ZNR Financial, a large accountancy corporation, is looking to assess the operations functions in three of its locations around the world. The ZNR Malaysia operations is marginally better than the operations of many of its competitors in the region, but still behind the very best players. The function is also viewed positively by other functions in the organisation and its ‘voice is heard’ when it comes to strategy conversations. Arguably, ZNR Japan operations continues to provide the basis on which ZNR Japan competes – it recently developed advanced AI software to enable the company to access new larger corporate clients who, in addition to basic accountancy services, value the customer intelligence that working with ZNR Japan can offer them. ZNR Hong Kong operations is now clearly better than most of its competitors and has an active voice in the strategic direction of the firm.

Recently, the operations team worked closely with marketing to respond to a key client’s request to develop more automated processing of high-volume, low-variety work on its behalf. The initiative has proved successful, so marketing is becoming increasingly keen to build on this internal ‘win–win’

relationship. Where would you position the three ZNR operations functions on the Hayes and Wheelwright model of operations contribution?