Overview of the work being done at William Hill online using agile and empirical based approaches to taking the business forward

1. Mind the Gap
Crossing the Chasm
Andrew Lee, MD William Hill Online
Michael Short, COO, Radtac
1

2. William Hill Online
£600.00
£500.00
£400.00
£300.00
£200.00
£100.00
£0.00
Revenue
(CAGR
=
26%)
Millions
Revenue
Growth
2008
2014*
*
Analyst
Consensus
• 80 years old, traditionally
a shop retail and
bookmaking business
• Significant Growth in
Online Sector in 6 years
• Gaming now 50% of
business
• New Entrants (Bet365)
• Clients using emergent
technologies (mobile /
tablet)
2

3. Trafalgar – The Original Project
• Platform providing the end to end Sports Book betting
– Large programme to face challenge of being supplier
dependant
– Recognised need to launch new products and features when
William Hill wanted to rather than the supplier
– Customer service and on-line experience a key differentiator
– Significant number of moving demands as far a requirements
– Technology that was a “responsive design” – one deployment
to all platforms
– Proving intractable to waterfall delivery
3

4. Trafalgar - Mind the Gap
4
“We
saw
that
we
needed
to
deliver
the
Trafalgar
soGware
project
and
recognised
the
gap
between
where
we
were
and
what
we
needed
to
improve
efficiency
of
delivery
for
that
product,
this
was
a
gap
we
had
to
close”
Solu2on:
Adopted
Agile
to
solve
these
issues
of
uncertainty
that
don’t
suit
waterfall
• Introduced
a
Small
team
from
Radtac
to
develop
Agile
approach
• Started
small
on
a
sub
team
• Communica2on,
visibility,
effec2veness,
self-­‐improvement

5. 5

6. “I skate to where the puck is going to be,
not where it has been.”
Wayne Gretzky (1961-)

7. 7
✔
✗

8. 8

9. Crossing the Chasm
9
Hierarchical
/
Centralised
Control
Suppliers
WHO
Growing
Global
Business

10. 10

11. Strategy supported by Agile
“The
only
sustainable
compe22ve
advantage
is
your
organisa2on’s
ability
to
learn
faster
than
the
compe22on”
AKtudes
“We
do
not
blame
for
failure….we
cri2cise
those
who
fail
to
help
or
fail
to
ask
for
help”
WHY?
To
create
an
enjoyable
and
memorable
experience
our
customers
love
and
trust
HOW?
We
do
this
through
a
deep
understanding
of
our
customers’
desires,
delivering
innovaYon
in
a
constantly
improving
and
engaging
environment

13. Recognition that this is a Culture Issue
• Motivation Key
• Doing what we had always done and expecting something different -
things had to change for everyone
• All of the WHO Team in a vertical slice
• Significant commitment – 12 -18 months
• Expand the support for Agile Cultural Change

14. Motivated and Talented Individuals
1
4
“Drive:
The
Surprising
Truth
About
What
MoYvates
Us”
–
Dan
Pink
(2012)
©
2014
RADTAC
Ltd.

15. Why we couldn’t go on like this
• Silo organisation
• Big picture
frustrated by
delivery mechanism
• Very time
consuming and
expensive to run in
a rapidly changing
market with cost
and tax pressures
15

16. Why we can work like this
• Agile teams to
deliver projects and
programmes
• Big picture
prioritised and
feature driven to
early delivery
• New tools such as
Yammer,
Transformation
team
16

17. Communication
• Agile Transformation Leader – COO of WHO
• Agile Transformation Team – A Vertical Slice
• Key early wins
– Innovation Team
– Innovation to deployment
– Communication (Town Halls, Visualisation, Yammer, Trello)
– Backlog (Prioritisation and removing ‘dogs’)
• Visibility of success
– Town Halls now able from Australia to Leeds
– Ideas from Yammer now visible from all to all
– Established of innovation teams in Shoreditch delivering POCs
17

18. Less
of
this….
…More
of
this
F2F
Collabora2on
èEfficiency
èMore
Ac2ons
è
Results
è
Learnings
18 18

19. Communication up and down
19
• Why we were doing
this
• How we were doing
it
• What tools and
training we were
making available to
help people
– Workshops
– Agile sessions

20. Where to now
• Head of Transformation – Internal
• Audit / Snapshot
• Improve Metrics
• Trust – it is the root of everything, focus on
the people
• Communicate – Communicate -
Communicate