communication between
clients and employees. This core can only be solved if ABCLs employees have a
clear direction on how they need to address their clients. This can be done if
employees are given set expectations, the tools to carry this forward (like a

SHREYA DESHPANDE, XLRI 2014, D14021

phone for instance when they are on the go), motivation to work in ABCL. Deeper
issues like fixing a dissolving I dont care culture and attitude within the
company. ABCL seems to be complacent and its people play a major role in
fueling the same.
A transformational change needs to be established here in terms of getting all
divisions to believe in what ABCL does.

SHREYA DESHPANDE, XLRI 2014, D14021