Monday, June 7, 2010

Consensus: The Political Platform of Revenue Assurance

In my family, I am the oldest of my generation. As a result, I often found myself the leader (aka, babysitter) of my younger siblings and cousins. At this point, I think I may need to rephrase. Adults (my parents, aunts, grandparents) expected me to be the leader, but in truth my younger family members really had little regard for me in this role. I can’t tell you how often they took great joy in disregarding any request I made of them, or took advantage of situations where I had no real authority.

Unfortunately, my lack of power did nothing to stop my family’s expectation of me to ensure their safety and bring them home in one piece at the end of the day. As you can imagine, this ended up presenting quite a predicament. How in the world could I convince my younger family members to listen to me? Especially since I knew that my directions were truly what was best for them. How could I make them want to hear what I was suggesting and, more importantly, see the value in it?

It is my understanding that Revenue Assurance Professionals today are often put in the same difficult situation, especially when it comes to the relationships they develop with operational managers. Management will hold RA accountable for risk and leakage, but operational managers want little to do with them, and in fact may even avoid working with them if possible. I have heard from various RA professionals how difficult it is to “convince” other department mangers to input their controls, or even let them in enough to figure out what controls are necessary.

Now, in some cases, this is because operational managers believe that the sole purpose of RA is to find leakage, which can only make them look bad. I have actually heard of a story where a Telco gave RA a percentage of all leakage they find. At face value this might not seem like such a bad idea, (especially if you are RA) but when you consider the logical ramifications, it puts RA into an absolutely horrible political position. It makes operational mangers feel that revenue assurance is making money by making them look bad. I can’t imagine too many operational managers who would be willing to work with RA in this scenario.
This is why I believe in a consensus based approach between RA and operation managers. As the GRAPA principle, Consensus states:

It is the primary objective of revenue assurance to promote cooperation between the operational teams involved in each of the different aspects of revenue management. The goal of revenue assurance is to create a solution that involves the consensus of all parties involved. RA is NOT a policing function, it is a problem solving function, and most problem solving requires the willful cooperation of all parties involved. 

Willful cooperation, there it is - the key that I missed when trying to manage my younger siblings/cousins, and the essential component to constructive relationships between RA and department heads. And the best way to build this type of relationship is through a consensus based approach to RA issues.

What makes consensus such a powerful principle, is that at its core it is about a role shift for the RA team, it opens the opportunity for operational managers to utilize RA before the risks get out of hand, rather than just bringing RA in to clean up the mess. It gives the message that the best revenue assurance solutions are created proactively, and that RA is there to assist, not point fingers. Consensus, in many ways, makes revenue assurance every department’s responsibility, but positions the RA team as the “go to” guys for establishing solutions. Now maybe I am wrong, but I would guess that operational managers would be much more likely to go to an RA team that is ready work with them and may offer unique solutions to problems, as opposed to the RA team who is dedicated to uncovering leakage which can only make them look bad.


Now I must say that there are other GRAPA principles that dictate this situation, including Departmental Sovereignty, Scope Management, and Integrity in Relationships. Today, however, is about Consensus, and how it can be a powerful tool for the RA professional in earning the respect and trust of operational teams.
I can go on and on about why consensus is so fundamental to the successful career of an RA professional, but that means very little without verification from the GRAPA community. As a professional principle, it is most certainly a community matter, and I look forward to hearing feedback.

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