CSIRO research has demonstrated scope for dramatic gains in business performance across a range of small and medium enterprises (SMEs) in Australia.

A building company, an independent girls' school, a bus company and psychiatric hospitals are among 18 SMEs that have received a strategic boost from CSIRO.

A team of CSIRO statisticians who specialise in management investigated how each of the companies operated and made suggestions to help them improve their performance.

"Without our involvement in the program, we probably would not have won the NSW Quality Builder of the Year award, worth at a guess, around $100,000 to us," says Mr John McKenna, Managing Director of Marksman Homes.

"The CSIRO project helped our team understand the need for data, develop better communication channels and focus our attention on the important things," Mr McKenna says.

The researchers have been working in a diverse range of industries, locations and SME sizes as part of this project for around 15 months. This has allowed them to find common problems and to identify problems that were specific to individual enterprises.

The researchers found that many of the companies needed to develop their strategic thinking, review their performance measures, to improve communication, look at how they did things, and adopt better methods of data presentation.

"We believe that if a company can clearly define what they want to achieve, we can help them along the road to finding out how to better measure those things that will determine and influence their success," Mr Dransfield says.

"This approach helps us identify where there are areas for improvement," Mr Dransfield adds.

The 18 organisations that have been involved in the study are a diverse group and include pathology services, hospitals, home building, chemical manufacturing, coach services, apparel manufacturing, software engineering, local government, consulting services, food processing and distribution, health care outsourcing, legal services and a restaurant.

"We recommended ways in which they could address problem areas. We worked with the staff to resolve problems and improve particular aspects of the business," Mr Dransfield says.

Mr Jeff Murray, Business Services Manager for Maitland-based Blue Ribbon Coaches and Travel said that the project has helped them to take a good look at how they identify and solve problems, thereby streamlining processes. One such area was the vehicle breakdown procedure.

"We conducted an exercise using a deployment flowchart. The flowchart allowed us to identify many time-consuming loops in our processes. We realised that before a mechanic or a replacement vehicle was sent there were quite a lot of people involved. This tended to slow down the efficiency of the process. By using the flowchart we were able to identify which steps could be avoided to improve the process," Mr Murray says.

Ms Jenny Allum, Head of SCEGGS Darlinghurst said that the process had changed the way they viewed their performance.

'We used to measure our performance using financial reports and test results. The CSIRO has showed us that 'soft' measurements were OK and that we could gather other useful information. We now look at the health of the whole school, and the confidence and development of the girls as well as how well the tuckshop is going this month."

St John of God Hospitals, a not-for-profit enterprise primarily providing mental health services, found that the project helped them understand the system of processes in the hospitals and to use this to strengthen their measurement system.

"About half of our permanent staff were involved in a series of workshops which explored the fundamentals of what it is we do and what we are trying to achieve - they created a real buzz," says Annette Chennell, Director of Strategic Support.

More information:
Mr Stan Dransfield, CSIRO 02 9325 3251 (Thursday) or 0417 217 363 (mobile)
or
Kate Brown, CSIRO, 02 9325 3102