Table of Contents

1.INTRODUCTION............................................................................................................ 1

2.ANALYSIS OF THE MACRO ASPECTS ..................................................................... 3

3.AN OVERVIEW OF THE SERVICE SYSTEM ............................................................ 6

4.PLANNING AND CONTROL SYSTEM ..................................................................... 12

5.QUALITY PLANNING AND CONTROL SYSTEM .................................................. 14

6.MANAGEMENT INFORMATION SYSTEM ............................................................. 16

7.WORK STUDY ............................................................................................................. 18

8.PROJECT PARTICIPATED ......................................................................................... 20

8.1.Introduction ............................................................................................................. 20

8.2.Problem Statement .................................................................................................. 21

8.3.Approach Taken ...................................................................................................... 21

8.4.Project Schedule (Work Done To Date) ................................................................. 21

8.5.Expectations of the Outcomes ................................................................................. 22

9.CONCLUSION .............................................................................................................. 23

10.APPENDIX .................................................................................................................. 25

10.1.Advertisement Brochure ....................................................................................... 25

10.2.Google Earth picture of the plant .......................................................................... 35

10.3.Sections from Project ............................................................................................ 36

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Table of Figures

Figure 1 Black box representation of the system ................................................................ 3

Figure 2 Blueprint for a customer requiring consultancy on grants and incentives............ 6
Figure 3 Office layout of Ofisus ......................................................................................... 8
Figure 4 Organizational structure of Ofisus. ..................................................................... 16

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 1. INTRODUCTION
(1.1) During my semester holiday, I have performed my IE400 practice at Project
Implementation Department of Ofisus Danışmanlık ve Yazılım A.Ş., which is established in
2006 and located at Mustafa Kemal Mahallesi, Dumlupınar Bulvarı, No: 266, Tepe Prime İş
Merkezi A Blok D:62 Çankaya/ANKARA. (1.2) Ofisus is a Single Stakeholder Joint Stock
Company whose owner is Oktay Öztürk. (1.3) The company provide services in consultancy
sector to its customers. Grant, Incentive and Project Consultancy, Corporate Governance and
Development Consultancy, Investment and Financial Advisory Services, R&D/Design Centers
and Innovation Management Consultancy, European Union Supports are a few of these services
(see company brochure of 2023). Other than this, the company has organic link with some other
companies such as İhale Teknolojileri A.Ş. (https://ihalepro.com) through which public contracts
are shared with members and support offered. Another organically linked company is Elika
Teknoloji A.Ş. (https://elika.app) offering a number of applications to expectant mothers to
provide support during their pregnancies. BanaSoor Hizmet Yeri Teknoloji A.Ş.
(https://banasoor.com) is another company that has organic link with Ofisus. This last one
provides a platform to meet specialists of any subject with people who need that specialty. These
three companies and Ofisus have a dynamic relationship in between.

(1.4) Any firm (from SMEs (small and medium sized enterprises) to consortiums)
seeking consultancy that is offered by Ofisus is welcome at the company. There is no limitation
in terms of customers. As stated by Gül Tali, the specialist who were in charge of me, they
accept any applicants unless their goal is absolutely unachievable (absurd)
(https://ofisus.com/referanslar/referans-listesi/).

Other than its employees, the governmental bodies such as tax office, Ankara Chamber of
Commerce, Çankaya Municipality can be considered as stakeholders due to legal obligations. In
addition, since the deportment I carried out my practice mainly deals with Grant, Incentive and
Project Consultancy, they have a strong communication with KOSGEB, TUBITAK, The
Ministry of Industry and The Ministry of Commerce. With any question, dilemma, conflict about
the legislation, they immediately contact with these institutions. Lately, they have also applied
for accreditation to the two ministries. In case it is approved, they will be listed as a certified
company and this certification will greatly impact their progress with any application in the name

1
of their customers. If accredited, they will also be able to get incentives from government with
their consultancy services.

(1.5) Quarter of the employees are graduated from Industrial Engineering. The IEs are
usually hired for project preparation (from TUBITAK & KOSGEB projects to EU projects). The
main reason for this is because IEs possess much more technical knowledge than any other
engineers. When it comes to R&D, there is no better. During their educations, IEs gather
information almost from all engineering departments. This makes them familiar with any kind of
technical information (software, metallurgy, machinery, even chemistry) and let them participate
more in any kind of project preparation. IEs are responsible with making the data
understandable, acceptable, consistent, more importantly, correct! IEs are also more comfortable
presenting the knowledge since going through parts of a device entirely is not a problem for them
since they advance their analytical thinking with their education. It is a fact that R&D works
require several aspects and IEs see all those aspects throughout their study. That’s why Ofisus
prefers IEs for project preparation. However, there is no written rule at my practice company as
IEs will only work on projects. The company, in general is aware of the contribution of IEs and
puts no limitation to their development. There are a couple of IE working at marketing
department. They were first hired for writing projects. When they wanted to try themselves in
marketing, Oktay never refused and they have been successfully contributing to social
media/marketing department since.

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 2. ANALYSIS OF THE MACRO ASPECTS
(2.1) As any system, this establishment has its own inputs, outputs and resources. Being a
consultancy company, Ofisus can be regarded as a service organization. Along with its linked
companies, it provides information as requested by its customers. Hence, the input of the
organization is customers. In more detail, customers request reports, consultancy, knowledge
regarding their businesses, investments, applications, legislation, etc. This request is processed
by the company via mainly employees. After a careful inspection, the output customer is seeking
for is prepared by using knowledge, conducting researches on the Internet on the computers,
making phone calls with governmental authorities, setting up meetings with the customers and
related institutions at the office, providing trainings if needed. All of these are considered as the
resources. At the end, customers get her/his report, feasibility study, application, project
proposal, etc. specific to the customer. This relationship connecting input-resources-output can
be pictured as follows (Figure 1).

Resources
• Office & furniture
• Employees
• Supplies
• Hardware & Software
• Knowledge
• The Internet
• Database
• Time

Inputs Outputs
• Customers • Customized services

Figure 1 Black box representation of the system

As the company’s customers require consultancy regarding grants and incentives

provided by the Turkish Government and these grants and incentives mostly target domestic
establishments, we can say that Ofisus usually operates in domestic market. On the other hand,
some EU projects require consortiums with a foreign party. In such cases the company provides

3
consultancy for those foreign parties indirectly. There is actually no setback regarding operating
abroad. However, this requires a similar knowledge and experience on hand. For now, the
company does not have that kind of experience and knowledge about the operation of foreign
governments. Hence, they are not planning to open a branch or another company abroad for now.

As previously stated, Ofisus only provides knowledge derived from the information
gathered. They do not need and export any kind of its resources. The equipment used for
operation basically constitutes the capital and they are all provided from domestic market.

The company does not possess any kind of certification. Certifications, in Turkey, usually
does not have a significant impact on customers. This can be considered as a general culture in
consultancy sector, although it would be much better for consultancy firms to have such
certifications at least for a standardization.

(2.2) Being a consultancy company, the service product is completely intangible: data in,
knowledge out. The meeting room in the office or online media such as Zoom, Microsoft Teams
can be considered as supporting facilities, at which meetings are held and data exchange occurs.

(2.3) Ofisus does not have a written mission or vision. However, every employee in the
office is focused on giving the best experience to the customer in a timely manner, without
sacrificing quality. Their main goal is leaving no question in the customers’ mind when the
transaction is completed. It’s vision, however, is written implicitly in the company’s webpage:
“Inspired by national and international examples and constantly advancing in the light of our
own mission, we aim to meet the demands of our partners well and create added value together.”
(https://ofisus.com/hakkimizda). This mission and vision are applicable across company.

(2.4) The dominant factor for choosing the location of the office is that Tepe Prime is a
prestigious business center. Of course, there are many places that can be a location for a
consultancy firm with less cost. However, the customers of this sector care about the varnish.
Tepe Prime harbors many prestigious companies within, even the dining places at the ground
floor are most popular ones. It is also side by side with Dumlupınar Boulevard, which is one the
busiest roads in Ankara. This also provides easy access for both its customers and employees.

There is also another office at ODTÜ Teknokent for software developers of Ofisus. This
is solely because the government provides incentives and tax deductions for software

4
development works carried out at techno-parks. However, the focus of this small office is mainly
on apps of other organically linked companies mentioned above.

(2.5) There is not much employee circulation in the company. However, in case of a need
for a recruitment, the subject is brought to department chiefs first. The offeror should prove the
need in terms of workload. If it is a reasonable request, this suggestion is carried up until Oktay.
If he is also satisfied with the reasoning, he alerts the HR team for a new hire. Working together,
HR and the head of that department prepares a job description. The candidates are interviewed
first by HR, then the head of department and lastly by Oktay, who will give the final approval.
After hiring, there is no specific/standard training for the new employee. S/he will be educated
by existing employee on the way.

(2.6) The roadmaps used by my department is obtained directly from the legislations.
Every condition and every step are clearly identified/described by the legislations. If there is a
cloudy part in any legislation, related people in ministries are contacted for clarification.

Microsoft Office apps are used company wide. However, İhale Teknolojileri A.Ş.
mentioned before has created an application for Ofisus for recording any kind of work-related
activities by workers. This application allows any kind of information created by an employee to
be controlled by related people within the company.

5
 3. AN OVERVIEW OF THE SERVICE SYSTEM
(3.1)
Customer in need of a service The service product is
requests meeting via webpage, The service request is denied delivered and customer
e-mail or a phone call. and customer leaves. leaves.

N
Customer is accepted at the office for Payment is completed.
gathering info on what service s/he needs. Did customer revised Y
her/his request?

Is the request
acceptable for the
given (can be done
within) due time?
N Customer is informed why it cannot be done
and asked for changes so it can be done.
Y

Y
A contract is made between both parties Is customer
indicating the information about the service, satisfied with the
such as the data needed, the price, deadline, N service product?
etc.

Is there a pre- Y Service product is presented to the

Payment collected.
payment? customer.

N
VISIBILITY LINE Seen by customer
Not seen by customer

Requested service is processed.

N
Is additional
information / meeting Y Provide from customer through
needed from mailing/phone calls/meetings.
customer?
Is application
approved? Y
N

Is additional
information / meeting Y Provide from institutions through
needed from related mailing/phone calls/meetings.
institutions?

Does the service

N require any
application to Y Make necessary applications and follow
institutions the process.
(KOSGEB,
TUBITAK, etc.)?

Figure 2 Blueprint for a customer requiring consultancy on grants and incentives

6
 The department at which I have conducted my practice provides service to customers in
need of consultancy regarding grants and incentives given by institutions such as KOSGEB,
TUBITAK, etc. or by the Ministries of Trade or Industry. A customer enters the system as input
and the output of the system is either the service product or rejection of the job. Although there is
no written blueprint for this department, the process is carried on as indicated in Figure 2.

(3.2) Performance monitoring and analysis is carried on by the head of the departments.
Productivity of an employee is defined as the number of satisfied customers or approved projects
in general. However, in case of a negative outcome such as an unsatisfied customer or a rejected
project, the reason under it is investigated. This is mainly because there can be many other
reasons behind this failure. For instance, for a project proposal made to TUBITAK, TUBITAK
itself visits the customer and tries to understand the insight of the project. Sometimes, customer
can present the project insufficiently. In such a case, although the project is well-prepared,
TUBITAK may reject the project. If the cause of failure is not employee originated, this will lead
to a minus in employee’s performance sheet. In addition, every employee in the company uses a
CRM (Customer Relationship Management) software specific to Ofisus to record their
progresses, meetings, reports, etc., which is developed by İhale Teknolojileri A.Ş. The records
processed into this software is accessible per position of the employees. For instance, the head of
a department can only access recordings of the employees her/his department, while Oktay can
access all of them. The time or place an employee used for completing the tasks are not usually
monitored since the company policy in general focuses on the final result. Yet, in case of a
failure, these two aspect are also questioned.

(3.3) Although most of the service products have standardized parts within, the type of
the services provided by Ofisus can be classified as professional services since every customer
differ from each other in many aspects. For instance, for grant and incentive applications, the
process is specified by legislations. However, the application requires a project proposal and this
project heavily differs from other projects depending on the customers. Two project may show
diversity in terms of the budget, the product to be produced (software, service, car parts,
buildings), type (R&D studies, export-import), size of the customer’s company (SMEs,
consortiums, large-scale factories) and many others. This part of an application requires high
customization with high labor hours and thus, high customer contact. This situation goes for all

7
kinds of services provided by Ofisus. Some part of a service product is standardized, yet, they all
have a fragment that needs customization per customer.

(3.4) Ofisus, as mentioned before, has an office in Tepe Prime. The office has several
rooms for employees’ use, a kitchen, a meeting room, a manager’s room, a director’s room and a
front desk for greeting the customers. The company implements hybrid working. For instance,
our department comes office only on Wednesdays and Fridays. In case of a meeting on other
days, employees come to office and use the meeting room. Total number of work desks is less
than the total number of employees. The layout of office is given in Figure 3.

Workroom Workroom Workroom Kitchen

(6 desks) (6 desks) (6 desks)

Manager's
Room
Front Desk

Meeting
Room Director's
Room

Figure 3 Office layout of Ofisus

(3.5) There are two types of pricing at Ofisus. One of them is the fixed prices put per
service requested by the customer. For example, although our department is working on grants
and incentives, there is a different pricing for different types of applications. KOSGEB
applications, e.g., requires less work compared to TUBITAK applications. Hence, the fixed price
for project preparation and application is less than it is for TUBITAK applications. The price
charged for a feasibility study, however, is much more than TUBITAK applications. In general,
the pricing is fixed for a kind of service and depends on time and workload to be spent on that

8
service product. In addition to these fixed prices, the company gets percentage from the grant
and incentives the customer gets. Although there is a standard percentage presented to the
customer, this part is negotiable according to the amount the customers will get. It is stated that
the percentage is decreased as the amount the customers gets from institutions is increased. This
payment is made only after the grant or incentive is deposited in the customer’s account. Ofisus
did not want to share the prices per services and percentages.

(3.6) (Ofisus did not want to share balance sheets or income statements.)

Balance sheets and income statements are fundamental financial statements that provide
important information about the financial standing of an organization. They are used to assess
the company's performance, profitability, liquidity, and overall financial health.

Balance Sheet:

The balance sheet provides a snapshot of the company's financial position at a specific
point in time. It consists of three main sections:

Assets: This section lists the company's resources, including current assets (cash,
accounts receivable, inventory) and non-current assets (property, plant, equipment).

Liabilities: This section includes the company's obligations, such as accounts payable,
loans, and long-term debt.

Shareholders' Equity: This section represents the company's net worth, calculated as the
difference between assets and liabilities. It includes common stock, retained earnings, and
additional paid-in capital.

Income Statement:

The income statement, also known as the profit and loss statement, summarizes the
company's revenues, expenses, gains, and losses over a specific period. It helps assess the
company's profitability, efficiency, and overall financial performance and consists of the
following sections:

Revenue: This section records the company's sales or services rendered.

9
 Cost of Goods Sold (COGS): It includes the direct costs associated with producing or
delivering the company's services.

Gross Profit: Calculated by subtracting COGS from revenue, it represents the profit
before deducting operating expenses.

Operating Expenses: This section includes expenses such as salaries, rent, utilities,
marketing costs, and research and development expenses.

Operating Income: It is derived by subtracting operating expenses from gross profit.

Non-Operating Income and Expenses: This section includes gains or losses from
activities outside the company's core operations, such as interest income or expenses, investment
gains or losses, and taxes.

Net Income: Also referred to as the bottom line, it represents the company's profit after
accounting for all expenses and taxes.

Ratio Analysis:

Ratio analysis involves calculating various financial ratios based on the data from the
balance sheet and income statement. These ratios provide insights into different aspects of the
company's financial health. Some commonly used ratios include:

Liquidity Ratios: Such as the current ratio and quick ratio, which assess the company's
ability to meet short-term obligations.

Leverage Ratios: Including debt-to-equity ratio and interest coverage ratio, which
measure the company's financial leverage and ability to cover interest payments.

Profitability Ratios: Such as gross profit margin, net profit margin, and return on assets
(ROA), which evaluate the company's profitability and efficiency in generating profits.

Activity Ratios: Including inventory turnover, accounts receivable turnover, and asset
turnover, which assess the company's operational efficiency and utilization of assets.

These ratios provide meaningful benchmarks for comparing the company's performance
over time and against industry peers.

10
 Below table presents some possible titles and items that may appear on the balance sheet
and income statement for a consultancy company following Turkish accountancy standards:

Current Assets (Cash and Cash Equivalents,

Accounts Receivable, Prepaid Expenses)
Assets
Non-Current Assets (Property, Office, and
Equipment, Intangible Assets (such as software or
patents), Investments, Other Long-Term Assets)
Balance
Sheet Current Liabilities (Accounts Payable, Short-Term
Loans and Borrowings, Accrued Expenses)
Liabilities
Non-Current Liabilities (Long-Term Loans and
Borrowings, Deferred Income, Other Long-Term
Liabilities)
Share Capital
Equity: Retained Earnings
Other Reserves
Consultancy Fees
Revenue Commission Income (if applicable)
Other Operating Revenue
Salaries and Wages
Rent and Lease Expenses
Utilities
Office Supplies
Operating Expenses
Income Marketing and Advertising Expenses
Statement Professional Fees
Depreciation and Amortization
Other Operating Expenses
Interest Income
Non-Operating Income
Gain on Sale of Assets (if applicable)
Interest Expenses
Non-Operating Expenses
Loss on Sale of Assets (if applicable)
Income Tax Expense
Table 1 Possible titles and items that may appear on the balance sheet and income statement

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 4. PLANNING AND CONTROL SYSTEM
(4.1) There is no forecasting activity specific to operation of Ofisus. Most of the services
provided have standard times and costs to the company. Customer relations are usually in control
of Oktay. He has a business network and most of the customers are from that network. This
situation has been going on the same since the establishment of Ofisus. The general success rate
of 65% has been providing new customers as indicated by Oktay himself. Hence, they did not
need any kind of forecast on income or expenses. However, in the project preparation stage of an
application carried on in my department, there are heavy forecasting activities. A project
proposal usually covers a period of three years (this period can be as long as 6 years according to
the size of the investment). For this period, the project should provide forecasts on expenses and
incomes. These forecasts heavily depend on the previous data collected during market research.
While forecasting, the team brings many information together and consider different aspects
such as trends, econometrics, life-cycles of products, economic model of Turkey in effect, etc.
There is no specific model they are using for forecasting since every customer’s project is
different. These forecasts are also used for accuracy later on. As mentioned before, in case a
project is accepted by said institutions and put into practice, the customer gets incentives
according to her/his transactions and a percentage from these incentives is paid back to Ofisus.
The company records these forecasts when the project is accepted as future income in its book.
When the customer gets paid, Ofisus follow its accuracy on forecasts by comparing forecasted
and actual income.

(4.2) Ofisus (with Oktay’s own words) is a boutique consultancy firm. The company has
a high success rate. This allows the company choose between customers. They do not accept
every request. The customer and the service required are evaluated in many aspects: Is it doable?
Is it large enough? Does the customer have the potential? Does the customer have the spirit? This
way the company controls the demand and keeps its score high. Still, there are fluctuations in the
work load of employees. The department I practiced at have more work load in January-March
and July-September since the project proposals are evaluated in April-June and October-
December. In order to smooth this high work load of employee, company puts a deadline for data
collection which is before the deadline put for applications. However, most of the customers
usually violate these deadlines and put the employee in a tight spot. In such cases, the employee

12
makes overtime to meet the deadline for application. As indicated by my supervisor, Gül, they
cannot impose any sanction since meeting the customer’s need is much more important. The
company does not hire part-time workforce for these times but provides compensations for its
employees. The most important one is hybrid working. As indicated before, Ofisus does not
track its employees at all times. Hence, if an employee does not have any work to be done, s/he
can use that working time as me-time. They do not have to come to office also in case they do
not have a deadline approaching.

In other departments, the demand is usually smoothed by giving deadlines to customers

so that the workload of employees is flat. If customer is in need of the service before the deadline
suggested by Ofisus, the price goes up. The tighter the deadline, the higher the price. The
employee also benefits from this over-pricing as success fee.

(4.3) Ofisus provides consultancy for its customers and other than the office, computers,
Internet connection, etc. the only thing that flows between the company and customers is data.
Unlike the past times, the reports prepared are also shared with the customers in electronic
media. They do not give the reports to customers on papers anymore. The only inventory the
company keeps is the data (reports, templates, blueprints, etc.) which is kept in a secure server on
a cloud.

In terms of service capacity, Ofisus keeps track of the number of employees. The
company needs to provide services to customers without making them wait or missing the
deadlines. It also wants to have a stable team that does not change according to work load. In
order to establish a balance between these two constraints, Ofisus allows hybrid working. This
way, employees work overtime in need to meet customer demands in time while spending the
workhours for their own benefits in idle times.

13
 5. QUALITY PLANNING AND CONTROL SYSTEM
(5.1) The definition of quality in my department was a bit different than the usual sense
of quality. Normally, quality is assessed according to the output. In our department, however, the
output is the acceptance or rejection of an application. Hence, the team evaluates the quality of
the project before it is submitted. The company has a great deal of experience in this area and
they know how a project proposal should include to be approved. They assess the data provided
by the customer and give feedbacks if it will not be enough before KOSGEB, TUBITAK or
ministries. The team makes suggestions on improvements (e.g., software, materials, upgrades
according to EU standards), expansions (e.g., to abroad markets, producing supplementary
products) that can be made to bring the project to an acceptable level. For example, it is known
that the governmental institutions tend to provide incentives on export oriented and advanced
technology related projects. If a customer applies to Ofisus for an incentive application
consultancy service for production of some clothing that is going to be produced using some
outmoded machinery and sold in domestic market, the team searches for machinery using
cutting-edge technology and abroad markets at which the product can be sold and makes effort to
convince the customer to make these changes in the project. This way, the company tries to
guarantee the acceptance of the proposal. However, in case there is no room for improvement or
the customer is not convinced that the project will fail, Ofisus rejects the service request. After
more than 1800 projects prepared, they know the definition of quality satisfactory before the
governmental institutions.

As mentioned earlier, the quality of a project assessed before it is submitted. The

company knows what the institutions want so they prepare the proposals accordingly, mainly
using templates generated using previous successful project. Although, they always check the
documentation, format, writings, calculations beforehand. This is what I did in the participated
project. At the beginning of my study, I have realized some mistakes (typos, formatting issues,
inconsistency between different pages, etc.) on the 2023 advertisement brochure of Ofisus. When
I informed my supervisor, she asked me if I can conduct a broad analysis, so I did. Mr. Oktay
was pleased with the work I put forward for it was a detail-oriented one. Hence, my
responsibility with the participated project was performing a quality check on a proposal. First of
all, the company uses a word processer that carries on Spell Check. Documents are controlled for

14
spelling and punctuation errors. The tables including calculations are imported from
spreadsheets. They are also controlled for correct formulations. Lastly, the document is read
from top to bottom for grammar errors. During this process, each page is controlled also for
formatting, alignments, page numbers, etc.

Similarly, these control processes, of course, applied for the reports presented to the
customers. In addition to those above, a pre-presentation is performed in the presence of project
managers and, sometimes, Oktay himself, as if they are the representatives of the customer.
However, it should be noted that this pre-presentation is sometimes omitted when it comes to
regular customers.

(5.2) As put forward before, the quality control of a service is carried out beforehand in
my department. Nevertheless, the service does not end there. Following the approval of a project,
there comes the implementation process. As the customer implements the project, s/he receives
incentives and direct a percentage of this payment to Ofisus. During implementation, the
company keeps contact with the customer, follows the progress, provides assistance in case of a
need and share information for enhancing the process. The main checkpoint of the quality
control of this stage is the incentive received by the customer. If it is above the forecasted
amount, this means that things are going as anticipated. In case of an amount less than predicted,
the reason is investigated and additional consultancy is provided. Timespan for an incentive is 3
years. This monitoring process until the end of this period. This process is actually has another
benefit. If the project goes smoothly and receives all the incentives as a result of proper
implementation, the customer receives a certificate of success at the end of this period. Receiving
this certificate is important since the customer will not be able to apply to another incentive in
the absence of this document. This also means loss of a customer for the company.

15
 6. MANAGEMENT INFORMATION SYSTEM

(6.1) The organizational structure of the company is given in Figure 4. They actually do
not have a separate HR department; hence, the company does not have a written organizational
structure. But, when it comes to decisions, things go according to this figure. At the top of the
structure sits the CEO, Oktay Öztürk, owner of the company. There are 4 different main
departments in the company and according to their work loads, they are also branched into
teams. Every department has a manager and every team has a team leader.

TUBITAK Projects
Project Ministry of Development Projects
Development
R&D Center

Tekno-City Projects

TUBITAK Projects

Ministry of Commerce Projects

Project
Implementation KOSGEB Projects

TURQUALITY Projects
CEO
Oktay Öztürk Digital Transformation Consultation

Management HR Consultation
Consultation Marketing Management and Brand
Consultation
Strategic Planning and Corporate
Governance Consultation

Strategic Procurement Consultation

Social Media
Process Analysis and Management
Consultation

Figure 4 Organizational structure of Ofisus.

Every decision made in Ofisus has an origin and every actor has a responsibility at some
point in the company in terms of decisions they are taking. Strategic level decisions are made by
the CEO, Oktay. These decisions include partnerships (such as banaasor), expansions (such as
elika, ihalepro). He also is the person who has the last say on capital expenditures, even the

16
related works or requests are made by managers. However, the managers are usually independent
on tactical level decisions. Regarding the implementation of plans such as scheduling,
procurements, employee requirements, cash flow analysis, etc., there are some basic rules and
principles of the company and the managers cab act as they see fit according to these milestones.
They also conduct necessary analyses on new customers or services requested. They do not have
the authority to accept/reject a customer alone. Acceptance/rejection of a customer also requires
the CEO’s signature. Yet, they usually do not interfere the operational level decisions made by
team leaders. When it comes to day-to-day operations, team leaders have the say, again of course
according to some ground rules to be followed. Allocation of workers to projects, allocations of
tasks to workers, shift management (who to come office and who to work from home), employee
leaves and many other decisions related to operation are in team leaders’ responsibility.

(6.2) The production of a service product at Ofisus requires a heavy data flow. Meetings,
phone calls, company visits etc., constitutes very little of a process. Hence, every employee has a
laptop that is able to give the necessary performance for using basic applications such as web
browsers, word processors, spreadsheets, etc. All computers are equipped with an internal
camera, microphone and speakers since they are also used for online meetings. Other than these
computers, every department in the office has an external hard drive for backing up their
computers entirely once a month. This way they can easily recover it if anything happens to a
computer. However, they started to use Nextcloud for storing and sharing the important data in
my department lately. The data they are storing is, for example, the data sent by the customers
(balance sheets, investment plans, income statements, etc.), the data generated by the company
(financial reports, project proposals, feasibility reports, etc.) and the company files (templates,
statistical data, company’s financial reports and statements, etc.). Soon, all of the departments
will be using it. The motivation behind it is that the physical equipment for data-storing is
vulnerable and may fail any time. The cloud systems, however, have much more protection
measures than any company can afford alone.

(6.3) As mentioned above, other than standard software as operating systems, pdf
handlers, spreadsheets, etc., the company uses a CRM software developed by its organically
linked company, ihalepro, which has software developers. This app helps for every employee in
the company to record their entire progress, follow their schedule and share this info with their

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superiors. This way, the CRM help the managers and team leaders to give necessary decisions.
During my practice, for example, Gül, my supervisor, explained how she applied her manager
for an additional employee to her team. She presented her supervisor, Seda, the manager of
Project Implementation Department, the workloads her team has for the last 2 months. This
information can be easily accessed through CRM application. She also has the amounts her team
is going to earn to the company with their work, the numbers of successful applications and the
applications to be made which are being prepared at that moment. The CRM and its records
showed that the revenue made by the teams’ work can easily afford another member to the team.
The manager analyzed the numbers and all other records entered to the CRM and convinced that
the team definitely needs another member. Finally, with the approval of the CFO, they have
started search for another employee. At the time I was doing my practice, they were at the
process of selecting among candidates.

Additionally, we can add to the list the accounting application, Paraşüt, which is used by
their accountant. However, accountancy is an outsourced service. So, they do not have any detail
on how the application works.

7. WORK STUDY
(7.1) In general, it cannot be said that there are repetitive tasks. The tasks that teams carry
on seems to be repetitive but every task takes long time to be measured. For instance, a project is
prepared in a month or total preparation time for a TURQULITY project takes 3 to 5 years. Also,
every job differentiates within since every customer differs from each other in many aspects as
explained before.

(7.2) There is also no standardized job evaluation in the company. As mentioned before,
the supervisors follow the work done by the employees under their responsibility through CRM
application. In case they see a problem with the performance of an employee (continuous late
submissions, consistent failures, etc.), they try to identify and solve the problems individually
with the employee. These performance evaluations do not affect the wage of an employee
directly. Of course, in general, there is a lower limit for the performance of an employee as
expectations but there is no written rule on this subject. The wage differentiation among workers
is result of two aspects. First one is the experience of the employee. In general, the longer you

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work at the company, the more wage you get since you have more experience. In other words,
every year spent by the worker in the company reflects to her/his wage as an increase at the end
of the year, whether s/he gets a promotion or not. The other reason of the increase in wage is the
promotion. If one becomes a manager while s/he was a team leader before, at the end of the year,
s/he will get another raise in her/his wage. In general, one can see that there are no solid lines for
wages. In this company, one has to show the quality of the work s/he completes and can be sure
that the good work will never disregarded.

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 8. PROJECT PARTICIPATED
8.1. Introduction
During my internship, I have chance to participate in an ongoing project regarding
renewable energy system to be established for a production company in Ankara Sincan 2nd
Organized Industrial Zone, who is a fixed customer of Ofisus (they wanted to keep the name of
the customer as secret, hence, it will be referred as Customer from now on). The Customer
operates in pharmaceutical industry since 1992 and has a 41,000 m2 manufacturing plant at
Sincan OIZ (see Google Earth picture of the plant). In the plant, they also produce prepared feeds
for farm animals.

The project for which the Customer required Ofisus’ consultancy is about renewable
energy. The Customer applied to Ofisus with the problem symptom of high energy costs towards
the end of 2022. They expressed their needs for a study on how to reduce the energy costs.
Ofisus, who has expertise on governmental incentives regarding energy related investments, has
suggested to use the roof of the plant for installation of a solar energy system, also as an
expansion to their production items. This type of investments is usually costly. Fortunately, the
Turkish Government provides incentives when it comes to renewable energy. This way, the
Customer will produce the energy they need for production, they will sell the excess energy
produced to energy distribution companies and make profit, and finally, they will be one step
closer to be classified as an environmentalist firm.

Of course, there are legislations to be followed for such an investment. First of all, the
production of energy via solar energy systems is subject to Regulation on Unlicensed Electricity
Production in the Electricity Market published on Official Gazette No. 30772, dated May 12,
2019. Secondly, to be eligible to get incentives, the project prepared is also subject to Decree of
the Council of Ministers on Government Aid in Investments No. 2012-3305, dated June 15,
2012.

After a couple of meetings with the Customer, they agreed on preparation of a project to
solve the problem defined as “Establishment of a Solar Energy System on the Roof of the Plant
while Benefiting from Government Incentives”. For this task, the team of Gül Tali, the project
manager, along with Ezgi Baran, project specialist, and Deniz Köklüağaç, Project Assistant

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Specialist, is assigned by the department manager Seda Cankurt, who is also R&D and P&D
specialist. The technical work is outsourced for the project.

8.2. Problem Statement

As shortly mentioned above, the problem of the Customer was high energy costs. Due to
the latest adverse events realized in economic situation in Turkey, the Customer had been
suffering from high energy costs. Based on this symptom, Ofisus has defined the problem as
“finding alternative ways to decrease the energy costs” at first. Following a few research on
incentives provided by the Turkish government, they have revised the problem as “establishment
of a solar energy system”.

8.3. Approach Taken

Since Ofisus has a great deal of expertise on incentives, meeting the requirements of
aforementioned legislation did not take much time for them. They have prepared a list of
requirements and presented this to the company. Following these requirements are met, they
started to prepare the proposal. The service product Ofisus provides has a very straight forward
process since everything that needs to be done is bound with legislation.

During this process, I was asked for controlling the progress completed up until now.
This is an important task for every project to be submitted for approval since in case of absence
of any document, the project can be rejected easily. Informed on the weight of the task, I started
searching the given legislations and I have prepared a checklist towards the end of my practice
which includes such items as Ministry of Energy approved solar system energy project (see
appendix for a part of the project approved), TOBB approved capacity report, EIA Not Required
Decision approved by Ankara Governor's Office, Letter of Commitment for purchase of only
domestic products, Ministry of Industry approved budget report, the Connection Agreement to
Distribution System made with Ankara Chamber of Industry, etc. I have also taken part in
project control before it is submitted for approval for educational purposes.

8.4. Project Schedule (Work Done To Date)

The application to Ofisus is made towards the end of 2022 by the Customer. After
debriefed about the process, the Customer have the technical part of the project ready to an
outside company and submitted it for approval within the first 2 weeks of 2023. Following the

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project approval in the 3rd week of January, the team started to prepare other documents based on
this project. During my practice in February, the project was almost completed. It was a three-
year project and the start of the establishment of the system was anticipated as April 6, 2023. The
deadline for implementation (including procurement process, establishment, testing and
commissioning) is April 6, 2026.

8.5. Expectations of the Outcomes

From the point of Ofisus, they are expecting the incentive application to be accepted. This
way, the company will keep its Customer satisfied with the service product they get and continue
to revenue. The Customer is charged yearly and as long as they are happy, they will continue to
pay Ofisus for consultancy services.

In terms of the Customer, on the other hand, the expectations can be summarized as
successful cost cutting by both producing its own energy and getting incentives from/selling
excess energy produced to the government. Being an environmentalist company can be
mentioned as a side benefit.

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 9. CONCLUSION
I cannot say how much I enjoyed from my practice. First of all, there were many
Industrial Engineers, Oktay Öztürk included (2006 graduate of METU also). Them being helpful
in every way made my learning better. They never said no for my desire to be involved whatever
they are doing, they answered all my questions with patience and was happy every time I said “I
understand”. The environment was as friendly as it can be and it can be seen that they enjoy
working at Ofisus. The only thing I can complain about is the practice period being so short for
doing more. The services they provide generally take time, starting from approximately 3 months
to 5 years for big projects. But the most precious thing was that I was offered a job at the Ofisus
after I graduate. Oktay, the CEO, eagerly wanted me to join the team. Even, Gül wanted me to
visit the office and be a part of another project in her team as a practice regarding establishment
of a consortium for production of car parts to be exported.

At the beginning of my practice, I was offered to work on incentives regarding e-

exporting. The legislation about e-exporting was published recently and the company has much
to cover this topic. However, since my time was short at the company, I could not have time to
complete such a work. If I had more time, I would definitely fall all over this topic and prepare a
template showing the steps to be taken if any customer request it.

The most important thing in the service system is to customize the product offered to the
customer. Since every customer has its own characteristics, every product presented is special in
itself. In my future training, I expect to improve myself in terms of better transforming customer
needs into products. The better the transformation, the better the product served.

The industrial engineers in my practice company have the most importance. According to
my supervisor, Gül, the most important characteristic of IEs is to have the ability of analytical
thinking in every step. IEs can approach any problem/situation from many approach unlike other
engineers. Technical details or finance do not scare IEs and they have the attitude of every
problem has a solution. They know where to look for a solution even if they do not have any
experience, while other engineers are usually adhere to certain patterns. In addition to these, Gül
indicates, IEs are more sociable. This make IEs more enterprising, be quick to reach what they
are searching for.

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 Being aware of all better angles mentioned above, the company hired many IEs (one
fourth of the employees are IEs). Even they are recruited for a specific job, they are set free to
choose what they want to work on. Being an industrial engineer, Oktay knows they will perform
better when they do what they are interested in. Most of the IEs in the company work on project
preparation processes since they are tend to grip every aspect of a project. However, there is one
IE, for instance, working in Social Media Group.

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10. APPENDIX
10.1. Advertisement Brochure

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10.2. Google Earth picture of the plant

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10.3. Sections from Project

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