I set up Revenue Protect with one thought in mind: making telecommunications companies work better. For me, it is more than just a job, it is a passion. I get excited when I work with people who share that passion. And there is nothing better than energizing and motivating people who may have felt unable to change things for the better. My associates are all people I know to share my passion for bringing the best out of telcos, usually with a very obvious financial upside for the businesses they help. Oddly, though, making money is not the motivation. Making money is a by-product. The goal is to do things well, avoiding waste and delivering win-win results all around. If you can do that, the money follows. To borrow a phrase from one of my heroes, W.E. Deming, "we are here to make another world". I sincerely believe that and believe that electronic communications is at the heart of the enterprise that will make our world a better place.
Unfortunately, being passionate also means I can be unforgiving of people who refuse to improve. The great lesson of revenue assurance is that we all make mistakes. But only the wise learn from them. To improve, you have to begin by admitting that we can all do better. I have adopted that attitude throughout my career and stuck with it through think and thin. Some people just do not want their soft underbellies to be examined. I understand that, but I would add nothing if I turned a blind eye in exchange for an easy life. That is why I am as well-known for being critical of my peers as I am for working collaboratively with them. For example, I have long found fault with the shortcomings and errors in the UK regulation of bill accuracy. But I also made sure that when T-Mobile UK became the first telco to demonstrate its compliance with those regulations, that it gave the public a detailed, thorough but jargon-free explanation of what we did. You can still see the billing integrity document I wrote on the T-Mobile UK website. Of course, I did not expect many customers to read it. But I did hope that other telcos would take note and copy it. Over the years, I have been very flattered when peers have told me they did just that.
I think that revenue assurance is at a crossroads. It may go the same way as many a business idea that turn out to be a short-lived fad. It may continue to be a job where the goal is nothing more than to bail water out of a leaky ship. I have sympathy with those who think the claims made of revenue assurance sound a lot like sales pitches for snake oil. But it may also go the way of good management science. It has the right pre-requisites. On the one hand, there is the deep understanding gained from process mapping and a detailed engineering knowledge of telecommunications systems and software in both the OSS and BSS. On the other hand, there is the remarkable volume of empirical data generated by each business. To use this data you need the right technical skills coupled with a methodical and statistical approach. These are the fundamentals for a science that can both alter the expectations for how telcos work, and explain how and where to deliver change. It is a vision that I encourage my peers to collaboratively work towards - whilst understanding that there will be no short cuts to success! That is my vision. That is why I do this.
Eric R. A. Priezkalns
