Example Reflection ­ Learning launch

Challenge  In Correos­ the Spanish public postal service ­there’s been a big investment in the last two

decades to improve the services and products offered to clients. Government has a logistical

interest in Correos being the ​de facto provider for postal service in the country, having the

competition offering niche products. Twenty years ago there was no private sector

competition and, when these new actors appeared with their high performance processes

and low prices, Correos realised they had been stuck for many decades and they needed to

improve basically in everything. However, all the investment has resulted in a big marketing

campaign and a brand new stationery products offer, cleaning the face but not improving the

product much, seriously affecting the employees motivation. Cool & elegant offices with a

modern logo with almost the same old services and processes, which derive in an important

amount of clients complains.

Correos needs to turn into the referent it was or simply disappear in favour of these new

actors who really know how to take advantage of innovation.      Selection  Since we have an important flow of clients in and out of the offices every day, and the

employees that take clients petitions are also there, we decide to go for a Learning launch

approach in one of our offices. We’ll get to see clients views and complains on site, will see

why employees do what they do as they do it and will confront these later with the big data

that Correos holds as an entity. We decided for Learning launch because the resources are

aplenty for it.    Application  We choose to implement it one of the many offices that exist in Madrid, but not the biggest

one; we need it to be big enough to have our own space, so chosen clients can feel

comfortable. Employees arrive at the office at 8:15 and office opens for client at 8:30. We

start our day at 8:00 bringing coffee and snacks aplenty and separating a zone of the main

hall with translucent screens.    We choose 3 types of clients:

­ Random: Once every other client getting out of the office is invited to join us for a

coffee or a snack to have the chance to talk to a manager representative of Correos

about his/her experience/problem. The reason of taking people when getting out is

because they already had a “client experience”.

­ Problem for the employees: whenever an employee is faced with a situation he thinks

that could be improved or solved, he invites the client to have a coffee for free in our

dedicated space and marks down the problem in paper.

­ Complains: whenever any client has a specific complain, he can get to talk to us. Our

criteria to treat the problem will be quite straightforward: anything that’s punctual will

be left for the office manager to be dealt with. Otherwise, we will invite the client to

participate in our Learning launch.

To every single person, we ask the same question: “​What’s your main problem when having

to come to Correos?​”. I’ll put an example: “​I came with this mobile to be sent to my mother. Y

expected to have to buy the box (because I couldn’t find a small one) but didn’t expect that a

parcel service couldn’t offer me any cell tape to close it. What they offer me instead is to buy

a whole roll of cell tape for 4€, the scissors for 3.50€ and a whole meter of bubble plastic for

5€.​” Some kind of “Oh, that’s too bad” and small talk will do while, Mike (a person of the

team) will check the prices, the description of the problem and that effectively, there’s no

other solution. Mike will also talk to one of the employees and will realise they actually have

scissors on their desk, will ask them why they didn’t realise they could offer them to the lady

and he/she will respond “I could, but chances are I wouldn’t see them back”.    From here, the idea is having a special desk that offers the parcel’s packaging, charging a

100% for the cost of the cell tape and the bubble plastic used and no charge for the scissors.

Let’s say the whole cell tape costs 4€, is 50 meters long. We will use less than a meter for

the mobile box so it costs us 50 meters / 4€ = 8cent. The cost for the cell tape will be 16

cent, we are getting twice as much margin and is relatively nothing to the client sending a

box.    Then we take a group for the random clients and propose the solution to them. We make

sure they understand the advantages of it and ask them under which situation, given they

have no box, wouldn’t they use it in place of buying the stationery products as a whole. We

can actually show them the many problems we’ve found during the morning and get them to

try and find a solution that’s agreed by their peers.

Insight & approach  The insight we got was that people didn’t care that much about paying twice the price of a

product if it made the total amount cheaper. They’re paying twice as much for the cell tape,

but since they’re using just a bit they’d do that rather than buying it at a fair price and then

having 99% of the product stored at home.    The approach was to create fake stands in every office with all the materials and a panel

explaining the pricing with examples, so people could read them while waiting for the regular

line. The criteria was if the amount of people using the packaging stand justified the time

spent by the employee at that desk in providing the packaging stuff, it was ok. This valuation

could be irregular among the different offices.


Example Reflection ­ Learning launch Challenge In Correos­ the Spanish public postal service ­there ’s been a big investment in the last two decades to improve the services and products offered to clients . Government has a logistical interest in Correos being the ​de facto provider for postal service in the country , having the competition offering niche products . Twenty years ago there was no private sector competition and , when these new actors appeared with their high performance processes and low prices , Correos realised they had been stuck for many decades and they needed to improve basically in everything . However , all the investment has resulted in a big marketing campaign and a brand new stationery products offer , cleaning the face but not improving the product much , seriously affecting the employees motivation . Cool & elegant offices with a modern logo with almost the same old services and processes , which derive in an important amount of clients complains . Correos needs to turn into the referent it was or simply disappear in favour of these new actors who really know how to take advantage of innovation . Selection Since we have an important flow of clients in and out of the offices every day , and the employees that take clients petitions are also there , we decide to go for a Learning launch approach in one of our offices . We ’ll get to see clients views and complains on site , will see why employees do what they do as they do it and will confront these later with the big data that Correos holds as an entity . We decided for Learning launch because the resources are aplenty for it . Application We choose to implement it one of the many offices that exist in Madrid , but not the biggest one; we need it to be big enough to have our own space , so chosen clients can feel comfortable . Employees arrive at the office at 8:15 and office opens for client at 8:30 . We start our day at 8:00 bringing coffee and snacks aplenty and separating a zone of the main hall with translucent screens . We choose 3 types of clients : ­ Random : Once every other client getting out of the office is invited to join us for a coffee or a snack to have the chance to talk to a manager representative of Correos about his / her experience / problem . The reason of taking people when getting out is because they already had a “ client experience ” . ­ Problem for the employees : whenever an employee is faced with a situation he thinks that could be improved or solved , he invites the client to have a coffee for free in our dedicated space and marks down the problem in paper . ­ Complains : whenever any client has a specific complain , he can get to talk to us . Our criteria to treat the problem will be quite straightforward : anything that ’s punctual will be left for the office manager to be dealt with . Otherwise , we will invite the client to participate in our Learning launch . To every single person , we ask the same question : “ ​What ’s your main problem when having to come to Correos?​ ” . I ’ll put an example : “ ​I came with this mobile to be sent to my mother . Y expected to have to buy the box ( because I could n’t find a small one ) but did n’t expect that a parcel service could n’t offer me any cell tape to close it . What they offer me instead is to buy a whole roll of cell tape for 4 € , the scissors for 3.50 € and a whole meter of bubble plastic for 5€.​ ” Some kind of “ Oh , that ’s too bad ” and small talk will do while , Mike ( a person of the team ) will check the prices , the description of the problem and that effectively , there ’s no other solution . Mike will also talk to one of the employees and will realise they actually have scissors on their desk , will ask them why they did n’t realise they could offer them to the lady and he / she will respond “ I could , but chances are I would n’t see them back ” . From here , the idea is having a special desk that offers the parcel ’s packaging , charging a 100 % for the cost of the cell tape and the bubble plastic used and no charge for the scissors . Let ’s say the whole cell tape costs 4 € , is 50 meters long . We will use less than a meter for the mobile box so it costs us 50 meters / 4 € = 8cent . The cost for the cell tape will be 16 cent , we are getting twice as much margin and is relatively nothing to the client sending a box . Then we take a group for the random clients and propose the solution to them . We make sure they understand the advantages of it and ask them under which situation , given they have no box , would n’t they use it in place of buying the stationery products as a whole . We can actually show them the many problems we ’ve found during the morning and get them to try and find a solution that ’s agreed by their peers . Insight & approach The insight we got was that people did n’t care that much about paying twice the price of a product if it made the total amount cheaper . They ’re paying twice as much for the cell tape , but since they ’re using just a bit they ’d do that rather than buying it at a fair price and then having 99 % of the product stored at home . The approach was to create fake stands in every office with all the materials and a panel explaining the pricing with examples , so people could read them while waiting for the regular line . The criteria was if the amount of people using the packaging stand justified the time spent by the employee at that desk in providing the packaging stuff , it was ok . This valuation could be irregular among the different offices .