Challenge

I am a member of an organization’s online marketing department and our  challenge is to improve the workflow within the department in order to increase  sales in the online channel and to spend marketing budgets on the right  campaigns. The project scope includes the online marketing department  composed of 20 employees. This project has a limited budget and we would like to  achieve our goal in 30 days.

Selection

Our team has already gone through several design thinking activities/tools, so we  are ready to try the learning launch tool. The learning launch is an experiment  meant to quickly test an idea and prototype.

Application

For our first learning launch, we focused on the structure/execution of our online  marketing tasks. In particular, we wanted to see if we could structure our tasks,  projects, and processes to adapt the methods of project management for our work  in an effort to become more agile. This tested our assumption that the structure  and execution were the main causes of our workflow challenge. We went through  two workshops to structure our tasks processes in a more agile way. These two  sessions occurred within in a three-week timeframe. We expected to produce a  document with a clear description of our new, more agile processes/workflow.

For our second learning launch, we focused on gaining clarity about our tasks and  priorities. This tested our assumption that our prioritization of tasks was the main  cause of our workflow challenge. Our team completed an anonymous survey. The  surveys included questions about our new, proposed process, understanding the  process and the prioritization of tasks, and feelings about the change, and were  conducted within a one-week timeframe.

Insight

By applying the learning launch tool, our team identified our assumptions and  designed launches to test these assumptions. Our results were slightly different  from what we anticipated: while our team was open to the prioritization of tasks  and process, the key stakeholders in the larger marketing department and IT

department expressed some concerns. Moving forward, our team will review this  insight and incorporate it into future launch designs. The ongoing incorporation of  insight is particularly important at this stage, as launches come before a full rollout  in the design thinking timeline.

Approach

Given that our team has already gone through several design thinking  activities/tools and are at this stage in the timeline, the learning launch is the  appropriate tool. As previously mentioned, our team needs to review the insight  gained from our first two launches and incorporate this insight into future launch  designs. Future launch designs should reflect insight gained, progress made, and  come closer to a compelling solution ready for full rollout.

