Logistics
The Challenge
A leading logistics company in the US, operating across multiple locations, was grappling with inefficient and inconsistent back-office processes. These inefficiencies led to increased time expenditure, revenue leakage, over 50% reduction in process accuracy, a suboptimal end-user experience, and ultimately high operational costs and production inefficiencies.
Despite prior efforts using manual discovery methods to identify end-to-end cost optimization opportunities, the company was unable to achieve the desired level of transformation.
Industry
Logistics
Timeline
6 weeks
Function
Data Entry Operations
Attempted Solution before Scout
The company initially relied on manual discovery to address its operational challenges. However, this traditional method yielded fragmented insights that failed to offer a holistic view of inefficiencies. It lacked the end-to-end visibility and advanced analytics needed to identify critical bottlenecks, and did not account for nuanced workflow variations across teams and locations.
Enter
Over
6 weeks
Scout uncovered hidden effort patterns, and provided data-backed inputs to redesign SOPs.
Objectives: Enabling Effort Efficiency Through Firstsource-Led Discovery
Pinpoint manual effort hotspots and repetitive work patterns
Identify automation-ready workflows across form types
Quantify time spent on data entry, navigation, and referencing tasks
Equip Firstsource’s internal CoE with step-level, data-backed insights to drive change
Scout Insights: A Clearer Picture of Effort Distribution
High Manual Effort Across Steps
Scout revealed that 57% of user effort was spent on repetitive actions within a single application, while another 42% was spent navigating across 25 screens or tabs to reference and input data.
These patterns pointed to opportunities for workflow redesign and data integration - particularly in legacy form processing.
Expert vs. Standard User Variance
Standard users took 1.2–2x more time and steps per task compared to process experts, indicating a lack of standardization. This variance highlighted the opportunity to codify expert behavior into improved SOPs.
Fragmented Application Usage
Significant effort fragmentation was observed across internal systems and an external verification portal. Frequent
screen / tab switching for simple tasks introduced delays and increased error risk, underscoring the need for streamlined workflows and interface design.
Scout Recommendations helped Firstsource turn Insight into Action
Introduce Self server OCR BOT
Introduced a self-serve OCR bot which can read the key info and generate a comparison report, eliminating over 70% of screen switching and data referencing effort.
Automate ‘New Form’ Processing
The “New Form” workflow—structured, rules-based, and highly repetitive—was identified as the most automation-ready. Automating this process can free up analysts to focus on complex cases and exceptions.
Standardize Execution Patterns
Benchmark high-performing user behavior to reduce variability. Drive consistency in navigation, data validation, and task execution across the team.
Redesign SOPs & Training
Use real interaction data—not assumptions—to update SOPs and develop targeted training programs. This ensures alignment with actual user behavior and improves adoption.
Potential Business Impact: Unlocking Tangible Results for the Client
By acting on Scout-driven insights, Firstsource helped define a transformation roadmap that is expected to deliver:
Scout empowered Firstsource to move beyond anecdotal views and lead a transformation grounded in real user behavior – delivering targeted automation, streamlined operations, and scalable change for the client.
What’s next?
The success of this Firstsource-led Scout deployment lays the foundation for scaled adoption across adjacent workflows and faster automation rollout. For the client, the focus now shifts to executing the roadmap, capturing effort savings, and using this engagement as a model for broader transformation.
