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Transforming a Company’s Culture by Connecting Human Resources to Strategic Outcomes
 Case Study: Ontario Systems
The Client
Ontario Systems, a top provider of revenue-cycle, debt-management, and accounts-receivable services and software. Based in Muncie, Indiana, Ontario offers software applications and expertise to some of the country’s leading healthcare systems and collections firms.
The Situation
In 2008, after almost three decades in business, Ontario found itself at a crossroads: while it remained a leader in its industry, its success was beginning to wane. It was losing market share and its profits were declining. It had to turn things around—to reaccelerate and get back on a growth curve. Because its capital was primarily invested in its intellectual property—that is, its people—it focused its turnaround on its human resources, with the goal of hiring the best employees and developing HR into a strategic player.
FlashPoint's Approach
Ontario began addressing its challenges by undertaking a rapid-transformation process, and company leaders asked FlashPoint to join in as a key partner. Along the way, we served as a valued adviser, taking care to learn about Ontario’s business, to understand what it was trying to solve, and to offer candid and unbiased opinions.
Our work centered on tying Ontario’s human resource functions to its strategic plans. Throughout the transformation process and beyond, we continually looked at the desired end results and defined what role HR needed to play to achieve them. We focused on six key areas:
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Performance Management. We focused much of our efforts on helping Ontario build a performance-based culture. We started by looking at Ontario’s overall company goals, connecting them to the departmental level, and then eventually tying them to individual goals. We worked with leaders and managers to develop clear competencies for all employees because we wanted everyone at the company to understand how the work that they do impacts organizational success. We then redefined the company’s performance management processes, incorporating performance management software to help deliver success. |
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Compensation. In addition, we assessed and rebuilt Ontario’s compensation program so that it drives strategy execution. We worked with leaders to develop a compensation philosophy and used that philosophy to guide us as we built a total rewards package, including base pay and short- and long-term incentives. A key goal was to tie compensation to performance; the incentives component that we included rewards employees who execute Ontario’s strategy and achieve results. |
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Strategic Job Families. One innovative process we undertook was to help Ontario define its strategic job families—those positions that have the most direct impact on achieving the company’s strategic objectives. We worked with leaders to help them understand the key concepts of strategic job families—that certain roles are more critical to strategy, that it’s a priority to have top performers in those roles, and that the company must provide those people with greater rewards when they perform well. As part of this process, we created forms that leaders used to assess which roles at Ontario are indeed strategic. Once we defined the strategic job families, we looked to see if the company has the right people in these essential roles. As part of our compensation work, we created incentive plans that significantly reward employees in strategic roles if they are successful in achieving their goals. |
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HR Department Restructuring. Throughout our work with Ontario, FlashPoint also analyzed and restructured the HR department, making sure that HR staff members best utilized their strengths to help the company reach its strategic objectives. During much of the transformational process, we assisted the HR department with onsite support. We spent significant effort to help the HR staff recruit new roles, including a total rewards director and an organizational development and learning director. |
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Recruiting. As we worked with Ontario to hire new positions, we also helped it to establish better recruiting processes. First we redefined the position profiles, focusing them less on roles and responsibilities and more on what outcomes they should achieve; this helps Ontario to take a stronger results-oriented approach toward its recruiting and the candidates it hires. In addition, we made changes to the recruiting workflow, getting managers more involved in the process and giving them tools so they can take ownership. We made everything easier to manage by helping members of the HR department research, assess, and implement an electronic applicant-tracking system. |
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Leadership Development. Finally, to provide follow-up support, we built and facilitated training programs for many of the tools and processes we implemented. We offered managers ongoing coaching, and we conducted an in-house leadership development program to help build their skills. Ontario continues to provide many of these learning programs, and we work with the company to refine them as its needs evolve. The overall effect has been to reinforce Ontario’s strategic approach and to instill the new performance-based culture. |
The Results
Ontario’s CEO clearly indicates the impact of the company’s transformation efforts: in 2008 the company lost $11 million; within a year it experienced a $21 million profit swing, a result of changing the entire talent structure. “I can attribute that to what FlashPoint brought to the table,” he states. By partnering with FlashPoint to design and implement HR programs that tie to strategic outcomes, Ontario has built a workforce that is more engaged, connects better to the company, performs more efficiently, and better serves customers. As a result, the culture at Ontario has shifted dramatically to one of high expectations and high energy, ready to innovate well into the 21st century. |
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