Reflection – Learning Launch 

 Challenge 

 I work in the HR department of a multinational consulting firm with offices in diverse locations   including Europe , America , Africa , Middle East and Asia . We identified a problem with our profit share   program which was not driving the team collaboration that we wanted and was not linked to the   company ’s strategy to drive innovation and collaboration .   We consider this a good “ wicked ” problem   to test because it is about human emotion , what people value and how they want to be recognised . 

 Based on secondary research from Deloitte Human Capital ( not ethnographic tools ) on the changing   nature of work and diverse and changing employee preferences , we developed a hypothesis ( see   table ) that we wanted to test .   Note that the business directive was that any new program could not   cost the company any more money . 

 From : Traditional Cash Profit Share   To : Link to strategy to drive innovation and   collaboration 

 Linked to profit   Linked to company strategy to drive innovation   and collaboration 

 Cash payments   Choice of development opportunities ( eg   conferences , mentoring , team rewards ) 

 Paid to individuals   Also focus on teams .   ( As a consulting firm it is   essential that we recognise collaborating teams ) 

 Annual payment   Recognise just in time - immediate 

 Formula for how distributed   Empower line managers to tailor rewards to   their team members 

 Selection 

 Our team had a prototype which had been approved by key stakeholders so we chose the learning   launch .   We thought that we had enough secondary research to proceed to this step .   We wanted to   test on a small group to mitigate risks of error . 

 Due to the diverse countries that we operate in , we decided to do two learning launches ; the first in   New Zealand and also in Thailand ( together they form about 5 % of the total population ) .    We chose   these countries in order to ensure that we had a diverse population that would feature a range of   cultural preferences and leadership styles , that would enable us to test our assumptions and our   hypothesis that employees would value the greater choice and flexibility . 

 We were very conscious that remuneration and rewards can be an emotive issue for employees ,   therefore we wanted to contain the sample size to only 5 % of the total population in order to mitigate   risks of things going wrong . 

 Application 

 We followed the following steps : 

 1 . Training and briefing of local HR and leadership in NZ and Thailand . We asked them to   gather their own stories about how they and others would benefit from the new approach , so   that they could tell these stories to the employees in their countries to make the idea more 

 real and concrete . The stories had to be “ real ” and come from the people in that location . The   stories included : 

 a. Araya in Bangkok would use her reward to engage an external mentor to help her   improve her network and therefore help her to take on tougher assignments in the   future . 

 b. A team of consultants in Auckland would use their reward to go to an “ internet of   things ” conference in Seattle .   This would help them to seed ideas for future business   growth . 

 c.   A team of consultants in Bangkok would use their fund to volunteer to provide water   improvement in a remote community .   This team valued creating innovative solutions   for sustainable development and the paid time off to do this . 

 2 . We asked the HR team to work with the leadership in their country to write conversation   scripts to help them talk to their teams about what they value in rewards , so that they could   tailor the rewards to that particular individual and group .   We identified that line managers   would need support during the pilot . 

 3 . At the end of launch we interviewed a small number of employees and line managers , using   ethnographic tools to understand and provide feedback on : the conversation they had with   their line manager / employee ; how they chose their /the employee ’s reward and why ; describe   how it has made them / their employee cope with the changing workforce of the future ; what   impact has this had on their career . 

 We decided to use ethnographic tools because we wanted to understand with greater detail   how people felt , what conversations took place and how individuals and teams were actually   impacted .   This would augment the secondary Deloitte research that we had used for   developing the prototype . 

 Insight 

 Based on the ethnographic interviews , we discovered the following : 

 •   Line managers in Thailand felt uncomfortable with the discretion and ambiguity .   They were   not used to having such conversations with their team members .   They were concerned about   lack of consistency , lack of guidelines , making poor decisions and feeling foolish with their   peers . 

 •   Line managers in New Zealand felt more comfortable with the greater flexibility .   They had   concerns about building expectations in team members that could not be fulfilled and that the   directive that this program not cost the business anymore funds was too restrictive . 

 •   Employees in Thailand were very excited by the new program and felt “ liberated ” to take a   more active role in their career .   However one of the interviewees said they would prefer   cash . 

 •   Employees in New Zealand were also very excited and felt empowered to use their funds to   propose innovative rewards that would test them professionally .   One noted that at university   they were taught to work in teams and felt that the company ’s focus on rewarding teams was   essential for the company to be prepared to meet the challenges of the changing workplace of   the future . 

 The ethnographic testing , albeit a small sample , gave us better data on the personal and emotional   impact of this program . Our learning was that it would have been beneficial to have done this right at   the start . 

 However , the advantage of the learning launch is that it involved co - creation design in the gathering of   stories and visualisation cartoons and we found “ champions ” in the business who could help with   further development .   This co - creative energy was over and above the actual data findings from the   launch . 

 Approach 

 Based on the learning launch and findings , the team decided that there were a number of risks to   overcome before this program could be launched for all employees globally .   Our assumption that all   employees and line managers would value choice and flexibility was not universal when weighed   against the risk of losing cash and the uncertainty associated with having more discretion .   Whilst   there was strong support from employees in New Zealand , the cultural factors evident in Thailand   suggested that not all countries could be ready for this change .   Due to the program involving   remuneration , it was felt that this was too emotive to get wrong and that we should proceed   cautiously . 

 The following next steps were tabled : 

 1 . Return to the design phase and include more diverse thinkers 

 2 . Investigate if more funds could be allocated to the program ( reflecting feedback from the NZ   line managers ) . This could make the program more impactful in application . 

 3 . Consider how the program could be tailored to different geographies and what additional   training and support would be necessary . Would the business be prepared to have a different   program in Asia or is global consistency more strategically important ? 

 4 . Plan a third learning launch in Africa ( subject to outcome of steps 1 - 3 ) 

 5 . Share the personal stories and visualisation cartoons captured from the learning launches , on   the firm ’s intranet .   Open a yammer conversation globally to build excitement and interest .    This would help to build a “ cause ” ( as advocated by Victor Hernandez from Mars ) , perhaps for a   future roll out . 

 If we had our time again , we would have done ethnographic research right at the start and   involved more people in the design phase to co - create the prototype .   Our prototype was too well   developed before launch and employees and line managers were not involved in the co - creation . 

 On a personal level , I discovered that I was biased to seeing only the positive findings and I had   to be really objective to also appreciate the data that did not align to my assumptions and   hypothesis . 


EMAIL: 
ID_NUM: 
NAME_STUDENT: 
PHONE_NUM: 
STREET_ADDRESS: 
URL_PERSONAL: 
USERNAME: 

### Task: You are a PII (Personal Identity Information) Detection. Given a essays written by students, you have to identify ONLY the following:
NAME_STUDENT - The full or partial name of a student that is not necessarily the author of the essay. This excludes instructors, authors, and other person names.
EMAIL - A student’s email address.
USERNAME - A student's username on any platform.
ID_NUM - A number or sequence of characters that could be used to identify a student, such as a student ID or a social security number.
PHONE_NUM - A phone number associated with a student.
URL_PERSONAL - A URL that might be used to identify a student.
STREET_ADDRESS - A full or partial street address that is associated with the student, such as their home address.
### Input: Reflection – Learning Launch 

 Challenge 

 I work in the HR department of a multinational consulting firm with offices in diverse locations   including Europe , America , Africa , Middle East and Asia . We identified a problem with our profit share   program which was not driving the team collaboration that we wanted and was not linked to the   company ’s strategy to drive innovation and collaboration .   We consider this a good “ wicked ” problem   to test because it is about human emotion , what people value and how they want to be recognised . 

 Based on secondary research from Deloitte Human Capital ( not ethnographic tools ) on the changing   nature of work and diverse and changing employee preferences , we developed a hypothesis ( see   table ) that we wanted to test .   Note that the business directive was that any new program could not   cost the company any more money . 

 From : Traditional Cash Profit Share   To : Link to strategy to drive innovation and   collaboration 

 Linked to profit   Linked to company strategy to drive innovation   and collaboration 

 Cash payments   Choice of development opportunities ( eg   conferences , mentoring , team rewards ) 

 Paid to individuals   Also focus on teams .   ( As a consulting firm it is   essential that we recognise collaborating teams ) 

 Annual payment   Recognise just in time - immediate 

 Formula for how distributed   Empower line managers to tailor rewards to   their team members 

 Selection 

 Our team had a prototype which had been approved by key stakeholders so we chose the learning   launch .   We thought that we had enough secondary research to proceed to this step .   We wanted to   test on a small group to mitigate risks of error . 

 Due to the diverse countries that we operate in , we decided to do two learning launches ; the first in   New Zealand and also in Thailand ( together they form about 5 % of the total population ) .    We chose   these countries in order to ensure that we had a diverse population that would feature a range of   cultural preferences and leadership styles , that would enable us to test our assumptions and our   hypothesis that employees would value the greater choice and flexibility . 

 We were very conscious that remuneration and rewards can be an emotive issue for employees ,   therefore we wanted to contain the sample size to only 5 % of the total population in order to mitigate   risks of things going wrong . 

 Application 

 We followed the following steps : 

 1 . Training and briefing of local HR and leadership in NZ and Thailand . We asked them to   gather their own stories about how they and others would benefit from the new approach , so   that they could tell these stories to the employees in their countries to make the idea more 

 real and concrete . The stories had to be “ real ” and come from the people in that location . The   stories included : 

 a. Araya in Bangkok would use her reward to engage an external mentor to help her   improve her network and therefore help her to take on tougher assignments in the   future . 

 b. A team of consultants in Auckland would use their reward to go to an “ internet of   things ” conference in Seattle .   This would help them to seed ideas for future business   growth . 

 c.   A team of consultants in Bangkok would use their fund to volunteer to provide water   improvement in a remote community .   This team valued creating innovative solutions   for sustainable development and the paid time off to do this . 

 2 . We asked the HR team to work with the leadership in their country to write conversation   scripts to help them talk to their teams about what they value in rewards , so that they could   tailor the rewards to that particular individual and group .   We identified that line managers   would need support during the pilot . 

 3 . At the end of launch we interviewed a small number of employees and line managers , using   ethnographic tools to understand and provide feedback on : the conversation they had with   their line manager / employee ; how they chose their /the employee ’s reward and why ; describe   how it has made them / their employee cope with the changing workforce of the future ; what   impact has this had on their career . 

 We decided to use ethnographic tools because we wanted to understand with greater detail   how people felt , what conversations took place and how individuals and teams were actually   impacted .   This would augment the secondary Deloitte research that we had used for   developing the prototype . 

 Insight 

 Based on the ethnographic interviews , we discovered the following : 

 •   Line managers in Thailand felt uncomfortable with the discretion and ambiguity .   They were   not used to having such conversations with their team members .   They were concerned about   lack of consistency , lack of guidelines , making poor decisions and feeling foolish with their   peers . 

 •   Line managers in New Zealand felt more comfortable with the greater flexibility .   They had   concerns about building expectations in team members that could not be fulfilled and that the   directive that this program not cost the business anymore funds was too restrictive . 

 •   Employees in Thailand were very excited by the new program and felt “ liberated ” to take a   more active role in their career .   However one of the interviewees said they would prefer   cash . 

 •   Employees in New Zealand were also very excited and felt empowered to use their funds to   propose innovative rewards that would test them professionally .   One noted that at university   they were taught to work in teams and felt that the company ’s focus on rewarding teams was   essential for the company to be prepared to meet the challenges of the changing workplace of   the future . 

 The ethnographic testing , albeit a small sample , gave us better data on the personal and emotional   impact of this program . Our learning was that it would have been beneficial to have done this right at   the start . 

 However , the advantage of the learning launch is that it involved co - creation design in the gathering of   stories and visualisation cartoons and we found “ champions ” in the business who could help with   further development .   This co - creative energy was over and above the actual data findings from the   launch . 

 Approach 

 Based on the learning launch and findings , the team decided that there were a number of risks to   overcome before this program could be launched for all employees globally .   Our assumption that all   employees and line managers would value choice and flexibility was not universal when weighed   against the risk of losing cash and the uncertainty associated with having more discretion .   Whilst   there was strong support from employees in New Zealand , the cultural factors evident in Thailand   suggested that not all countries could be ready for this change .   Due to the program involving   remuneration , it was felt that this was too emotive to get wrong and that we should proceed   cautiously . 

 The following next steps were tabled : 

 1 . Return to the design phase and include more diverse thinkers 

 2 . Investigate if more funds could be allocated to the program ( reflecting feedback from the NZ   line managers ) . This could make the program more impactful in application . 

 3 . Consider how the program could be tailored to different geographies and what additional   training and support would be necessary . Would the business be prepared to have a different   program in Asia or is global consistency more strategically important ? 

 4 . Plan a third learning launch in Africa ( subject to outcome of steps 1 - 3 ) 

 5 . Share the personal stories and visualisation cartoons captured from the learning launches , on   the firm ’s intranet .   Open a yammer conversation globally to build excitement and interest .    This would help to build a “ cause ” ( as advocated by Victor Hernandez from Mars ) , perhaps for a   future roll out . 

 If we had our time again , we would have done ethnographic research right at the start and   involved more people in the design phase to co - create the prototype .   Our prototype was too well   developed before launch and employees and line managers were not involved in the co - creation . 

 On a personal level , I discovered that I was biased to seeing only the positive findings and I had   to be really objective to also appreciate the data that did not align to my assumptions and   hypothesis .
### Output: 