Learning Launch    Challenge   I work in the wholesale business division within our company, our challenge is to improve two aspects in our day-to- day business.

a. Ability to run our monthly customer billing with less effort and reduce time so we can speed up the invoice

process

b. To spend product capital expenditure on the right features to improve revenue and customer experience.

The scope includes the entire business division composed of 6 members, as well as wider Digital Office and Finance  department, whom we work closely. The project is limited to internal team resources and should be completed within  1 month. We will focus on trying to uncover the inefficiency of our billing process as well as understanding customer  needs.    Selection   Our team research through several design thinking tools, and we decided to try the learning launch tool. The main  reason for choosing this tool over others is - the learning launch is an experiment meant to quickly test/verify an idea  and prototype.     Application

•  In the first learning launch, we focused on the structure/execution of our monthly billing process. In particular,  we wanted to see if we could structure our tasks, workflow, and processes to adapt the methods of Scrum  project management for our work (e.g., time boxed, daily, specific meetings, reviews, etc.) in an effort to  become more agile. This tested our assumption that the structure and execution were the main causes of our  workflow challenge. Our team went through a two-day training with an Agile coach. Next, we went through  three workshops to structure our tasks and processes in a more agile way. These two tracks occurred within  in a three-week timeframe. We expected to produce an operating procedure report with a clear description  of our new, more agile workflow to conduct our billing process.

•  For second learning launch, we focused on gaining clarity about our customer pains and needs. This tested our  assumption that our prioritization of product features was the main cause of our less-deal customer  experience and slow revenue growth. Our team completed an anonymous survey. Additionally, five key  stakeholders from customer’s marketing and business/sales department also completed an anonymous  survey. The surveys included questions about our new, proposed product roadmap, understanding the  features and the prioritization of feature roll-out, and feelings about the features, and were conducted within  a two-week timeframe.

Insight  By applying the learning launch tool, our team identified our assumptions and designed launches to verify these  assumptions. In addition, we spend time drafting expected results, hoping to find that a more agile approach would  improve our billing process, customer experience and revenue growth. The actual results were not exactly as we  expect but it is very close, customer’s marketing and business/sales department expressed some concerns over our  product rollout plan and prioritisation.     As the next step, our team will review this launch results and incorporate it into upcoming launch designs.     Approach   Overall, we find the learning launch is the appropriate tool for what we required and it is able to provide good outcome  as the input to improve our process going forward. The output from the first two launches will certainly serve as the  guiding principle into future launch designs. In the upcoming launch designs, we will aim to reflect insight gained,  progress made, and come closer to a compelling solution ready for full rollout.

