Stephen Lathrop leads UHY Consulting’s Project Management team, as part of the practices Transformation Solutions group, that works to provide high-value consulting services to solve clients’ business, accounting, and finance objectives nationwide, specializing within the construction and engineering industry. Stephen is responsible for project performance, business planning, staff resourcing, career development of staff, strategic planning, and minimizing risk and project losses.
Among his significant accomplishments, Stephen completed a diagnostic and full implementation for improving collections and customer treatment for a major telecommunications company that included on-site observations and multiple interviews for the root cause analysis of process improvement in collections and account coding. He developed a brown paper process map and led a cross-functional Kaizen event to develop an implementation strategy to optimize account processes. The cross-functional Kaizen led to development of an optimization strategy, including coordination of a new customer segmentation strategy, newly developed account coding process, and training and communication improvements through sales, sales order, order management, customer care, IT, and receivables management. His implementation strategy identified over $4.4 million in initial A/R aging benefits, revised and standardized customer differentiation policies, improved customer experience, and streamlined collections procedures reducing call volumes by 44 percent and letter volumes by 19 percent, while increasing collections on A/R aging and reducing bad debt reserve.