A Truly Outstanding Partner
During 2011 and 2012, I was assigned to manage a large group of line grooming projects for GENBAND. GENBAND was under contract with Verizon California to help them consolidate line equipment in their central offices as part of a larger effort to both recover floor space and to reduce power usage.
” GENBAND provided the engineering expertise and tools that identified the optimum way to consolidate lines in less line equipment to allow for the power down and removal of excess line equipment after the lines were migrated out. ”
GENBAND subcontracted out the on-site labor to perform the actual line equipment transfers using cut sheets prepared by GENBAND Engineering.
In 2011, GENBAND used multiple subcontractors, including Alternate Communications, to perform the on-site line equipment transfers as engineered by GENBAND. Throughout that year Alternate (Commerx) soon established themselves as the most effective and innovative subcontractor out of the group, truly partnering with GENBAND to make the program a success. Organizationally they were very nimble and were able to staff up quickly finding experienced telecommunications people in the local area to perform the on-site work.
The line grooming program in California being pursued by Verizon was truly ambitious, trying to reduce the line equipment footprint in dozens of office in a very short interval. Because of the automated tools they brought to the project, GENBAND was able to quickly prepare LET lists that would otherwise have had to have been prepared manually by Verizon.
As part of the project. GENBAND was required to provide weekly progress reports on the number of transfers However, due to the sheer volume and velocity of the work it became clear that we had a problem with keeping an accurate count of what actually was being completed. This caused a lot of unnecessary revisits to areas of the Main Distribution Frame at each office that had already been worked and in turn slowed down the completion of individual projects. Manual tracking of LET completions was extremely cumbersome, time consuming and inaccurate. This is another area where Alternate differentiated themselves through innovation.
On their own initiative, Alternate developed a tool that allowed the direct application of GENBAND LET lists into a database that greatly simplified the completion and tracking of LET completions, and improved productivity on site. Rather than manually checking off a paper list, Alternate site teams were able to connect from site directly to the database and update the database directly, not only with an accurate count of what had been completed but an accurate record of exactly what individual LETs had been completed. Because they granted GENBAND direct access to view the database we were able to get near real time updates of the work that had been completed and also feedback on discrepancies found so that GENBAND could quickly react and make corrections as necessary.
Even though the Alternate teams in California were already the most productive and self-sufficient, the introduction of this tool improved productivity so much that we requested and Alternate agreed to allow other subcontactors to use the tool as a means to help them get caught up. Alternate did this voluntarily and without argument because they truly wanted the overall program to succeed and they knew it wouldn’t unless everyone succeeded, not just them.
Because of their outstanding performance and innovation, GENBAND awarded the site work for the entire 2012 Verizon California Line grooming program to Alternate communications. Despite the greatly increased volume of work due to having the responsibility for all the sites in California for 2012, Alternate was able to scale up, acquiring and retaining a large pool of qualified talent to meet the demands of the program. Thanks in large part to their database tool that they had developed the previous year and the hard work and quality consciousness of their entire staff, the 2012 line grooming program in California was a resounding success.
“Alternate was and continues to be a truly outstanding partner to GENBAND!”
Scott Slaughter, PMP
Project Manager
*Genband is now Ribbon Communcations
*Alternate is now Commerx
*Glow Networks is now CSS Corp