
<p>Melbourne Water manages and protects Melbourne&#8217;s major water resources on behalf of the community. The organisation touches all parts of the water cycle that are essential to our way life: from providing clean drinking water, treating sewage, managing flooding, and keeping Melbourne&#8217;s rivers, creeks, and catchments healthy.</p>



<p>As an organisation, Melbourne Water wanted an uplift in customer focus. People at Melbourne Water agreed that there wasn&#8217;t enough focus on customers and what their needs were. In addition, guidance and structure to customer digital governance was lacking and the strategy and tactics were not clear enough. Melbourne Water simply did not put customers first.</p>



<p>Exco Partners were engaged to create a digital customer experience framework that is simple and practical for internal Melbourne Water people to use and that delivers meaningful experiences to customers.</p>



<h2>Our approach</h2>



<p>Most organisations place too much emphasis on mindsets. Long lasting positive change comes almost exclusively through action (behaviours) and habit-building. Tailoring the approach for this effect, the emphasis of the Melbourne Water program was to develop and embed a select number of skills and focus on staff building them into habits where they form part of the ‘way things are done’.</p>



<p>The overall objective was to build foundational customer experience skills (including mastery skills in specialist areas) and capability uplift across the entire Melbourne Water organisation.</p>



<h3>Our framework for customer experience uplift:</h3>



<div class="is-content-justification-center is-nowrap is-layout-flex wp-container-1 wp-block-group">
<div class="wp-block-exco-services-card services-card iconed"><div class="icon"><img decoding="async" src="https://cms.excopartners.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/04/users-yellow.svg"/></div><h4 class="title">Make it everyones job</h4><div class="details">Customer experience is often considered the domain of front-line workers. The sales and customer staff for example. CX uplift requires commitment from everyone.</div></div>



<div class="wp-block-exco-services-card services-card iconed"><div class="icon"><img decoding="async" src="https://cms.excopartners.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/04/users-yellow.svg"/></div><h4 class="title">First build the fundamentals</h4><div class="details">Most organisations place too much emphasis on mindsets. Long lasting positive change comes almost exclusively through action (behaviours) and habit-building. </div></div>



<div class="wp-block-exco-services-card services-card iconed"><div class="icon"><img decoding="async" src="https://cms.excopartners.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/04/users-yellow.svg"/></div><h4 class="title">Customers focus</h4><div class="details">It is important that everyone uses the customer and the customer&#8217;s objectives at a north star in their decision making.</div></div>
</div>



<p><em>&nbsp;</em></p>



<p>Exco approached this project by understanding the biggest pain points in the organisation to design a course to address those needs.</p>



<p>The first phase, Discover + Assess focused on understanding Melbourne Water&#8217;s current state, future state and how to get there. This was done by interviewing Melbourne Water employees. The interviewees were very engaged, providing invaluable insights and resources. The co-design approach meant Exco could create meaningful and targeted training modules.</p>



<p>The second phase, Synthesize + Create involved converting discovery (interviews and existing Reputation &amp; Customer Satisfaction data) into desired module content. The modules covered the learning approach, tools, habits and outcomes. These learning modules blended media, individual, group and facilitator-led approaches and incorporated activities that will build CX capability, but also be able to function as stand-alone areas of learning for participants. &nbsp;</p>



<p>Exco worked with people in Melbourne Water to deliver these materials and incorporated assignments for participants to complete between modules to keep focus. It was also agreed that leaders would give people time during their day to practice what they learnt in the modules.</p>



<p>The final phase, Test + Roll out focused on rolling out the modules to the &#8216;Early Adopters&#8217;, a group of employees at Melbourne Water that were deemed subject matter experts within the organisation. This allowed the group a chance to review the content and to further strengthen out the learning modules with participants. Exco gave a range of tools that they can use with customers and taught them how to use it and set an internal culture where they can practice this e.g. a Teams group was created so individuals can share questions.</p>



<h2>The result</h2>



<p>Exco developed and delivered seven customised customer experience capability modules to train and coach staff across the organisation from frontline and team leaders to management.</p>



<p>Foundational courses focused on the basics:</p>



<ul>
<li>Who are the customers, and why are they<br>important</li>



<li>Delivering exceptional services</li>



<li>Open communication and engagement</li>



<li>Relationship management</li>
</ul>



<p>Mastery courses focused on:</p>



<ul>
<li>Developing sustainable strategic partnerships</li>



<li>Community Engagement</li>



<li>Turning insights into action</li>
</ul>



<p>Courseware was also enhanced with digital vlogs covering key content and train-the-trainer services were provided.</p>


<div class="wp-block-image">
<figure class="aligncenter size-full is-resized"><img decoding="async" loading="lazy" src="https://cms.excopartners.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/05/mw-1.jpg" alt="" class="wp-image-5403" width="1400" height="855"/></figure></div>


<p>Exco partners surveyed the participants after delivering the training modules. Results showed that the program was valuable:</p>



<ul>
<li>100% of respondents said they learnt something new;</li>



<li>89% of respondents rated the quality of the training 4/5 out of 5;</li>



<li>95% of respondents rated the quality of the instruction 4/5 out of 5.</li>
</ul>



<h2>Conclusion</h2>



<p>Exco successfully researched, designed and implemented training modules at Melbourne Water to manage customer-facing content and services. Melbourne Water can broadcast the learning throughout the organisation to ensure lifting customer awareness and focus. Selected Early Adopters will assist in strengthening the learning content and approach to roll-out the training modules and continue the CX capability building.</p>


Customer Experience Uplift Program


<p>ResourceSmart Schools (RSS) is a leading, internationally-recognised sustainability and climate change education program offered by Sustainability Victoria (SV). The structured framework and facilitated support provides guidance, knowledge and skills to achieve measurable environmental change within schools and beyond the school gate.</p>



<p>ResourceSmart Schools helps school communities benefit from embedding sustainability into everything they do and is well placed to help Victorians take action on climate change. By participating in the program, schools implement appropriate solar generation systems, energy efficiency and other sustainable practices (water efficiency, improved waste management, and biodiversity improvement) through curriculum, school operations, culture and community.</p>



<blockquote class="wp-block-quote">
<p>Exco Partners <strong>Digital Experience Runtime,</strong> bridging the enterprise grade performance of Dynamics CRM with an amazing digital customer experience and user engagement capability&nbsp;</p>
</blockquote>



<p>Despite the RSS program being highly successful to date, SV was facing a significant problem with declining user participation attributable to the legacy web application that supports the program. The legacy web application was built on an ageing technology stack that was relatively slow, unintuitive for users, and caused a range of user-related issues driving user decline.</p>



<p>Sustainability Victoria engaged Exco Partners to address these challenges and uncover better ways to reach and engage with school communities and develop new ways to interact with these groups to support a long-term and sustainable benefit.</p>


<div class="wp-block-image">
<figure class="aligncenter size-large is-resized"><img decoding="async" src="https://cms.excopartners.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/07/rss-mockup.png" alt="" class="wp-image-3057" width="800"/></figure></div>


<p>Exco Partners delivered an innovative solution based on the Microsoft Dynamics 365 platform. The Microsft Dynamics 365 platform provided an enterprise-grade foundation for customer relationship management (CRM), business process automation and customer support. Teachers and Students interacted with the platform via a React-based user-experience oriented web interface designed by our award-winning design team.</p>



<p>We established the project with the following objectives:</p>



<ul>
<li>Enable further reach and engagement with the teaching, student and school communities in general</li>



<li>Develop new ways to create a long-term connection with the above user groups</li>



<li>Increase the accessibility and usability of the program</li>



<li>Increase SV’s ability to contribute to Victoria’s positive sustainable and environmental practices.</li>
</ul>



<p>The project was approached with three key phases drawing on our CoreMethods™ methodology. We designed each phase to address key aspects of the project and drew on specific skills across our multi-disciplined Exco Partners capabilities.&nbsp;</p>



<blockquote class="wp-block-quote">
<p>“An innovative solution was required to utilise the Microsoft Dynamics platform without compromising the consumer user experience”</p>
</blockquote>


<div class="wp-block-image">
<figure class="alignright size-full is-resized"><a href="https://excopartners.com/2022/08/26/crn-impact-awards"><img decoding="async" src="https://cms.excopartners.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/09/CRN_Impact_FinalistTiles_PlatformInnovator.png" alt="" class="wp-image-3110" width="300"/></a></figure></div>


<p>Our first phase, Discovery, focused on customer research, stakeholder engagement, visual design, and planning. The key finding from the Discovery phase indicated there were three critical areas of focus the new platform needed to address.&nbsp;</p>



<p>Usability: make the system easy and intuitive, reduce steps, automate processes, and simplify user workflow.</p>



<p>Engagement / Motivation: building an environment that encourages and motivates students toward sustainability through sharing, small wins and clarity of benefits.</p>



<p>Support: creating a platform and online community from which teachers and students can manage their journey without the need for a dedicated SV support</p>



<p>Our second phase, Build, delivered the technology solution in a series of two-week sprints. The functional components were documented as User Stories and then iteratively developed and system tested.</p>



<p>A vital requirement of the technology stack was to vastly simplify the legacy platform infrastructure, which required multiple web and database servers.</p>



<p>The back-of-house capability needed a secure and robust data management capability so that the Sustainability Victoria product managers could support their customers. The ability to search, filter and report on school data without speciality support was important, as was the flexibility to continue to evolve school data with data and process automation.</p>



<p>We selected the Microsoft Dynamics 365, and Microsoft Power Platform based on power and ability to integrate seamlessly and securely into an enterprise technology environment, such as managed by Sustainability Victoria. &nbsp;</p>



<p>The power of tools such as Microsoft Power Automate and Power BI further enhanced the capability of the back-of-house solution.</p>



<p>An innovative solution was required to utilise the Microsoft Dynamics platform without compromising the consumer user experience and to address the user research findings of usability, engagement, motivation, and support.</p>



<p>The React framework was desirable for the technology solution of the consumer user interface. React is the most popular framework for delivering amazing user experiences on the web and has significantly enhanced our solution’s user experience capability.</p>



<p>We used our Digital Experience Runtime toolset to accelerate the integration of the front-of-house React user interface to the back-of-house Microsoft Dynamics platform. This integration created a seamless experience for managing data for both consumer and internal SV users.</p>



<p>We selected an Azure Active Directory B2C solution for managing consumer user authentication, reducing the need for bespoke security and user identity management. Our front-of-house user interface solution was deployed in a serverless container environment, which vastly simplified the infrastructure needed to support the system.</p>



<p>The final solution, live in mid-2022, successfully delivered a solution that supports almost 3000 schools across Victoria. Sustainability Victoria is also discussing options to bring other Australian states on board using their own branded version of the technology solution.</p>



<p>The solution was recognised by the industry for innovation in the CRN Impact Awards 2022.</p>



<div class="wp-block-exco-hero-content exco-hero-content container-fluid secondary">

<h2 class="has-text-align-left"><strong>Our Experience Runtime and RADD stack</strong></h2>

<div class="wp-block-image">
<figure class="alignright size-large is-resized"><img decoding="async" src="https://cms.excopartners.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/07/radd-stack@2x.png" alt="" class="wp-image-3059" width="600"></figure></div>

<p class="has-text-align-left">Our Digital Experience Runtime is a curated collection of services, tools and methods designed to accelerate the delivery of amazing digital experiences.</p>


<p class="has-text-align-left">These accelerators enable the rapid development of rich consumer user experiences. The solution is backed by the enterprise-grade performance and flexibility of the Microsoft Dynamics 365 and Microsoft Power platforms.&nbsp;</p>


<p class="has-text-align-left">The Exco Partners Digital Experience Runtime lets us create innovative and user-experience oriented solutions using the React user interface framework.</p>


<p class="has-text-align-left">The Exco Partners RADD stack allows for a serverless deployment of the Digital Runtime based solution to simplify infrastructure support and management complexity. React, Azure AD B2C, Dynamics and Docker.</p>

</div>


tomatos

Amazing digital experiences with Dynamics CRM

A platform for sustainable schools


<p>Enrolling a child in kindergarten is a critical turning point in families&#8217; lives and is a significant, often first, interaction with the local government or council.</p>



<p>With the Victoria Government making significant contributions to early childhood development programs, many local governments are looking for innovative ways to engage, support and sustain their early childhood programs.</p>



<p>Exco Partners have engaged with various councils and local government groups as part of many programs to digitise the citizen experience.</p>



<p>Our most recent work was with Knox City Council (KCC) to design their &#8220;KN Enrol&#8221; system. The objective of the design was to simplify the kindergarten enrolment process for parents and to streamline the enrolment review process for the Educators. In line with the KCC&#8217;s Service Excellence value, it was important for this initiative that the process be efficient, convenient and easy for parents, including those facing language and other barriers.</p>


<div class="wp-block-image">
<figure class="aligncenter size-large is-resized"><img decoding="async" src="https://cms.excopartners.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/knox-concept@2x-1024x630.png" alt="" class="wp-image-2832" width="600" srcset="https://cms.excopartners.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/knox-concept@2x-1024x630.png 1024w, https://cms.excopartners.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/knox-concept@2x-300x185.png 300w, https://cms.excopartners.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/knox-concept@2x-768x472.png 768w, https://cms.excopartners.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/knox-concept@2x-1536x945.png 1536w, https://cms.excopartners.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/knox-concept@2x-2048x1260.png 2048w, https://cms.excopartners.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/knox-concept@2x-1400x861.png 1400w, https://cms.excopartners.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/knox-concept@2x-800x492.png 800w" sizes="(max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px" /></figure></div>


<p>Our process started with a design sprint to review the existing processes, conduct research and analysis with the end-users and design a prototype user experience concept the delivered on the specific needs of Knox City Council, its educators and its citizens.</p>



<p>The solution will go live in Q4 2021.</p>



<blockquote class="wp-block-quote">
<p>The Exco team have been fantastic to work with. They worked to really understand what was needed and always had our families in mind and what their experience would be. Their innovative thinking helped us create an enrolment form which is easy for families to navigate and edit.</p>
<cite>Andrea Bulacios, Knox City Council</cite></blockquote>



<h3>Our solution to Kindergarten Enrolment and Placement</h3>



<p>Our Digital Kindergarten Enrolment and Placement (KEP) solution enables councils to accelerate their digitisation efforts and meet the demands of a digital-first user experience for their citizens.</p>


<div class="wp-block-image">
<figure class="alignright size-large is-resized"><img decoding="async" src="https://cms.excopartners.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/kinder-mock-ups-1-1024x943.png" alt="" class="wp-image-2829" width="400" srcset="https://cms.excopartners.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/kinder-mock-ups-1-1024x943.png 1024w, https://cms.excopartners.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/kinder-mock-ups-1-300x276.png 300w, https://cms.excopartners.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/kinder-mock-ups-1-768x707.png 768w, https://cms.excopartners.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/kinder-mock-ups-1-652x600.png 652w, https://cms.excopartners.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/kinder-mock-ups-1.png 1108w" sizes="(max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px" /></figure></div>


<p>Exco Partners have designed KEP to take advantage of existing Victorian Government licences and existing Microsoft based infrastructure to deliver a secure, scalable and cost-effective Kindergarten information management system.</p>



<p>The KEP solution supports the Department of Education and Training requirements (KIMS) for data collection and reporting automating procedures for compliance and funding support.</p>



<p>KEP does not mandate strict and rigid processes allowing complete customisation and integration with existing council infrastructure and operations, including approval workflows, identity management and CRM</p>



<p><br><br></p>


kinder-drawing

Microsoft PowerApps Development

Digitising Kinder Enrolment


<p>Founded by the Victorian government’s Future Farming Strategy the National Centre for Farmer Health (NCFH) is an organisation focused on the education, research and innovation into health, wellbeing and safety of farmers and rural communities.</p>



<p>In 2018, farms accounted for 23% of worker fatalities in Australia, yet the agriculture industry made up only 2.3% of the workforce (1).</p>



<p>NCFH had an incredible asset of information, research, and data on farming health, yet a challenge remained:</p>



<ul><li>How can these “hard to reach” community groups be better engaged to build awareness of farming hazards and to create a sustained, long-term and positive impact</li><li>How can the information, research and data be best presented in a way the is consumable, discoverable and in a medium that is useful to the community to utilise? </li></ul>



<p>Exco Partners was engaged by the National Centre for Farmer Health to address these challenges. Specifically, to uncover better ways to reach and engage with farming communities, and to develop new ways to interact with these groups to support long-term and sustainable benefit.</p>



<p>A project was established with the following objectives:</p>



<ul><li>Enable further reach and engagement with the clinical, educational, research and&nbsp;farming communities</li><li>Develop new ways to create a long-term connection with the above user groups</li><li>Increase the awareness of the NCFH and the hazards present in farming</li><li>Increase the NCFH ability to contribute to the positive health, wellbeing and safety, of farming and regional communities across Australia and internationally.</li></ul>



<p>The project was approached with three key phases drawing on Exco Partner’s CoreMethods™ methodology. Each phase was designed to address key aspects of the project and drew on specific skills across a combined Exco Partners and NCFH team. The first phase, Discovery, focused on customer research, stakeholder engagement, visual design, and planning. The second phase, Delivery, focused on software development and delivering the key features/functions as defined during the Discovery. The final phase, Launch, completed launch activities, released the finished project deliverables to the public and supported the release through the initial stages of user uptake.</p>



<div class="wp-block-exco-flex-container exco-flex-block container-fluid">
<div class="wp-block-exco-icon-card exco-icon-card" data-sal="slide-up" data-sal-duration="1000"><div class="icon"><img decoding="async" src="https://cms.excopartners.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/12/light-bulb.svg"/></div><div class="title">Discovery</div><div class="details">Mobilisation and project initiation. Planning, review existing artefacts, user research and analysis and visual design.
</div></div>



<div class="wp-block-exco-icon-card exco-icon-card" data-sal="slide-up" data-sal-duration="1000"><div class="icon"><img decoding="async" src="https://cms.excopartners.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/11/tools.svg"/></div><div class="title">Delivery</div><div class="details">Agile software build phase to deliver discovery scope.

Output of this phase will be a tested and release ready software package and completion of business readiness activities such as training.

</div></div>



<div class="wp-block-exco-icon-card exco-icon-card" data-sal="slide-up" data-sal-duration="1000"><div class="icon"><img decoding="async" src="https://cms.excopartners.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/11/rocket.svg"/></div><div class="title">Launch</div><div class="details">Business readiness, software released into production and Hyper-care activities to support business change and hand-over to lifetime support.</div></div>
</div>



<p>A “Human Centred Design” approach was used as the centre piece of Discovery activities. Human Centred Design is a method of problem solving and design that seeks to develop solutions that promote consideration of a human perspective. This method was particularly suited to the project as the core outcomes were human related, specifically regarding the health, wellbeing, and safety of farming and regional communities.</p>



<p>To better understand the problem space, the Exco Partners Customer Experience team started with a focused period of heuristic review of existing data and initiated a set of user research.</p>



<p>Exco Partners engaged a user stakeholder group comprising of farmers, industry body representatives, Deakin University, Agriculture Victoria, DHHS and health professionals, running a series of workshops, forums and interviews to understand the problem space. The insight from this stakeholder group informed a series of initiatives including:</p>



<ul><li>Development of a digital Health and Wellbeing Application, the Farmer HAT</li><li>A new Farmer Health Website, focusing on awareness, engagement, discovery and accessibility of health wellbeing and safety information.</li></ul>



<div class="wp-block-image"><figure class="aligncenter size-large is-resized"><img decoding="async" src="https://cms.excopartners.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/05/farmer-hat-1024x683.jpg" alt="" class="wp-image-2404" width="700" srcset="https://cms.excopartners.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/05/farmer-hat-1024x683.jpg 1024w, https://cms.excopartners.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/05/farmer-hat-300x200.jpg 300w, https://cms.excopartners.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/05/farmer-hat-768x512.jpg 768w, https://cms.excopartners.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/05/farmer-hat-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cms.excopartners.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/05/farmer-hat.jpg 1200w" sizes="(max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px" /></figure></div>



<p>The Delivery phase proceeded for the Farmer Health Website and Farmer HAT product. The Delivery phase used a “Scrum” based framework for managing the software development activities. The Scrum framework is a method for breaking down large complex problems to smaller units of work that can be managed and delivered iteratively. Scrum is largely associated with “Agile” software development practices which is a method for managing software projects that promotes collaboration and flexibility over more rigid methods of traditional project management.</p>



<p>The delivery phase was structured in a series of two-week “Sprints”. Each Sprint was planned to focus on a particular set of features as were described in the User Stories. In each sprint, the User Stories in focus would progress individually through the process, as shown in the User Story Life-cycle diagram below, to progressively detail, build and test the required software.</p>



<p>The project team, comprising a blend of Exco Partners and NCFH staff, would meet each morning via video call in a “Stand-up” meeting to review the progress of the previous day, plan for the next activities and discuss challenges preventing progress. A “Kanban” was used to monitor the status of each User Story through the delivery process. A Kanban is a visual method for monitoring and managing units of work moving through a process. The Kanban, represented virtually for the project team in the Microsoft DevOps platform, was key to being able to collaborate on the project delivery with the team members needing to work remotely due to COVID.</p>



<p></p>



<p>The NCFH Farmer Health Website and Farmer HAT launched in September 2020 projected to serve over 50 thousand unique users in the first 12 months since launch and over 100 thousand page views.</p>



<hr class="wp-block-separator"/>



<ol><li>Safe work Australia. (2017) <em>Traumatic Injury Fatalities database and national Data Set for Compensation-Based Statistics</em>.</li></ol>


digital-product

Digital Product Development

National Centre for Farmer Health


<p>Are you a mad-hatter service designer? A guru of customer experience? Are you just a punter wanting to test out a new way to serve your customers? If you are, you have likely scratched your head with how to truly test your new service ideas before committing too much time and energy it making it real.</p>



<p>Sure, you can send out a survey to your customers to get some valuable insight, but that boring right; for you and your customers! A survey can also send you down the wrong path as people will often &#8216;act&#8217; differently in real life than what they might describe in an idealised survey answer.</p>



<p>Why not create something fun for your customers and test your services and experiences in real-life scenarios. A choose-your-own-adventure, if you will. Your customers can click through some real-life scenarios, choosing the paths they would like to take while you gain valuable insight and data from the journey they take.</p>



<p></p>



<div class="wp-block-exco-hero-content exco-hero-content container-fluid secondary">
<h3>Get in touch</h3>



<p>Want to find out more? Send us a message and discuss our customers&#8217; success in using a choose-your-own-adventure style scenario testing method.</p>



<div class="is-layout-flex wp-block-buttons">
<div class="wp-block-button"><a class="wp-block-button__link" href="/contact" rel="">Contact Us</a></div>
</div>
</div>


adventure

Designing and Testing Services


<p>Exco Partners was engaged by a Victorian Government Department review the Procurement and uplift the approach and detail in order to support more effective delivery and continuous improvement.</p>



<p>The review and subsequent implementation of the framework will enable greater consistency through the refinement of accessible process diagrams and workflows to guide detailed feasibility, engineering and design, procurement and delivery stages of major road projects.</p>



<p>The engagement aimed to identify, and where possible quantify, the specific process areas that have been impacted by changes to the procurement framework, benchmark the current state with other major infrastructure organisations operating within the same procurement framework, and identify potential process changes to improve process efficiency and effectiveness. The engaged sourced a significant data sample of completed procurement requests, developed and analysed the data to inform the design of the to be process models.<br></p>



<p>The engagement then moved to the implementation of the initial recommendations, specifically a fit for purpose to-be process model designed to reduce the number and frequency of non-conforming procurement requests, make the procurement process (regardless of procurement type) easier to consume, provide greater visibility of the in-flight procurement requests, and define a consistent way of working for the businesses procurement team.</p>



<p>The engagement included the development of an interim automated solution (share-point) to drive earlier stakeholder engagement, and consistent procurement advice to reduce the ‘time to procure<br>metric’.</p>



<h3>Approach</h3>



<p>The DMAIC six sigma approach was use to complete the engagement, as follows:</p>



<div class="wp-block-exco-flex-container exco-flex-block container-fluid">

<div class="wp-block-exco-icon-card exco-icon-card" data-sal="slide-up" data-sal-duration="1000"><div class="icon"><img decoding="async" src="https://cms.excopartners.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/pencil-ruler.svg"></div><div class="title">Define</div><div class="details">The existing process was not well defined. The engagement documented the current
business practices and compared them to the stated procurement framework (owned by the MTIA).</div></div>


<div class="wp-block-exco-icon-card exco-icon-card" data-sal="slide-up" data-sal-duration="1000"><div class="icon"><img decoding="async" src="https://cms.excopartners.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/11/scales.svg"></div><div class="title">Measure</div><div class="details">A large sample of 1100+ completed procurements was undertaken to understand the
magnitude of the problem. A clear insight was the effort/value relationship on procurement activity.</div></div>


<div class="wp-block-exco-icon-card exco-icon-card" data-sal="slide-up" data-sal-duration="1000"><div class="icon"><img decoding="async" src="https://cms.excopartners.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/12/magnifying-glass.svg"></div><div class="title">Analyse</div><div class="details">The analysis of the as-is process (via a series of quick start workshops), identified areas
of non-alignment with the MTIA and helped prioritise to-be changes</div></div>


<div class="wp-block-exco-icon-card exco-icon-card" data-sal="slide-up" data-sal-duration="1000"><div class="icon"><img decoding="async" src="https://cms.excopartners.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/11/tools.svg"></div><div class="title">Improve</div><div class="details">The as-is process was then reviewed via 3 difference lenses. The customer, the
approver and the MRPV procurement team to identify and prioritise the improvement areas</div></div>


<div class="wp-block-exco-icon-card exco-icon-card" data-sal="slide-up" data-sal-duration="1000"><div class="icon"><img decoding="async" src="https://cms.excopartners.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/12/award.svg"></div><div class="title">Control</div><div class="details">In order to ensure uptake of the to-be process (from all stakeholder groups) a detailed
‘playbook’ for the procurement was developed referencing the new automated solution (also
developed).</div></div>

</div>



<h3><br><strong>Governance</strong></h3>



<p><br>The overall engagement was managed by an allocated Exco Partner – who was responsible for<br>service delivery and commercial oversight.<br>Skills, capabilities &amp; systems</p>



<ul>
<li>Development and management of tendering strategies addressing good commercial and<br>government policy and practice</li>



<li>Development of project tender documentation, including Invitations for Expression of Interest,<br>Requests for Proposals, Tenders and/or Quotes, Project Briefs and Service Agreements,<br>incorporating:
<ul>
<li>Clear and measurable output specifications,</li>



<li>Performance standards and performance management requirements</li>
</ul>
</li>



<li>Advice on and/or management of Tender processes including:
<ul>
<li>Tender processes and evaluations (may include interactive tender processes and<br>workshops)</li>
</ul>
</li>
</ul>



<h3>Outcomes</h3>



<p><strong>The outcomes of the engagement:</strong></p>



<ul>
<li>A clear, concise, consistent process for procurement regardless of type (new,<br>variation or exemption) or value (less than or greater than $250k)</li>



<li>A vastly improved customer experience for the departments business. An easier to consume<br>process, and an automated procurement initiation document (PID) that improves the time taken<br>to seek approval and provides visibility on the status of the procurement activity.</li>



<li>A significant improvement in the effectiveness and efficiency of the departments procurement<br>team’s output. More proactive advice as opposed to reactive execution (as was the case before<br>this change)</li>



<li>A closer alignment of the departments process with the overarching MTIA procurement framework with<br>the express purpose of reducing the incidents of non-conforming procurement.</li>
</ul>



<p><br><strong>The performance of the engagement:</strong><br>This engagement was impacted by a number of business issues that required<br>changes to the initial scope, schedule, and timeframes of delivery (the introduction of new<br>stakeholders and delays to the Sharepoint development environment being two issues that required<br>changes to the priority and sequencing of deliverables). The engagement was completed within the agreed timeframes and within the agreed commercial construct to a very high quality standard.</p>



<p>As a value-add the Exco team have agreed to recurring reviews (initially fortnightly and then<br>monthly) to ensure the new process is embedded, review the performance of the automated solution<br>and review the data associated with team performance to ensure it is delivering as expected.</p>


melbourne-roads

Business Process Re-engineering

Victorian Government Procurement Process Design


<p>Exco Partners were engaged to design the User Experience of a product for the management, engagement and sharing of information across Melbourne University&#8217;s multi-billion-dollar research capability. The objective was to design a tool to increase user engagement, compliance to costing policy and greater transparency and collaboration.</p>



<p>The objectives of the project were to deliver a tool to simplify and better manage the budgeting and costing process for research work at the University. Given the scale of research at the university, even small savings in effort or cost overruns had the potential to save the University millions of dollars per year.</p>



<p>The project was initiated with series of user journey-based workshops to understand the key flows, transactions and use cases for the system.</p>



<p>Desktop research followed to further explore the problem space and draw on inspiration from other similar concepts.</p>



<div class="is-layout-flex wp-container-5 wp-block-columns">
<div class="is-layout-flow wp-block-column">
<figure class="wp-block-image size-large is-resized"><img decoding="async" src="https://cms.excopartners.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/06/uom-ant-workshop-1024x642.jpg" alt="" class="wp-image-2467" width="400" srcset="https://cms.excopartners.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/06/uom-ant-workshop-1024x642.jpg 1024w, https://cms.excopartners.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/06/uom-ant-workshop-300x188.jpg 300w, https://cms.excopartners.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/06/uom-ant-workshop-768x481.jpg 768w, https://cms.excopartners.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/06/uom-ant-workshop-800x501.jpg 800w, https://cms.excopartners.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/06/uom-ant-workshop.jpg 1141w" sizes="(max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px" /></figure>
</div>



<div class="is-layout-flow wp-block-column">
<figure class="wp-block-image size-large is-resized"><img decoding="async" src="https://cms.excopartners.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/uom-research.jpg" alt="" class="wp-image-2469" width="300" srcset="https://cms.excopartners.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/uom-research.jpg 294w, https://cms.excopartners.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/uom-research-285x300.jpg 285w" sizes="(max-width: 294px) 100vw, 294px" /></figure>
</div>
</div>



<p>A low fidelity Figma based wireframe was developed to validate the concepts with key stakeholder groups. Some examples below:</p>



<div class="is-layout-flex wp-container-8 wp-block-columns">
<div class="is-layout-flow wp-block-column">
<figure class="wp-block-image size-large"><img decoding="async" loading="lazy" width="404" height="228" src="https://cms.excopartners.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/uom-low-fi-2.png" alt="" class="wp-image-2471" srcset="https://cms.excopartners.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/uom-low-fi-2.png 404w, https://cms.excopartners.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/uom-low-fi-2-300x169.png 300w" sizes="(max-width: 404px) 100vw, 404px" /></figure>
</div>



<div class="is-layout-flow wp-block-column">
<figure class="wp-block-image size-large is-resized"><img decoding="async" src="https://cms.excopartners.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/uom-low-fi.svg" alt="" class="wp-image-2473" width="400"/></figure>
</div>
</div>



<p>Based on the initial user feedback, the low fidelity wireframes were then elaborated to build out a high-fidelity clickable prototype, again using Figma. This prototype was tested with end-users to further validate the concepts.</p>



<p>An example of the prototype output is shown below:</p>


<div class="wp-block-image">
<figure class="aligncenter size-large is-resized"><img decoding="async" src="https://cms.excopartners.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/uom-hi-fi-1024x769.png" alt="" class="wp-image-2475" width="600" srcset="https://cms.excopartners.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/uom-hi-fi-1024x769.png 1024w, https://cms.excopartners.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/uom-hi-fi-300x225.png 300w, https://cms.excopartners.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/uom-hi-fi-768x577.png 768w, https://cms.excopartners.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/uom-hi-fi-1536x1154.png 1536w, https://cms.excopartners.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/uom-hi-fi-1400x1052.png 1400w, https://cms.excopartners.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/uom-hi-fi-800x600.png 800w, https://cms.excopartners.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/uom-hi-fi.png 1677w" sizes="(max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px" /></figure></div>

<div class="wp-block-image">
<figure class="aligncenter size-large is-resized"><img decoding="async" src="https://cms.excopartners.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/mu-budget-app-1024x768.jpg" alt="" class="wp-image-1783" width="600" srcset="https://cms.excopartners.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/mu-budget-app-1024x768.jpg 1024w, https://cms.excopartners.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/mu-budget-app-300x225.jpg 300w, https://cms.excopartners.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/mu-budget-app-768x576.jpg 768w, https://cms.excopartners.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/mu-budget-app-800x600.jpg 800w, https://cms.excopartners.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/mu-budget-app.jpg 1400w" sizes="(max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px" /></figure></div>

library-shelves

User Experience Design

Melbourne University research experience design


<p>The benefits that are available for an organisation through simplifying, organising, automating and re-imagining its finance operation can be enormous. More than simply removing cost, the benefits can span all aspects of the business from improving customer experiences to improving cash collection, reporting and forecasting, enabling further opportunity for strategic investment and growth.</p>



<p>Exco Partners are experts in transforming finance operations. We have a refined and structured Service Design based approach to re-engineering and imagining all aspects of finance processs including Order-to-cash, Produce-to-pay, Record-to-report and more. This approach is important as it is at this stage when true innovation and transformational decision making happens. We have seen too often that simply replacing the technology and systems will simply result in the as-is being rebuilt. Addressing this, we have spent considerable time establishing a strong practice for the people and process design phase of transformational change.</p>



<p>Our team have a depth of experience across finance operating models and organisational model design with a robust methodology for managing organisational change covering aspects of building awareness and advocacy to uplifting capability and embedding new ways of working. </p>



<p>We are also skilled in the leadership, management and delivery of the technology implementation, often a significant component of a finance transformation.</p>



<p>As an example of our work, we are leading a major financial transformation with the Nine Entertainment media group. The transformation will deliver benefits across all operational aspects of financial management within the organization and will deliver transformative change across people, process and technology for the whole group which combines Channel 9 TV Broadcast, Fairfax Print and Digital, Domain, Stan and Macquarie Radio.</p>


video-production

Finance Transformation

Transforming a finance operation


<p>For an organisation to be able to deliver transformational change, thorough careful consideration and preparation are needed in the design of the change program itself. It is not enough to simply pick a delivery methodology and a technology platform. A successful and truly transformative change program needs as much consideration into the&nbsp;<strong>how</strong>&nbsp;as the&nbsp;<strong>what.</strong>&nbsp;Yet the&nbsp;<strong>how</strong>&nbsp;it is often overlooked or neglected with leaders simple stating &#8220;we will be using agile” or creating an org chart and assuming everyone will just work it out.</p>



<p>We believe the three important design steps for planning a change are the people design, the information design and the interaction design. </p>



<p>Read more about our thinking about designing for change <a href="https://excopartners.com/2020/04/22/designing-a-transformational-change">here</a>.</p>


Design