When Standardization Met Operation

October 20, 2025 9 Min Read By: Steve Spence and Richard Gariepy

Because when process met purpose, everything just clicked.

If you joined us at TSIA World Envision, you already know our story. Two teams within one organization that once lived parallel lives, Offering Management and Managed Services Operations, finally found each other. It wasn’t love at first sight. In fact, it was more like When Harry Met Sally — plenty of mutual respect, a few spirited debates, and a gradual realization that we were better together than apart.

This “love story” isn’t about romance. It’s about alignment. It’s about what happens when two functions learn to trust one another enough to build something standard, repeatable, and scalable without losing the human side of service.

And we believe what we learned applies to any organization that’s ready to move from project thinking to partnership thinking.

Why Offering Management Matters

Offering Management is where clarity begins. It defines what a company sells, why it matters, and how it can be consistently delivered.

For years, we built and sold services without that structure, relying on experience and goodwill to fill in the gaps. It worked, until it didn’t.

Eventually, we realized that 80% of what customers wanted from Managed Services was the same. The remaining 20% gave us room to personalize, but the foundation needed to be standard. That realization became the spark behind Compugen’s Service Building Blocks (SBB).

Each block represents a discrete, repeatable service that can stand alone or be combined with others to form a complete solution. As we created our very own service delivery methodology, combining industry best practices with the specific expertise of Compugen, that provided a clear line from solution concepts proposed up to operational excellence delivery, and all the phases in between.

The service that’s sold is the same one that’s contracted, onboarded, and executed. That’s Offering Management in action, bridging business intent with operational reality.

Finding Common Ground Between Vision + Delivery

We used to joke that Offering Management lived in the clouds while Operations lived in the weeds. One of us was focused on scalability, the other on serviceability. Both of us were right, and both of us were missing half the picture.

The turning point came when we started working as one system instead of two. Offering Management began designing services with operational input baked in, and Operations started seeing standardization as an enabler, not a constraint.

That partnership turned friction into focus.

If you’re in a similar situation, where your visionaries and your executors are out of sync, start by bringing them into the same room early and often. You don’t need everyone to agree on everything, but you do need everyone to own the outcome.

What Repeatability Really Means

Repeatability has a bad reputation. People hear the word and think “cookie cutter.” The truth is, repeatability is what allows creativity to thrive.

Our Vision-to-Results automation journey is still unfolding, but even early progress has confirmed our direction. As we standardize our services, automation becomes more achievable and far more predictable. The path is clear: the more disciplined the process, the faster and cleaner the outcomes.

The real win was confidence. Sales knew exactly what they were selling. Delivery knew exactly what they were delivering. Clients knew exactly what they were getting.

If you want to move fast, don’t start with automation. Start with repeatability. You can only automate what you understand.

Value by Design, Not by Chance

We like to say that Value Assurance begins long before the first report or renewal meeting. It starts at design.

Imagine eating breakfast at a diner. You order waffles and ask for real maple syrup instead of the imitation stuff. The cook doesn’t need to rewrite the recipe. They just know how to make the swap. You get exactly what you want, and they stay on schedule.

That’s Value by Design; structure with room for personalization.

By embedding governance and regular operational reviews into our Service Building Blocks, we ensure customers always feel heard. The framework doesn’t just deliver consistency. It makes value visible at every stage of the customer relationship.

Why the First 30 Days Matter

We’ve learned that what starts well, goes well.

When a federal Crown corporation transitioned to Compugen’s Managed Services, their CIO told us it was “the best IT experience with a third party I’ve ever had.” Sixteen years later, they’re still loyal customers.

The reason wasn’t luck. It was structure. Our onboarding process was standardized, but our engagement was personal. We had a strong program manager who understood the customer’s world and a clear methodology that kept every handoff aligned.

If you want long-term loyalty, start by getting the first 30 days right. Nothing builds trust faster than competence and consistency out of the gate.

Lessons We’d Pass On

Every organization has its own version of our story; two teams that need to align for things to work. The following principles have served us well:

Standardize what you already do well.

Don’t confuse flexibility with chaos.

Prove dependability before asking for trust.

Make services as easy to consume as products.

If it’s important, measure it.

We’ve also learned that humour helps. Collaboration works better when people can laugh together, especially when the work gets complex.

A Shared Model for Everyone

Our story isn’t unique. It’s proof that structure and trust can coexist.

Offering Management gave us the clarity to define what we sell. Operations gave us the discipline to deliver it reliably. Together, we built a model that works at scale, and one that any organization can adopt.

When process meets purpose, everything just clicks.

And if we’ve done our job right, you’ll be saying, “I’ll have what they’re having.”