Learning Launch Tool: delivery of a ticketing tool for managing  customer complaints

Challenge

As a consultant, I am mobilized on different types of client engagement. The engagement I detail  here was about implementing a new ticketing tool used for following customer complaints. The  project scope included identification, selection and implementation of the adapted solution.

One challenge was to conduct this project within a defined budget (200 K€) and timeframe (6  months). Another challenge was to go for a tool based on a workflow engine, to ensure a customer  complaint is actually treated. The tool needs to monitor the process from an end to end perspective  until the customer issue is resolved and not abandoned to maximize customer satisfaction.

Selection

The client I was engaged with was used to work on a classical way for this kind of projects, that is  working first on a detailed description of the needs, followed by a detailed specification written by  the IT team, then the development of the solution and finally the validation of the delivered software  with no implication of the end user at any step of this process.

The classical way to conduct such a project has demonstrated a lot of limitations when it is about  achieving results with high level of expectations and constraints: experience shows that projects are  conducted in a delay longer that the initial planning, the budget is under estimated and the final  product does not meet the end users expectation or at least works in an none adapted way.

So, this time we achieve to convince the customer there is a better way to proceed: we were enough  confident to accept the constraint in terms of timeframe and budget – it means any delay or  additional budget would be assumed by us or the selected vendor. Taking into those elements, it had  been decided to work on a more agile way taking advantage with the end-user engagement and the  use of the learning tool. The main objective was to quickly deliver, test and adjust a prototype taking  into account user feedback.

Application

We divided the scope of work in several use cases, depending on the kind of resolution needed to  close an issue from a customer. Moreover, before developing the solution over the final  environment, we developed a prototype over and Excel worksheet: in VBA is was possible to  developpe user interface in a flexible way.

Examples of screenshots for the prototype developed:

The prototype was developed by a team of three: a developer, an end-user and myself. We were in  the same room for several days.

This approach helped us to both work on the user interface and the API connection with third  parties. We provided the end users with a prototype for each use case defined and get back feedback  from them to improve the next delivery. We achieved to deliver a first prototype with the first use  case in 3 weeks.

Once the prototype with the main use cases implemented was globally validated we go through the  development for the solution based on the final environment. Those developments were based on  the prototype and not a written detailed specification. Once again, we submitted each use case to  the end users for getting feedback.

Besides engaging with end-users, the team in charge of IT environment and managing the system  have been part of the team in defining the right solution.

Insight & approach

This approach helped us not only to identify the key features, to prioritize them taking into account  end users point of view and not just what we assumed as the most important, but also to ensure the  solution was compliant with the IT environment and third parties API in a more efficient and effective  way. Besides, we avoided a long stage of writing down detailed specification which would have  delayed the delivery of a first release of the software.

At the end, we delivered the project in four months within the budget initially defined.

The learning launch approach is the right way to work on software we do not know what the final  results should be because it is the first time such a project is conducted.

The alternative way – classical cycle of development – would not have fit to this project due to  complexity we had to go through to adapt the prototype to the final environment.

