Premier Pro Sports League Gets the Agility it Needs to Carry Out Its Mission

Introduction

One of the world’s premier pro sports league needed to consolidate in order to modernize. Its technology was evolving, five different vendors contributed staff to its IT operations and it needed to become more agile to grow at pace with the marketplace. To meet this need, the league turned to a company known for its unique approach to solving complex problems in process management and niche recruitment: JDA TSG. Through a competitive RFP award, the league charged JDA TSG with bringing the management and staffing of its IT operations under one roof. Specifically, the league asked JDA TSG to future-proof management strategy, recruitment, process engineering, and team performance management for its technical operations group—giving the league more flexibility to take advantage of emerging opportunities. 

The Challenge

The league’s technical operations group was staffed and supported by a group of contractors supplied by five different companies, each with their own recruiting process, billing department and management structure. Support was provided 24x7x365 for the league’s three data centers across the country.

The league recognized that this structure had significant limitations and was ripe for transformation and efficiency. They saw the need to prioritize a wholesale change to the IT Operations group. The league wanted consistent hiring and onboarding and uniform processes and procedures, including disaster recovery to ensure business continuity. In addition, the league wanted to create a better experience for these dedicated resources from a management, communications and opportunities standpoint. As contractors, resources had no long-term perspective, or sense of ownership with their tasks, often leading to mediocre results and untenable attrition. The goal was to create a cohesive team that was managed by an organization that genuinely cared about their employees, and inspired excellence in and commitment to their work. The league needed the agility to support a fast-moving and diverse organization, where priorities can shift quickly.

The Solution

After working closely with the league to review its goals and needs, JDA TSG conceived a solution that would solve the league’s challenges both near and far. JDA TSG created a roadmap for consistent recruiting, onboarding, fulsome benefits, continuous training, performance management and process development to illustrate how the IT operations group could be structured for efficiency and growth. 

The Results

As stewards of the league’s day-to-day IT operations for more than six years, JDA TSG has infused strategic future thinking, management expertise, performance analytics and process optimization into the league’s IT operations. The outcome:

• Increased employee retention, productivity, output and performance. Attrition was lowered from 50% to 15% year-over-year. Productivity increases allowed for overflow of project work from other teams to be taken on by the JDA TSG Operations Team while still meeting all service metrics.
• Significantly improved existing service levels, ongoing infrastructure maintenance and risk mitigation. Under JDA TSG’s leadership service level agreements (SLAs) are being met 100% of the time; previously, SLAs were being met only 75% of the time.
• Put in place measurable processes and instilled a culture of responsibility and excellence that has exceeded initial service expectations. JDA TSG created and implemented Standard Operating Procedures for the entirety of the client’s program and continues to update and refine the SOP to satisfy ever-changing client requirements.
• Increased production by 15% while maintaining consistent operating costs and reducing risk. JDA TSG implemented a risk management strategy directly into the SOP and measures its success through constant service level agreement (SLA) monitoring.
• As a trusted partner, the league has broadened JDA TSG’s scope to include services within automation, Service Now, O365 administration, and digital broadcasting.