They offer a variety of financial products and services. These span investment, life assurance, asset management, banking, healthcare and general insurance. Their client base comprises of individuals, businesses, corporates & institutions.
Old Mutual is a significant participant in the South African economy. They are committed to addressing Black Economic Empowerment and were actively involved in the drafting of the Financial Services Charter.
The Business Case
Old Mutual had created a software based sales incentive scheme called the 51 Club to motivate their salespeople around the country. The scheme had proved highly effective in providing their salespeople with a reward scheme for increased sales. However, the system was mainframe based and the majority of the input was paper based. In addition, staff had to manually check that details were correct. It was felt that an improved system would provide for greater flexibility and also allow staff around the country to be able to access their data independently.
ViaData
ViaData was called in to run the project. The company took some time to initially understand the business and the goals of the project. Much time was spent on understanding the inter-relationship of the data required by the new system and the processes involved. There was a close interaction between the ViaData and the Old Mutual staff throughout the development, testing and implementation of the new system. It was appreciated that ViaData responded quickly to issues and that ultimately a stable system was created. ViaData also spent some time creating administrator and user manuals for the system.
Conclusion
The 51 Club system has now been running for more than six years. The system has proved stable and reliable, and has provided tangible and immediate benefits to Old Mutual. The Club is now considered to be a prime motivator for Old Mutual sales staff, and a fundamental part of its business.
