Atos Origin has a long history of working with the Ministry of Defence (MOD), across a number of areas such as strategic procurement, leaning the supply chain, business transformation and learning and development.
Much of our work to date has been with the Defence Logistics Organisation (DLO) and Defence Procurement Agency (DPA), focused on areas such as:
- Supply chain improvement
- Procurement reform
- Programme management
- Organisation design and development
- Change management
- Skills transfer and training.
We are increasingly working with MOD Centre and have been involved in supporting work around the Defence Industrial Strategy and Acquisition Change Programme.
Strong Defence related experience
We currently have a number of consultants working with the MOD and its suppliers across a variety of projects We have over 150 consultants who have extensive experience of working within the MOD. We have a number of partners and Associate Partners currently engaged on assignments to the MOD, reflecting the fact that it is a key strategic client.
Central to our success in the defence arena is our commitment to the delivery of sustainable solutions. It is important to ensure that our defence clients can continue to realise the benefits of their investment once we have left the engagement.
This has been evidenced in the work we are doing to support the DLO in its comprehensive Procurement Reform programme. Here we have put an element of our fees at risk against the delivery of proven results that are validated by a clearly defined audit process. Additionally we also put fees at risk against ensuring sustainability of skills within the MOD Commodity Teams once our consutants departed from the project.
Procurement reform
In addition to the development and deployment of Category Management tools and methodologies the Procurement Reform project for the DLO covered many aspects of organisational design, and cultural and change management. We have supported the MOD in the implementation of new organisational structures and trained MOD staff to undertake new and challenging roles in commodity management. In recognition of our successful work in these areas, we have jointly won awards from the Management Consultancies Association (MCA) and have been shortlisted for further awards with the DLO by the Chartered Institute of Purchasing and Supply (CIPS).
Much of the training material that we developed in conjunction with the Procurement Reform team will be made accessible to the wider MOD through the Defence Academy, which will be delivering commodity management training in the future.
Our work in Procurement Reform is beginning to extend beyond the DLO into the wider public sector arena. Our consultants continue to provide advice and guidance to the MOD to enhance the learning and development programme.
Working as a team with MOD
Our ability to work with our MOD clients to provide cohesive and supportive teams has been demonstrated in other projects such as the AS90 ESA. Within the project we worked closely with both the FASS IPT and BAE Land Systems to transform the business relationships between the FASS IPT and its supply chain. AS90 support was outsourced through a ten-year, incentivised partnering contract with BAE Systems. To underpin this new type of partnering relationship, some restructuring of the organisation and its processes had to take place and innovative contract mechanisms established.
Strategic Supplier Management
Atos Consulting works with the MOD in a number of areas to help address supplier relationships and to facilitate closer working relationships, increased productivity and mutual benefits to both suppliers and the MOD.
The DLO Lean Support Programme sees our consultants work with MOD IPTs to identify, design and put in place optimised support chains. This project enables IPTs to work with their Prime Suppliers to improve their planning of requirements, outputs and budgets. This provides a platform for suppliers to execute delivery better by applying lean principles and increaing their involvement in supply chain.
This approach to involving suppliers in the business and cultural changes within the MOD can be seen in our work with the Supplier Relationships Group, where the objective is to bring more coherence to the relationships between the MOD and its key suppliers. The result is improved decision-making and performance for mutual benefit. We are now working directly with a number of key Prime in conjunction with MOD to introduce a more strategic approach to Supplier Management
The MOD recognises the need for cultural and change management support in implementing large business improvement projects. We continue to provide support in terms of strategic thinking and planning, and in the transformation of the processes, people and technology required to bring these changes to fruition.