Centertop00 Essays - Electric Power Distribution, Electricity Market

Centertop00 Essays - Electric Power Distribution, Electricity Market centertop00 Who are we? Barr Towers are Australia's premier energy provider. Since the market deregulated, Barr Towers has emerged as the key player and has recorded year on year growth. Although competitors have come and gone, Barr Tower's focus on customer service has ensured that although their prices might be higher, people still want to have their energy supplied by Barr Towers. Barr Towers currently provides electricity and gas for 5 million Australian customers. They currently employ 2,500 people across 3 different offices in Melbourne. Barr Towers is owned and operated by Nick Barr. Barr started the company through the funds he made modelling. As a well-known Australian, Barr has become synonymous with a stable Australian economy. What do we do? Barr Towers is primarily focused on selling electricity and gas to their consumers. Barr Towers employs people to design their product lines (e.g. solar, electricity, gas plans), market their product lines (create ads) and then sell them to the customer (call centre). Separate call centres are used to call potential customers; call customers who are leaving us and we are trying to win back; and act as customer service representatives to assist customers with any issues they might encounter. Barr Towers takes pride in their one on one interactions, investing heavily in its customer service workforce. Future Strategy Barr Towers are currently looking at opening up in the recently deregulated Japanese electricity market. Although they have the capital to enter this market, they are worried that their service model will cost to much to run in Japan. In saying this, they are unsure that their model will be sustainable in the future in Australia either. In order to prepare for the entry into the Japanese market, Barr Towers are looking at ways to reduce their cost to serve customers. The board realise this is an issue moving forward and are looking for an innovative solution. They understand that they cannot continue Business as Usual (BAU) and expect a different result. They have assembled your team to look at the problems facing the business and where they should go into the future. Word on the street is that they have had a team from Microsoft pitch a new idea to them which will help with this. Although they don't have much for you now, they will try and send you as many materials as they can get their hands on and also give you some time with some senior executives. For now, they have a couple of key challenges for you. Key Challenges There are currently some major issues faced by Barr Towers. Location of offices Currently there are three offices in Melbourne that house the employees. A recent report by Deloitte has shown that Barr Towers looses 95 minutes of productivity per employee per week due to them walking between buildings. Second, as they are not near stations, employees walk 15 minutes to and from the station every morning. The board believes that if the office was closer to the station, employees would still catch the same train and arrive at work earlier and stay later. High cost to serve Although a major differentiator in the market, Barr Towers reliance on customer service teams are increasing their cost to serve. With a push to have call centres open on weekends, Barr Towers are worried about the potential costs of paying staff a casual wage and still making margins on electricity. The weekend wage of a casual employee is $35.50 and on a weekday it is $21.60 Unsure of preparation to enter Japan The market is there for the taking and Barr Towers aren't there yet. They need a clear plan of how much it is going to cost to get into the Japanese market and if it is worth it. Lack of collaboration The key issue that Barr Towers are worried about is the lack of collaboration between their staff. The teams do not talk, they do not interact and many people don't venture off their floor, let alone their office. Nous Group did a workplace audit and believed it was an issue with a lack of collaboration spaces. People were at the same desks they had spent their careers at. There were limited