In an evolving world, we help you reimagine your operating models, technology, processes and operations – and provide the transformation engine room to ensure success.

Transformation, by its very nature, is hard – and change doesn’t happen in your comfort zone. You need a transformation partner who can listen and support you to solve the complex challenges you face, guide you to seize opportunities and drive your transformation through to completion.

Whether you’re at the start of a programme, need help along the way or even post programme, our people-centred approach and nature ensures lasting, empathetic and impactful change.

  • Experience-led
  • People-centred
  • Future-focused
  • Experience-led
    purple icon depicting a leadership chart
    With decades of transformation expertise, both in business and in consulting, we’re dedicated to helping you achieve your goals.
  • People-centred
    purple icon depicting a team of people
    We foster collaboration, listening and understanding, partnering with you and putting people at the heart of your transformation.
  • Future-focused
    Future-focused
    We'll always share the art of the possible so you’re bold and brave in driving change that makes a meaningful impact.

Our services

Project and programme management

Defined and robust project and programme management are vital for planning and delivering successful and sustainable change and achieving business outcomes. You need the right foundations to successfully deliver initiatives from inception through to completion. You can get guidance and value-adding insights, including independent recommendations, from our expert teams: driving richer conversations, challenge, and resolutions.

How we can help:

  • Programme and project management mobilisation and delivery throughout the lifecycle
  • Identifying opportunities for change
  • Prioritising scale and timing in the change portfolio
  • Implementing the right governance, processes, tools and methods, and driving effective delivery through robust insight, control, and capabilities
  • Building the business case and quantifying the potential value and benefits

You'll get an experienced transformation team that provides advisory and hands-on support throughout the lifecycle, developing transformation and change capabilities and building a structure to drive sustainable change to support long-term growth.

Change management

Effective change management is at the heart of ensuring your people are engaged and supported throughout business transformation. Our experienced team can support in the following:

  • assessing the impact of your change on your people, and presenting detailed insights of the impact to your business and its strategic direction
  • designing a tailored approach and plan to implement change
  • enabling or engaging with your people to manage the successful execution of sustainable change.
Operating model transformation

Your operating model is central to all your organisation's activities. Rethinking your current processes and aligning them with your strategic needs and those of the wider market drives cost savings, creates scalability, and creates efficiencies to make your operating model future-fit and resilient.

The need to adapt your operating model may result from changes to people, processes, systems, skill sets, location, operational demands and macroeconomic factors.

We offer tailored solutions and a multi-disciplinary team of transformation programme managers and functional area experts to drive the most value from transformation. We can lead the process from inception to close while having full visibility of all activity within, inciting confidence in our stakeholders. Our services cover the full transformation lifecycle and include advisory and management of the following:

  • Operating model transformation programme design, mobilisation, and delivery
  • Target operating model design
  • Target operating model implementation

Our approach enables a focus on value-adding activities that transform business inputs into tangible outputs – helping manage and inform the decisions you make on your change agenda.

Project management office

The set up and running of a transformation and change engine room, commonly known as a project management office (PMO), is key in driving forward change at pace. Done right it's an active value-add function for your organisation and provides time, perspective and steer to your leadership team, ensuring they're equipped with information-enabling strategic outcomes

How we can help:

  • Designing a PMO which fits your organisation culture, team, and strategic needs
  • Assessing the resilience of your existing change capabilities and PMO, and providing practical insights to improve how you transform
  • Enabling leadership teams to go beyond by building your PMO, setting the direction and pace to achieve successful change
  • Immersing ourselves at the heart of your organisation as your interim PMO
Business analysis

Analysis is at the heart of decisions. You'll get support with requirements gathering and analysis throughout your transformation journey to support best-informed outcomes. This enables you to shape the direction of travel, with rich analysis as a reference point for change. We can support you from the start of your journey – defining your business case for change, measuring potential benefits, and assessing progress throughout your transformation. You'll always get the best possible support, insight, and practical guidance.

How we can help:

  • Assisting you in scoping your information gathering requirements, including facilitating workshops and interviews with key stakeholders to produce a complete view
  • Facilitating requirements gathering, liaising with stakeholders across your business, and managing the process
  • Producing analysis to inform recommendations in relation to your change or transformation alongside other teams
Carolyn Hicks
Head of Business Transformation and People Advisory
Carolyn Hicks

Why Grant Thornton

We don’t deliver change to you; we deliver change with you – working closely and empathetically to bring you and your people on the journey with us.

Clients often tell us that we understand their challenges and deliver tailored solutions that align with strategic objectives.

We’ve delivered long-term value in our previous engagements, from large-scale transformations to adapting business structures. We define the right solution with services that are completely bespoke to your organisation. 

Safeguarding a food and beverage manufacturer’s supply chain

The challenge
A fragmented global operating model, inefficient in delivering the ambitious vision of the business and unable to feel the benefits of a significant in-flight programme.
Our solution
Financial impact modelling and implementing mitigating measures led to a range of possible solutions. We then recommended an optimal operating model to support the chosen option.
The results
We were able to drive client value and help safeguard the supply chain, along with advising on an optimal operating model to spur efficiency and accuracy in executing the solution.

Delivering a best-in-class transformation office for a retailer

The challenge
As part of a complex transformation programme to support its business ambitions, a major retail client required a robust transformation engine room to help drive value.
The solution
We designed and implemented a best-in-class operating model, emphasising value-adding activities with the agility to execute the largest transformation programme cost-effectively.
The outcome
Comprehensive transformation management support – enhancing risk mitigation, ensuring transparency up to board level and offering useful insights that informed business decisions.

Implementing a transformation programme to deliver benefits

The challenge
After acquiring a pharmacy business, our pharmaceutical client needed to transform its operating model for dispensing over 30 million prescription items annually across 800 stores.
The solution
We helped plan, coordinate, enable and implement the transformation programme. We established a structure and a dynamic financial model to underpin phased delivery of benefits.
The result
Significant cost savings and successful implementation of a transformative, market-leading operating model supported by technology and a new purpose-built organisation structure.

What’s driving your need to change?

  • “We need to transform because our cost base is too high”
  • “We need to change because we can’t attract and retain the right people”
  • “We need to transform because our technology is out of date”
  • “We need to change because there’s a growth opportunity present in the market”
  • "We need to change because there's a shift in customer/consumer behaviour"
  • "We need to transform in response to new competition"
  • "We need to transform because we strive to align with regulatory requirements and ESG standards"

Wherever you are on your transformation journey, whatever your challenges, if you’re struggling to realise the benefits then our highly skilled and collaborative teams can help you break through to be truly transformational.

 

How we can help you transform:

1 Portfolio / Programme Management

Best practice guidance and expertise on how to design and run large-scale transformations, change portfolios and programmes that deliver the intended benefits within time, scope and budget.

2 Transformation Management Office (TMO)

Support with establishing, running and improving the core engine room to deliver successful transformation across your organisation. We also assist with designing and running the overall programme structure, TMO structure and governance, including business case development, programme measurement and tracking.

3 Operating Model Transformation

We work together to design your operating model: defining how your business functions, what capabilities you have – processes, data, people and systems – and when and where to apply them.

4 Transition Management

We prepare you for the transition back to business-as-usual after a large-scale transformation, for example, supporting resource re-deployment, centres of excellence design and setup, and continuous improvement processes design and deployment.

5 Programme Assurance

We can review and assess in-flight programmes, and make recommendations for improvements, with an ongoing assurance partner role or one-off health check approach.

6 Change Management

We help you engage your people across the organisation to design, deliver and embed the change: practically, culturally, behaviourally and emotionally, with diversity and inclusion (D&I) embedded as a matter of course.

Workshop

Transformation Room: manage change — action success

Many businesses and organisations are reconsidering their goals and strategy. In these half-day virtual workshops our transformation experts share personalised guidance in areas where many businesses need support.