Business Process Optimisation & Operating Model Design

Your margin didn't fall for a financial reason.

It fell because a job takes longer to run than it used to. Or a customer asked for something extra and the price was never adjusted. Or stock has built up and tied up cash nobody's counting. Or the systems that worked when you had eight staff are quietly failing now that you have thirty.

Your accountant will tell you the margin moved. They usually can't tell you why, because the why is in the operation, not the ledger.

This is the work I'm best at, and the reason I have an engineering degree as well as a CA.

Who this is for

Businesses where the way things are done grew organically and hasn't been looked at since.

You're likely a good fit if:

  • Revenue is up and margin is flat or down and you can't fully explain it

  • You suspect some products, jobs or customers lose money but can't prove which

  • Growth has broken processes that used to work

  • You're quoting on gut feel and sometimes discovering afterwards the job lost money

  • Working capital is tied up in stock or work in progress and you don't know how much

  • You're implementing a new system and want the process fixed before it gets automated

What actually happens

Weeks 1–3 — Map what actually happens

Not what the procedure says. What actually happens. Talking to the team and walking through the processes. Data on cycle times, throughput, yield, rework and downtime where it exists — and where it doesn't, we start measuring.

Weeks 4–5 — Cost it

This is the part that's usually missing. Every process inefficiency gets a dollar figure: the real cost of a changeover, the annual cost of rework absorbed into overhead, the true carrying cost of stock, the margin impact of a bottleneck. Product and job-level costing rebuilt from how the work actually gets done.

Weeks 6–8 — Redesign

The operating model: how the work should flow, who does what, where decisions get made, what information moves between functions. Prioritised by financial impact and by how hard it is to do, so you can start with the things that pay quickly.

Weeks 9–12 — Implement (optional)

Change alongside your team, with the numbers tracked so you can see whether it's working. Including system or tooling selection where relevant.

What you get

  • Current-state process maps for your significant value streams

  • A quantified inefficiency register — every finding with a dollar figure attached

  • Rebuilt product, job or service-level costing based on actual process reality

  • A target operating model: structure, flow, decision rights, information flow

  • A prioritised improvement plan, sequenced by payback

  • Recommended measures built into your existing reporting

  • Implementation support, if you want it

How it's priced

Diagnostic and redesign work is a fixed-fee project, typically eight to twelve weeks depending on how many value streams and sites are involved.

A Margin Diagnostic — one product line or value stream, mapped and costed — is a smaller fixed-fee piece over three to four weeks, and is the usual starting point if you want proof before committing to something larger.

Implementation support is scoped separately, or delivered as part of an ongoing fractional v-CFO arrangement.

Pricing is agreed up front, not billed hourly.

Why me

I'm Rachel Southee — a chartered accountant and a process engineer. It's not a common pairing, and it's the reason I do this work.

I started out as an engineer, not an accountant. At Opus International Consultants I worked as an environmental engineer, analysing where wastewater treatment plants ran out of hydraulic capacity and cost-estimating a multi-million dollar upgrade to a water treatment site. I hold a Bachelor of Engineering with First Class Honours in Biological and Chemical Processing, and I've co-authored published research on a novel fermented dairy product.

Since then I've worked inside operations rather than beside them. At Global Dairy Trade I helped insourced the auction operation — including a helpdesk call centre — from an overseas vendor, and moved business and customer service operations from New Zealand to Europe. That's operating model design done in practice: working out who does what, where decisions get made, and what information has to move between them.

At Fisher & Paykel Appliances I sat alongside chief engineers and product managers, running the analysis that determined which products were worth building, and improving the processes inside the business unit. At Bearing360 I redesigned a commercial model that had drifted out of alignment with the actual contracts, and gross profit improved by more than 20% as a result.

I'm comfortable on a plant floor and comfortable in the accounts. Most people are one or the other, and the money usually leaks in the space between them.

Let’s Talk

Twenty minutes, no pitch, just a chat. Tell me what's bothering you and I'll tell you honestly whether I can help.