Few companies capture the imagination like Revlon. Incredibly high profile, globally
recognized and cutting edge, Revlon is a recognized leader in the fashion and image industry. A
company that consistently delivers such highly accepted products expects it’s partners to bring the
same kind of performance to the table. Claudia, Beyonce, Cindy, Jessica, Latifah, Kate, Eva, all
high profile, professional personalities. Because of our experience in high profile and complex
environments BIA was engaged to help modernize Revlon’s product delivery capability.
Case Study:
An internal analysis at Revlon revealed that in some cases they were ten or more years behind
industry standards. Areas such as supply chain, production capability and distribution
management, reliability and quality control were at risk and avoidable costs were imbedded in
their processes. Because Revlon recognizes the importance of being a leader, they took strong
measures to resolve these wide spread deficiencies and engaged BIA to lead the initiative.
Our approach consisted of an application rationalization and modernization assessment, coupled
with a process reengineering strategy. Not only did BIA undertake to drive cost out of the
applications, but to work with the business to redefine their production methodologies, logistics
planning and facilities management. By first assessing their environment and prioritizing their
pain points a road map was developed that addressed the steps to be taken towards improvement.
Each of those steps were tied into specific values of the business and their impact to the overall
process. In short, our road map was tied to a burn down list that allowed the business to drive
their improvements down to any point they considered beneficial to their business.
Most systems and processes were impacted, for example their ERP application was modernized,
their audit controls were updated and production automated. But, this case study is not about the
deliverables, it’s about how we got there.
There are four main components to IT/Business modernization. The top level is governance
which includes audit and approval processes. Underneath governance are the business processes
which include day to day operations. Beneath business processes are the applications and under
applications is infrastructure. The key to modernization is fully integrating all components in the
road map.
The road map has both a present and future state. The present state identifies the details of your
four main components and prioritizes them according to relative importance. By assembling the
structure properly the relationship between the layers and the priority of each detail will clearly
identify the best opportunities for the business. In other words when you identify the biggest
problem you automatically identify it’s interaction and impact on all interconnected business
components.
The future state is an extrapolation of each component (governance, business process,
applications & infrastructure) to a modern, state of the art position. By transforming the present
state to a future state the interaction of components and details will remain valid for the business.
BIA built the future state view using the existing state model. This
retained the business nuances and kept the solution specific to Revlon.
Some of the improvements were simple to identify and implement such as application reduction,
server consolidation and rollout maximization. Other improvements were more difficult such as
process automation, logistics optimization and operational optimization. Some were very
complex and required a substantial commitment from business leaders such as ongoing
governance framework, footprint rationalization, shared services and business integration.
In a business transformational journey, business value, simplification, integration and value are
the markers that guide your steps and ensure success.
“Revlon is committed to leveraging and delivering the best.
BIA was key in applying that philosophy to ourselves.”
Luis De La Mora,
Director IT, Revlon