Situation
Our client, one of the UK’s largest water and wastewater utilities, was running a SAP S/4HANA transformation central to its regulatory delivery commitments. What began as a £20m programme had grown into a £70m forecast, with key milestones slipping and workstreams drifting away from the programme and the people it was meant to serve. The original go-live date had already been missed.
Senior leaders had no independent read on delivery quality. The systems integrator was, in effect, marking its own homework. The main board sponsor came to Valcon directly for an in-flight review, which led to a clear mandate: recover the transformation.
Approach
Valcon put a small team on the ground and ran a focused review, presenting the findings to the company board. We were then asked to lead the recovery.
- A minimum viable product scope was agreed and delivery split into two phases, taking risk out of execution and pulling benefits forward.
- Governance was streamlined to speed up decisions, with agile principles brought in so users stayed part of the delivery team rather than spectators.
- Workstreams were co-located under dedicated project managers, with a consistent engagement rhythm set across teams and stakeholders.
- One assurance framework replaced the patchwork of vendor-specific testing and applied to every systems integrator.
- Senior leaders gained a real-time, independent view of programme status and risk for the first time.
Results
The first re-plan landed far faster than the systems integrator’s forecast, delivering real cost savings and a clear lift in business confidence. The next phase went live successfully, back under control after serious delay and overrun.
The programme came in within its revised budget, with the controls and transparency to stop further cost leaking out. Stakeholder confidence returned on the back of better transparency, integration and governance. And the client named Valcon its partner of choice.
Make procurement-led transformation deliver more value
Valcon helps senior teams turn complex supplier ecosystems, delivery risk and transformation spend into clearer control, stronger outcomes and measurable impact.
