GBM Waste Management is part of GBM UK, the award-winning demolition company of choice within their market sector. The business was in the process of readying itself for growth through acquisition. Software and Change supported GBM to select new operational and finance systems partner and build a scalable software architecture to support the new phase of business growth.
GBM’s waste management division has over 50 years’ experience and extensive working knowledge of local and national markets. The company tailors bespoke packages for industrial and commercial customers. GBM Waste Management plays a vital role, offering recycling and sustainable waste management services for GBM UK.
A pivotal moment of change
GBM was going through an accelerated process of back office and operational professionalisation headed by their Finance Director Leanne Fairburn. Leanne had assembled a high performing team, however the impact and rate of change was slowing as the software they were using, and the vendor relationship that supported it, were beginning to run out of road. Essentially they were outgrowing the solution and the relationship. More demand from customers for better reporting, better features
They had spent some time over a couple of years looking for alternative operational and back office solutions. Although they had gone to market to look, no suitable options had been identified or, if they had, the confidence to move forward with them was lacking. They needed to decide what software to buy to replace their legacy systems.
Over time they were increasingly having performance issues with both their finance and operational software systems. The urgency in decision-making was increasing as key team members were unhappy and customers were questioning the lack of self-service and integration.
Software to support the business’ three core competencies
GBM understood their business and their USP in the market. They provided an end to end service from demolition to waste management and recycling. The challenge was there was no commercial off the shelf solution that supported all three competencies well. GBM needed to understand where the key value and opportunity was in order to focus the search. They also needed to understand how the three core competencies collaborated internally and rationalise where the prioritisation of pooled resource usage resided.
Quite quickly Software and Change established that the constraint wasn’t just software, it was the business architecture and processes they operated that needed to change as well. GBM loan plant and machinery to clients and to the divisions within their company. It was a major contributor to their offer and also the biggest blind spot they had in their planning and scheduling. It was also no one person’s job even though it was the glue that held everything else together.
Capturing requirements and building a framework for implementation
Software and Change started by reviewing the business strategy with a subset of their leadership team. This was key to unlocking the potential business opportunity and then the search could be designed to support that. Looking at technology that was as adept at supporting back office as it was yard and recycling centre operations as well as vehicle and plant maintenance was multifaceted and required a blend of approaches.
We took a deeper dive into opportunity areas and designed a requirements capture framework to support the market approach. We took them through specific rounds of search and qualification, to assemble a short list of softwares that could do the job. Then we refined the list further with a vendor team that GBM felt they could work with long term.
We developed documentation that would bring to life what it could look like and started to understand the impact that it would have the organization, processes and people.
Finally on selection Software and Change built a framework for software implementation that GBM followed with the vendor to successful implementation and return on investment.
Working as one team to deliver new operational and finance systems and partners
Software and Change integrated into their team, working as one. We lead them from uncertainty on next steps, to settled decision-making, and into new operational and finance systems as well as new roles and responsibilities and business areas within 12 months. GBM also acquired and implemented a new acquisition within the same timeline.
In addition to new operational and finance systems and partners, we delivered a scalable software architecture to support the next phase of business growth, proven by the acquisition and implementation of a new site in the process.
