This week I’ve received the final information for my cost reduction project. This has been a long and challenging process as I essentially received information on every service Telstra provides, whether relevant or not. I then began extracting the relevant services from each source of information and converted the data into efficient formats. The data I’ve received is from numerous sources, so there is virtually no consistency throughout it. This makes collating it that much more complicated as much of the data has to be converted into new formats so it can all be interpreted in the same way so real conclusions can be made. In addition to this duplicated data or crucial missing data were persistent problems. Thus as well as extracting and transforming the data, I must identify all the duplicated information and remove it.

The core aim of the project is to track and manage off-net costs more efficiently. Off-net costs occur when Telstra does not have the capability to provide the full service so must lease certain capacities from other suppliers. For example if a customer requires part of its network in India and Telstra does not own the ‘pipes’ in India they have to pay a fee to Bharti (the Indian telecommunications suppliers) to use their pipes in order to supply the customer with the network they require. Thus my task was to take all the supplier information I received and collate it to create a single spreadsheet showing all the services across the whole of Telstra that would require contract renewals each quarter. From this information I then calculated the total MRC’s (monthly recurring charges) which illustrate the combined costs of upcoming renewals per region/supplier per quarter. From this I could then calculate the percentage decrease of off-net costs on completion of the quarter.

The project is essentially looking at reaping more benefits from the economies of scale large businesses receive. Telstra supplies services all over the world which are the responsibility of one of the Telstra Regions. Telstra’s regions are categorised as Telstra Europe, Telstra USA, Telstra Australia and Telstra Asia which is further sub categorised as Telstra Hong Kong, Telstra Japan, Telstra India, and Telstra Singapore. Each of these entities understandably prioritise the services their regions’ supply and are responsible for. Each entity has its own target and budget and in many aspects acts as an individual company which shares the Telstra name. 

In Telstra International we focus on all the regions. While the rewards are hugely significant when each branch works individually, these rewards could be even greater if the regions worked together. This sort of cooperation does take place across many aspects of the Telstra business, but there are further areas it could be extended to. Thus my project was attempting to further this cooperation by collating all the international data into a single source where we see exactly how many contracts exist with each supplier across all regions. Thus we can look at total MRC per supplier across the whole of Telstra putting them in much stronger position to receive overall lower costs from suppliers.

My deadline was Friday so I was eager to meet it. I’ve been working on numerous projects with various departments so the workload here’s never low. However between my many other tasks, was this project which I’d been working on alone so I was excited to see what I could achieve and eager to see the end result. It was definitely a hectic week with late nights and early mornings; I was often continuing the work well into the night to ensure I met the deadline. Although after my sleep deprived week, on seeing the work that was involved my boss realised the deadline wasn’t at all realistic! I’d been given dozens of pages of data each with thousands upon thousands of services which I had to collate and present in an efficient manner. However I believed Friday was my deadline so true to my word I had it finished by Friday.

This project was one that initially seemed simple enough but became more and more complex the more I completed. It was certainly time consuming and tedious at times, but I’ve worked on the figures for the next year so Telstra should get some real benefits from it.  There is also now a process in place so that this work can be done efficiently each quarter  - without having to start with all the time consuming data cleanse I began with – so Telstra should continue to receive benefits in future years. Knowing I played a vital role in this is a huge motivator and makes the tedious long nights in the office suddenly seem very fulfilling.

I made up for my hard week at work over the weekend by going to another one of Sydney's stunning beaches. Sea, sun, sand, speedboats, beach volleyball, surfing - it doesn't get much better really! It's a beautiful place with houses right on the beach it reminded me of something from the OC! I attempted surfing again with the aim of mastering it before I left Australia but that doesn't seem remotely likely. It's definately a lot harder than it looks and repeatedly falling face first into the water and smacking your head of the board on the way down seems to be inevitable, at least for me! Funnily enough with all the stereotypical Australian surfer dudes on the beach my surf teacher was originally from Ireland, and despite her reasoning that if she could do it I could, I had little success. Though I still have two weeks left so I'm not giving up just yet! Anyway everyone, still loving Sydney and still find it surreal to be relaxing on the beach with temperatures of 27degrees, in winter!