Rio Tinto are a leading global organisation in the mining and metals sector who have been operating across Australia for more than 100 years. They place high importance on creating value for their shareholders by meeting customer needs through their world class assets.
Rio Tinto experienced several mergers and acquisitions, and the continuing growth of the group meant that managing information across various product groups and business units was becoming increasingly challenging. Previous approaches to expand processes involved significant investment in technology, but the value of strong Information Management (IM) foundation was yet to be realised.
GWI was engaged to introduce an overarching IM framework with the associated governance structures, processes and models to improve the management of the organisation’s unstructured information – and ultimately to enable the organisation to extract value from its information in support of business drivers and goals.
An Information Management Framework
GWI undertook workshops and interviews to identify key IM requirements and priorities for Rio Tinto. This involved interviewing business stakeholders from varying levels across the company. Based on the output of these interactions, GWI worked with the organisation to develop both an approach to IM and define a clear program definition that could be carried forward into capability development and delivery.
GWI developed an IM framework and roadmap for the group, providing expert IM advice and support to each program workstream and supported business function. The key elements of the IM plan, included approaches to information discovery, retrieval, access and utilisation – as well as a set of collaboration processes and initiatives.
Based on these foundations, GWI oversaw the production of the “best IM business case yet seen” in the organisation. Internal experts agreed that our involvement has enabled clear progress in the company’s understanding and maturity of information management processes and has allowed Rio Tinto to continue meeting the needs of their shareholders through extracting real value from their information.
