What is CAT?

Capability Assessment Test (CAT) is a valuable diagnostic tool developed by Seven Sigma’s consultants and successfully applied in a great number of small and medium-sized enterprises operating in various industries in Greece and abroad. This test helps businesses to identify their strengths and weaknesses, using eight assessment criteria. This way the organization gets access to a holistic view of its operations and activity, in order to design a robust strategy that will accelerate its growth.

What is NOT CAT?

CAT is not a Key Performance Indicator (KPI) that quantifies business performance. CAT is the link between all business performance indicators under the umbrella of corporate strategy.

What makes CAT so unique?

There are many types of business performance assessments that one could easily find through a brief desk research. So, what is the competitive advantage of CAT?
1. Multicriteria approach: Most types of assessments evaluate one specific business function rather than the organization as a whole. CAT, on the other hand, examines all business processes and their interdependencies, ensuring this way the validity and accuracy of the end results.
2. Strategic directions: Most assessments focus on the presentation of the final results and do not provide any guidance regarding the next steps that the organization should follow based on the data provided. CAT takes as an input the assessment results and provides the company with a list of organizational interventions and actions that if properly implemented will result in improved business performance and increased competitiveness in the market. This powerful tool has been developed by Seven Sigma, one of the leading and most specialized Innovation Management Consulting firms in Greece and abroad.

Try a CAT pilot!

Capability Assessment Test (CAT) is the ultimate product of Seven Sigma’s research and experience. The impressive demand for this service in the past few years has led the company to develop an online self-assessment tool based on the methodological framework used by CAT. Thus, each company can now complete the test on its own and get a first idea of the basic methodological principles and ideas behind the core offering. However, this tool does not replace CAT. Instead, it is a preliminary self-assessment that aims at helping clients to prepare for a more structured and holistic evaluation that will be conducted through the Capability Assessment Test.

CAT methodology

The first step of the evaluation is to conduct interviews with the CEO and the Heads of the company's departments. The interview process and the targeting of the questionnaire are structured in a way to guarantee high validity and accuracy in the final results. The interviews last one hour and aim to capture the current situation (as is) for each department / operation of the company, as well as to record suggestions on the ways in which the departments could operate more effectively (to be). Then, the executives of the evaluated company, under the guidance of the specialized consultants of Seven Sigma, will complete an extensive questionnaire that evaluates the organization in eight different business dimensions. The questionnaire consists of data that are objective in terms of the company's performance, but also qualitatively in terms of its operations. Seven Sigma will gather and process all data collected during the interview and questionnaire phases. The result of this analysis is the final CAT Report which has:

- A comprehensive description of the current situation of the company and a spider diagram which presents the score for each business dimension

- The strengths and weaknesses of each department of the organization

- The strategic directions and organizational interventions that should take place in the company

- An action plan which prioritizes the actions that should be implemented in the organization based on their impact, as well as the resources required for their implementation Finally, this report is presented to the company's executives.

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