Key Account Management Practices: TCS

Sreekumar S, 2010B21

Key Account Management practices in TCS

Key Account Management is a strategic planning approach that goes beyond traditional selling to tackle today's customer issues. It reaches inside both seller and buyer organizations, so KAM is undoubtedly more complex and more difficult than simple sales activity. Tata Consultancy Services Limited (TCS) is a global IT services, business solutions and outsourcing company headquartered in Mumbai, India and a subsidiary of the Tata Group conglomerate. It is the second-largest India-based provider of business process outsourcing services. TCS has been ranked #20 in the list of top companies of India, by Fortune India 500 magazine. TCS has a KAM policy by the name Global Account Management. Account Selection: As in any IT company the major criterion for selection of an account to be considered under KAM policy is the Revenue generated from the account. In simple words it denoted the Account Attractiveness. TCS follows a two parameter approach to classify and select accounts foe this policy: a. Account attractiveness b. Client parameters like Level of specialization, Criticality of account, Client Satisfaction level etc. Now based on this classification criterion under each vertical by which TCS works they have key accounts identified in every vertical. For example in the Banking sector they have AMEX as one of their Key Accounts as AMEX is one of their biggest clients. Likewise for each vertical like Infrastructure Management System, Quality Control, Independent Validation and Services they have each a separate set of clients being chosen as Key accounts Account Management TCS follows its own method of Key account Management. Being a customer centric company they have a one to one mapping process in their hierarchy as well. Starting from the Global Relations Manager for the Client to Business Relation Manager to Program/Project Manager to Team leads the hierarchy is mapped to a similar role of their clients for better accountability. This provides better accountability and responsibility with the client. Also every level of client has an independent level of escalation or point of contact in TCS. This helps in streamlining the process and maintains clarity about the ownership of each project under the same client. Again this structure is highly client centric. If the client wishes to have a different structure with a different hierarchy TCS is totally flexible for that. So once the Key account is identified, majorly the hierarchy is mapped one to one or is top down based on the client requirements.

Global Relationship Manager

Business relation Manager (BRM)

Business Relation Manager

Project Manger (PM) for Proj 1

Project Manager for Proj 2

ProjectManager for Poj 3

Legal, Monitoring and Responsibility Aspects Again based on the internal assessment done every year these accounts are reworked and the structure is changed based on the above mentioned parameters. Also the Global relationship Manager will be the key account handler for all the projects of that Client but at a lower lever each project will be handled individually by the Project Managers Now on the business front the Contract, legal agreement et al is done by Business relation manager. Master Service agreement for the entire client is handled by the Project Management Officer under Global relationship Manager from TCS and BRM works for smaller projects and their finer agreements at a lower level. Hence the ownership is offshore (PM) while responsibility lies with the onsite (BRM).