Scaling Effort & Engagement
Not every product or project is equal. As a design team, we needed to be able to scale our effort based on context. We created four tiers of involvement and the workflows and SLAs to match - spanning from full ownership to post-implementation review.
Own
Global design initiatives that the team owned (e.g. the global design system).
Lead
Initiatives owned by others (e.g brands) for which the design team would lead design.
Guide
Initiatives owned by others with an external design partner (appointed and onboarded by global design) with global review and approval on output.
Trust
Small, low risk initiatives that global design entrusted stakeholders to run in their absence.
Capacity Planning for Scale & Complexity
We modelled design capacity by involvement and scale, assigning an estimated "combined effort" points scale. Individual designers 'points budget' (capacity) grew with experience and seniority. When requirements outpaced resource, we load-shifted to partners.
Large
Medium
Small
Own
8
5
2
Lead
6.5
4
1.5
Guide
3
2
1
Trust
n/a
0.5
0
Extending Capacity Through Partnership
Traditionally, Reckitt markets would appoint local digital agencies as needed without any form of process or governance. Understandably, partner quality was inconsistent. We implemented governance to guide partnership success.
Defining the Standard
We established minimum requirements for all external collaborators, ensuring that every agency baseline aligned with our quality and operational expectations from day one.
Sharing Knowledge
Every partner underwent a mandatory onboarding, focused on Reckitt’s specific design and coding standards, alongside the Chameleon Design System, to ensure total fluency in our brand ecosystem.
Progressive Oversight
Our engagement was structured on a sliding scale of autonomy; the Global Design Team provided intensive oversight for new partners, gradually stepping back as they proved their proficiency and consistency.
Preferred Partners
To reduce risk and offer streamlined paths to acfion, we created a Preferred Partner status for agencies that had proven themselves over time. This provided pre-agreed rates and a supplier that was already onboarded.
Guiding Finish Water Warrior
When Finish Water Warrior was briefed the Global Design team was low on capacity. We triaged this into GUIDE/MEDIUM and worked with trusted partner Havas UK to ensure new accessibility and quality standards were met. We onboarded, shared brainstorming, reviewed and approved the work.
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