Project Reflection - Design Thinking – Story Telling Tool    Challenge   I was a Finance Process lead on several global ERP implementation and transformation projects. One of  the clients is a distributor of Information technology products and services, having business locations  globally.   As we know story telling is a powerful communication tool that enables us as a human being to  understand more about our emotional experiences. This makes it an effective method to use during the  design process.  We used story telling as a part of in our entire design phases while following the agile methodology.  Majority of the business processes agree with the design thinking and well aligned with storytelling.   The Challenge we have on the country specific localizations due to the local laws and regulations. One of  the recent examples is BREXIT (British exit from EU countries)  Selection   We have already gone through several design thinking activities/tools part of the agile methodology. We  have selected and followed unique approach. We have on boarded local subject matter expert from UK  and developed a country specific template and talk through using story telling tool.    Application   During the design phase, we on boarded new subject matter expert who has been specialized in UK and  EU localizations. Consultant is knowledgeable in technology as well as local governance processes.   The questions and challenges we gathered from the business users are well documented. Those questions  are specific to how we handle BREXIT and what are the implications both from system technology as well  as the business process perspective.  We used the story telling tool for this specific country localization challenge, structured in such a way that  will be applied and discussed during our daily scrum calls.   Then we also developed a country specific template to address any such kind of issues not limited to UK  itself.  We ultimately applied the template changes into the configuration followed by system testing. There by  the business users from impacted localizations can test the system and satisfied with the approach.    Insight     We, as team learnt several insights from the business stakeholders, while implementing the country  specific loculation template. We have identified several gaps and design issues that were made as  assumptions during the initial phase of design thinking. The final out of the designed country version  template was slightly different. The business stakeholder’s concerns were logged in “issue log sheet” and  considered as enhancement to the localization template. This is the way issues that were logged  translated into the add on requirements and developed the solution supported through the story telling  tool.    Approach   Since our team has already gone through several design thinking activities, the adopted approach is based  on the agile methodology. We have logged the concerns, updated them in the issue log tool, developed a  dashboard clearly visible for the business stakeholders and project management for the next course of  actions.

