When you think innovation, most people are quick to think of innovative brands in the private sector. But what may surprise some is how the public sector is embracing enterprise social business technology. For example, the U.K.'s largest public agency serving 20million customers has linked lean practices with its innovation program to produce 10's of millions (of Pounds) in savings.

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SPIGIT IS THE INNNOVATION ENGINE THAT DRIVES BUSINESS GROWTH
CASE STUDY
COMPANY PROFILE
Three years ago, one of the UK’s largest public agencies was focused on
decentralizing innovation in order to engage each and every employee
in the innovation process. With more than 100,000 employees servicing
over 20 million customers, this was no easy task. The agency’s traditional
suggestion box lacked the necessary infrastructure to effectively manage
and develop ideas. Realizing the need for a
centralized approach to idea management,
the agency implemented Spigit and its
community called “Idea Street.” Within the
tremendous effort was the result of 4,500
users contributing 1,400 cost-saving ideas of
which 63 were implemented.
THE CHALLENGE
Historically, the agency consisted of a number of departments, all of which
functioned largely independently. For example within one department alone,
the agency had many hundreds of job centers that were building out local
mile down the road.
silos, there was an agency-wide drive for continuous improvement to
encourage learning. Towards this end, the Lean Development Center was
established within the agency’s largest department. The Lean Development
Center was charged with looking at different areas of continuous
improvement, business processes that could be improved and standard-
ized across the organization – for example, looking at the new claims
process and how it could be improved.
Unfortunately, the agency’s Lean effort
lacked transparency. According to the
agency’s Innovation Manager, “There was
no effective way of sharing what Lean efforts
were going on across the organization.
One Lean practitioner could be looking at a
problem while another could be looking at
Contributors in the Lean process typically would not see what happened to
their idea, and if an idea did not go forward there was no easy way to share
that feedback with the idea originator.
Recognizing that a relationship between the agency’s Lean Development
Center and the newly-formed Spigit Idea Street community could prove
innovation efforts, previously limited by the number of available hands in
community to implement ideas, were helped considerably with the addition
of everyone involved at the Lean Development Center.
While Idea Street could offer Lean enhanced collaboration, transparency,
and organizational learning, Lean could offer Idea Street and the innovation
community a ready-made system for idea implementation. This extension of
Idea Street, a community called “Let Us Know,” included Lean Practitioners
in the early stage of idea development so that idea submitters could be
helped with root cause analysis (e.g. The 5 Whys, and various other Lean
techniques) to try to get a better quality solution at the outset. Others could
then see and comment so the agency could draw on the expertise within the
organization to develop ideas and extend insight and learning in the process.
THE IMPLEMENTATION
Contributors in the Lean process typically would not see what happened to
their idea, and if an idea did not go forward there was no easy way to share
that feedback with the idea originator.
Recognizing that a relationship between the agency’s Lean Development
Center and the newly-formed Spigit Idea Street community could prove
innovation efforts, previously limited by the number of available hands in
community to implement ideas, were helped considerably with the addition
of everyone involved at the Lean Development Center.
While Idea Street could offer Lean enhanced collaboration, transparency,
and organizational learning, Lean could offer Idea Street and the innovation
community a ready-made system for idea implementation. This extension of
Idea Street, a community called “Let Us Know,” included Lean Practitioners
in the early stage of idea development so that idea submitters could be
helped with root cause analysis (e.g. The 5 Whys, and various other Lean
techniques) to try to get a better quality solution at the outset. Others could
then see and comment so the agency could draw on the expertise within the
organization to develop ideas and extend insight and learning in the process.
BRINGING TRANSPARENCY AND ENGAGEMENT TO LEAN: HOW BRITAIN’S
LARGEST PUBLIC AGENCY SERVING 20M CUSTOMERS LINKED LEAN PRACTICES
WITH ITS INNOVATION PROGRAM TO PRODUCE 10’S OF MILLIONS IN SAVINGS.

2. 1-925-297-2600 INFO@SPIGIT.COM WWW.SPIGIT.COM
SPIGIT IS THE INNNOVATION ENGINE THAT DRIVES BUSINESS GROWTH
CASE STUDY
OUTCOME
The success of this joint collaboration led the COO to personally promote
a rollout of “Let Us Know” across the entire organization. Similarly, the
agency’s new Permanent Secretary, the equivalent of a CEO in a non-public
organization, who is dedicated to changing the way the agency works
culturally, decided to promote the program as part of the effort to transform
the agency into a listening organization. The momentum generated by
partnering with Lean business processes has helped to break down
when trialing crowdsourcing.
In order to avoid confusion about the value of a dedicated innovation effort
in an already lean-rich environment, the agency ultimately bifurcated idea
routing between the newly formed Lean Continuous Improvement group
dedicated to improving processes and the Horizon Scanning and Idea
group that sits within Business Strategy and is devoted to bigger picture
ideas that range from developing products, services, or channels to new
operational models.
One month after the launch of Idea Street’s “Let Us Know” community
30,000 users had participated. Three months later, well over 50,000
participants had joined the community
contributing a total of 2,588 ideas. At the close
in the initial “Contribute” stage; 996 in “Working
Collaboratively”; 43 “In Development”; 693
“Not Progressed”; 169 “Successful.”
community rollout the number of implemented
ideas almost tripled the number observed in
In the spirit of Lean and continuous improvement being driven from the
front line, the agency has extended training for more front-line workers to
become Lean Practitioners in order to multiply the insights that can be fed
to Lean Experts and ultimately Lean Development Centers. This speaks
to the agency’s overarching theme of the advancement and development
of people; efforts are made to keep idea generators involved as much as
possible in the development of an idea. In fact, idea submitters can even be
absconded from their job in order to help further develop their idea giving
people more experience with the organization as a whole.
An example of a successful idea includes a proposal to simplify the Flexible
Support Fund (FSF) process, the result of which led to a change to the
guidance and forms employed by Advisers within the agency’s largest
department. Previously, Advisers expressed to local Lean Practitioners their
frustrations when completing the forms to process the FSF payments, as it
was not easy to determine which form was needed.
The Lean practitioner carried out a practical problem solving exercise with
staff to obtain a better understanding of the problem and Idea Street was
then used to suggest changes. A member of the Service Integration Team
Customer” survey for the Flexible Support Fund. The Service Integration
Team contacted the idea owner to take the idea forward, and the owner
In the words of an idea owner who found Idea Street both simple and
rewarding to use, “Ideas are taken seriously and I’m pleased that I’ve been
“We have a large geographically distributed organization,” said the
Innovation Manager. “The value of enabling everyone to collaborate on a
single concept is worth the investment alone not to mention the tens of
millions in savings from implemented ideas”.
Innovation process design is a critical factor in demonstrating visible
momentum and ensuring results. Echoing this best practice, the Innovation
Manager advises outlining proper frameworks for helping idea generators
get ideas implemented in advance of program rollout. Other key lessons
the agency cited include the need to align participants with the strategic
objectives of the community at the outset as well as the need to have a
well-developed communications plan in place prior to launch, both of which
are pillars in Spigit’s Launch Assist services for new communities. The
agency next plans to expand into bigger picture, strategic challenges to
events to further promote engagement.
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