SUCCESS STORY
From Reactive to Predictable: How Smart Communications Cut Forecast Variance to 1–2% with Kantata
Smart Communications is a global SaaS leader in customer conversations management. Its Conversation Cloud — SmartCOMM, SmartIQ and SmartDX — helps more than 650 enterprises, many in highly regulated industries, deliversecure, personalized customer communications and frictionless digital experiences.
1-2%
monthly forecast variance, down from 10–12%
9%+ improvement
in CSAT scores
Industry
Company
Headquarters
What Kantata Replaced
Smart Communications’ professional services team uses Kantata to forecast accurately, staff projects quickly and deliver engagements on time and within budget. Joe Gionta, VP of Professional Services, North America, explained that Kantata helped the team move off manual, spreadsheet-based processes and mature into a predictable, proactive organization. According to Joe, “What Kantata does for us is make our lives easier. It makes our professional services team look professional.”
The Challenge
Before Kantata, Smart Communications’ professional services team ran its day-to-day work in spreadsheets, Word documents and manual processes. Work was ad hoc and repetitive, and the team was reacting to whatever came its way rather than predicting where it was heading. Forecast accuracy was a constant problem, leaving leadership unsure what to expect on revenue, utilization and margin.
Hidden costs dragged down the bottom line. With no automation to update forecasts from actual timesheets, every entry had to be duplicated in a spreadsheet, and a weekly scheduling meeting pulled the entire team away from billable, revenue-generating work. Project outcomes were, in Joe’s words, “not predictable in the least,” and the cost was the customer relationship itself. Smart Communications needed predictability, and the customer trust that comes with it.
“What Kantata does for us is make our lives easier. It makes our professional services team look professional. We are able to be predictable, on time and proactive.”
VP of Professional Services, North America, Smart Communications
Benefits
- Increased CSAT scores from 4 to 4.95
- Month-end close in 1–2 days, down from 1–2 weeks
- Week-by-week budget tracking that flags overruns before customers feel them
- Board-ready executive dashboards powered by Kantata data
The Solution
Smart Communications chose Kantata as the platform its professional services team needed to mature. The only hesitation was whether Kantata could deliver the capabilities it promised — so the team partnered with Kantata’s professional services group to make sure it was trained and enabled, and that it started from implementation best practices that gave it a solid foundation.
Today, Kantata is the first system the team logs into each morning and the last one closed at night. It produces the forecast for the executive leadership team—now at least three months out—and tracks resource availability, project status and RAID analysis. Resource management shows the global team’s availability on one screen, turning a four-to-five-day, multi-meeting staffing exercise into an on-the-spot decision that still keeps a human in the loop. Capacity planning makes it simple to see when to hire. Week-by-week project financials show how every project is trending against budget, effort and profitability, so the team can make changes mid-project and warn customers of a potential overrun well ahead of time. And the chief customer officer pulls board-ready reporting from a Salesforce dashboard driven by Kantata data.
“Ever since implementing Kantata, we’ve been entirely predictable to the point where the ELT doesn’t even worry about us anymore.”
VP of Professional Services, North America, Smart Communications
Happier Customers, Better CSATs, Better Delivery
With week-by-week visibility into budget and effort, the team spots issues early, communicates proactively with customers and puts a plan in place before an overrun becomes a surprise. Project delivery rose, and customer satisfaction followed: the team’s monthly scorecard climbed from 4.5 to an average of 4.95 out of 5 over the last year — a 9%+ improvement on an already strong team.
“From an on-time and within budget standpoint, we used to be pretty good at about 92%. Ever since implementing Kantata, we are 98.5%. That is music to my ears as an executive.”
Market-Leading Forecast Accuracy
Forecasting was once the “bane of the existence” of the PS leadership team. Before Kantata, Smart Communications missed its monthly forecast by as much as 10–12% and could see only two to three weeks ahead. Today the team forecasts within 1–2% every month — a market-leading level of accuracy — at least three months out. Leadership can now predict revenue and act to improve it, and the rest of the company trusts the numbers professional services puts forward.
“Prior to Kantata, we were missing our monthly forecast by as much as 10 to 12%. Ever since implementing Kantata, we’ve been in an accuracy of one to 2%, which is market leading.”
A Faster Close and a Mature, Predictable PS Team
The biggest surprise was month-end. Kantata’s period management capabilities cut the monthly close from one to two weeks to as few as one to two days. Combined with on-the-spot staffing and executive dashboards that no longer require manual digging, the team has moved from reactive to predictable — the foundation for “always deliver amazing.” Today, the ELT no longer worries about professional services.
“In order to be more mature, you have to have the tools to support you. It’s having a system like Kantata under the covers to support you.”
“If you were using spreadsheets to do everything, having a system like Kantata in place really allows you to grow as an organization and be a pleasure to the rest of your leadership team.”
VP of Professional Services, North America, Smart Communications
