Right Work, Right Capability, Right Location

From WFM Labs


The three rights in order. Work is classified first, capability is matched second, and location is decided last, as a consequence of the first two.

Right work, right capability, right location is a vision statement for a global resource optimization center (global ROC). It compresses the operating model into three words in a fixed order: the work is classified first, the capability to do it is matched second, and the location where it is done follows from those two. The phrase is deliberately short enough to put on a wall. Its content is the order.

The statement is a corrective. In many service estates the question is asked the other way around: where is the cheapest or fastest seat, and what work can we send there? Answered in that order, the decision rests on the variables that resolve today: rate and speed to seat. The variable that decides the outcome, capability at depth, resolves only after a ramp. A model that puts location first therefore selects, structurally, for the input with the shortest feedback loop. Reversing the order is the whole point.

The three rights, in order

Right work

Classify the body of work before anything else. Four properties do most of the work:

  • Value. What the interaction is worth, on two sides held separately: the commercial value of the relationship it serves, and the intrinsic value of the interaction type (an emergency rebooking protects continuity; a routine booking may carry an upsell). See Value First, Then Route.
  • Specification versus discretion. How much of the resolution path can be written down before the interaction starts. Specified work can be automated or placed widely; discretionary work needs depth. See Process Decomposition (L0–L3).
  • Complexity. How hard the residual is once the routine has been removed. Automation takes the easy contacts out, so what remains is harder than the average was.
  • Constraints. Anything that excludes a placement outright: the contract under which the work was sold, regulation, clearance, a badging requirement. A hard constraint excludes; it never lowers a score.

Right capability

Match the classified work to who can do it, at what depth. This is a supply question, and it is answered by a capability record rather than a location list: eligibility, proficiency, entitlement, and the tenure depth actually available in each pool. Speed to seat is purchasable; speed to proficiency is not, so capability is always read at matched tenure, never at headcount. See Outsourcing as a Risk Lever for the depth argument and Sample Size and Detectable Difference in Quality Measurement for why the comparison has to be made on one instrument.

Right location

Only now choose among the nodes: an in-country hub, a global service center, a vendor partner, or an automated path. Location is a consequence of the first two rights plus cost and the constraints already recorded. It is decided last for the reason given above: it is the input that resolves fastest, so it must not be allowed to lead. The three nodes exist for different reasons, and the choice is checked against those reasons, not against rate alone. See Sourcing Design Axes: Node and Client Ownership and The Vendor as Relief Valve.

Why "one"

The word before the three rights is one. A global ROC is one coordination point with one method, one set of definitions, one instrument across every node, and one placement gate through which every proposal passes. It is not one decision-maker. The ROC owns the methodology; the owners of each body of work own the decision, and a decline is legitimate and recorded with its price. "One" describes the yardstick, not the authority. See Vendor Governance Placement and Placement Engine Architecture.

Using it as a vision

A vision statement earns its place if a room can choose it from alternatives and then use it to settle an argument. Two tests:

  • The billboard test. Read alone, does it say what the organization is building? "Right work, right capability, right location" names the three decisions and their order.
  • The argument test. When a proposal arrives as "send it to the cheapest seat," the vision supplies the reply: classify it first, match it second, and then we will know where it goes.

The statement pairs naturally with the negative form of the same idea, a placement engine, not a headcount calculator, which says what the ROC is not. One is the aspiration, the other the boundary.

See Also

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