Digital Design Build & Operate Archives - Page 3 of 4

Lessons Learned: Three ways to deal with your digital innovation challenges

Posted on: 11 August 2021

While all our clients are different, they often use similar tactics to help them overcome challenges and innovate. Here’s what we’ve learned.

If the past year has taught us anything, it’s that digital transformation isn’t just nice to have. It’s essential to create innovative experiences that help you react to, and proactively anticipate, changing customer demands.

But whatever industry you’re in, digital transformation projects can be complex. And without the right ongoing, expert support, they can be difficult to execute.

Over decades helping our clients achieve their digital ambitions, we’ve discovered some key tactics that have been successful in helping them overcome their biggest challenges.

Here are the three most important – and you can start using them straightaway.

#1 – Respond quickly when customer demands change

Failure to adapt to changing market conditions can potentially mean you lose out to more agile competitors, which in turn means you miss out on key revenue opportunities.

Customer demands are at the heart of most changing industry trends. Particularly in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, there’s never been a better time to put your customers at the centre of your digital strategy.

One way to achieve this is by introducing new and innovative digital services that help improve the customer experience.

We helped Govia Thameslink to do just that. We worked closely to design and deploy a live passenger counting system that delivers train capacity information to customers in real time – improving passenger experience and reducing station dwell times.

As well as listening to your customers, it’s important you have the ability to scale on demand to adapt to new challenges. Our major retail clients like Argos and Waitrose & Partners know this better than most.

The ability to scale digital systems quickly helped both companies navigate the seismic shift from physical stores to online during the UK’s nationwide lockdown in 2020 – coupled with unpredictable disruption following Brexit – and keep their customers satisfied across any channel.

#2 – Be proactive, not reactive

Change isn’t always easy, particularly when your current strategy can appear to be working. But in reality, you could be fostering unnecessary complexity in your organisation.

Take manual processes for example.

One of our public transport clients realised that its managers, who had responsibility for its public areas, were spending so much time recording passenger footfall using pen and paper, they had little time left to carry out their basic duties.

It’s why we worked with our client to create an app that helped eliminate these manual processes. It not only made reporting far more efficient, but it also provides deep insights which now influence space and building designs – something that would have been impossible before.

By identifying a problem and taking proactive action, our client was able to unlock new efficiency gains and insights that help it better anticipate customer trends.

#3 – Test and learn constantly

Due to their ability to foster innovation, test-and-learn programmes have been at the heart of many of our clients’ digital development initiatives for years. And the best part is that test-and-learn doesn’t necessarily need a huge investment in time and resources.

The truth is, an effective test-and-learn programme can begin with something as simple as an email A/B test. As long as you’re gathering data and using it to make continuous iterations, you’ll soon see the benefits.

While our work with University College London Hospitals NHS Foundations Trust (UCLH) to develop and launch its Tuberculosis symptom checker app was a significant project, the foundations for our ongoing work are simple: regular idea dialogues and feedback workshops that use direct user feedback to continually improve the platform.

Once you’re confident with test-and-learn, it’s also a good opportunity to experiment with emerging technologies such as Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning – something our client Waitrose & Partners is using to reduce food waste and save money.

Discover opportunity in your biggest challenges

Now more than ever, it’s essential to engage with customers in more innovative, digital ways. But digital transformation projects require specialist skills – from design and build to integration, operation and improvement.

It’s why choosing the right partner to help you achieve your digital ambitions – and who understands the value of 24/7/365 support from embedded teams – is critical.

CACI is that kind of partner.

Backed by decades of experience helping major organisations such as Argos, UCLH, Waitrose & Partners and Mitchells & Butlers to deliver new digital solutions (and even legacy support services), we help you get complex, large-scale technology projects delivered on time.

We offer four core services to support successful project delivery:

Specialist consulting services to scope, design and deliver digital projects
Development of data-intensive software applications
Secure and compliant cloud hosting solutions
Ongoing management and monitoring of complex software systems

Find out more about our digital solutions and discover how we can help you manage your digital challenges.

Contactless Pubs: 4 Things We Learned Building Mitchells & Butlers’ Order-At-Table App

Posted on: 13 July 2021

Even before social distancing changed the hospitality industry, some businesses like Mitchells & Butlers were already responding to customer demands for quicker and easier ordering.

For example, an order-at-table app – enabling customers to choose and pay for their food and beverages without leaving their table – is an essential part of the new, contactless pub experience. Done well, it’s also convenient for the customer who no longer has to wait for service or queue at a bar. It’s great for the pub too – helping to improve efficiency and boost revenue.

Since 2017, we’ve been working with Mitchells & Butlers to develop, integrate, and refine an order-at-table app which is now available in five of their leading brands – O’Neill’s, All Bar One, Ember Inns, High Street, and Sizzling Pubs, making up around 25% of the company’s near 1,700 venues.

In that time, we’ve learnt important lessons about what makes a great at-table app that keeps customers coming back for more. So if you’re in the process of adapting your own hospitality experience to make it more contactless, here are four key elements to bear in mind.

1. REAL-TIME STOCK CONTROL INTEGRATION IS ESSENTIAL

Picture this: you’ve ordered food at a bar, only to be told a few minutes later that your choice isn’t available today. And then, under pressure, you choose something else which isn’t quite what you wanted. It’s frustrating to say the least. And while the bar tender could have told you your meal was out of stock at the time, they just didn’t have access to that information in the moment.

The same goes for an at-table ordering app. Without real time stock information, you risk frustrating and disappointing your customers, and creating unnecessary workload.

That’s why Mitchells & Butlers prioritised integrating its order-at-table app with the latest point of sale and stock control data to maintain an accurate menu that self-edits based on real-time product availability.

It also pays to keep out-of-stock items on the app menu – either crossed or blocked out – so your customers can still see what’s normally available to give them inspiration for next time.

2. PUT THE CUSTOMER IN CONTROL

Customers are leading increasingly busy lives, so offering the same choice and flexibility that they’d expect from face-to-face bar staff can be a significant competitive differentiator.

By giving customers more options at each stage of the ordering process, you can give them greater flexibility.

For example, a customer may have had their starter and main course, but now wants to take their dessert home. By offering the option to change part of their order at any stage, you’re giving them more options.

This helps to ensure the customer goes away happy, having had the experience they really want. And because you’ve made ordering that much easier, it can even increase your average transaction value.

3. SIMPLICITY IS THE KEY TO GREAT USER EXPERIENCE

When thinking about your app’s customer journey – including how it looks and feels – the process should be no less convenient than choosing from a physical menu and relaying their order to a server.

So, while it’s important to give your customers a wide range of options at each stage, your user journey should be concise, with the ability to select products and pay for an order in as few steps as possible – without the risk of payment errors or double charges.

Also, bear in mind that journey starts before they even download your app. It needs to be easy to find and recognise in their app store, and enable them to get started quickly.

It’s this kind of thinking that refined each of the Mitchells & Butlers brand app s, leading to significantly higher user uptake.

4. THE RIGHT TECHNOLOGY PARTNER CAN MAKE ALL THE DIFFERENCE

Delivering a great digital experience that works for both you and your customers relies on having the right technology, and choosing a partner that’s got experience creating customer-centric apps.

It’s important to look for a partner that understands your ethos and exactly what you’re trying to achieve – and one with a team that can work with your own IT staff to help ensure seamless back-end integrations and a clear project roadmap.

PUTTING THE CUSTOMER FIRST BENEFITS EVERYONE

Bringing technology like order-at-table apps into a pub environment shouldn’t just be seen as a solution to recent social distancing changes. Rather, it’s an opportunity to take a more customer-centric approach to digital transformation; start from the experience your customer wants, and build from there.

That includes listening and learning to what your customers are saying after you’ve launched. It’s important to test and learn from the results – making continual iterations as you go to refine and improve the experience.

If you’d like to find out more about our work with Mitchells & Butlers – or if you’d like to talk more about getting the most from an at-table ordering app – get in touch with our team of experts today.

Waitrose & Partners – Mobile Development Platform

Posted on: 12 July 2021

In this case study, we explore how we helped Waitrose & Partners put together their mobile development platform.

THE CHALLENGE…

Waitrose & Partners used multiple mobile devices running on many different operating systems in their stores. This meant they had lengthy application release cycles as each version of any software had to be developed and tested on different devices using multiple operating systems.

A development platform was needed that offered the best overall coverage of device and operating systems. The platform would also need to allow applications to be deployed more quickly, as well as implement fixes and enhancements in a timely manner. Finding and implementing such a platform would speed up time to market for any new mobile application introduced, giving Waitrose & Partners customers more choice and a better shopping experience.

As well as the mobile development platform, Waitrose & Partners were also looking for a technical partner who could offer:

Thought leadership
Technical expertise
Technical guidance

THE SOLUTION…

CACI reviewed several options and identified Xamarin as the development platform that should be selected. Once Xamarin was chosen, we built a proof of concept app enabling Waitrose & Partners to review and feedback into the development process.

Following the success of the proof of concept, we redeveloped and enhanced several existing applications using Xamarin for deployment across multiple stores. New applications were also developed and brought to market faster than before.

THE RESULTS…

In selecting Xamarin through CACI, Waitrose & Partners were able to prioritise their focus on the introduction of new systems and applications. The deployment of existing applications was much quicker than before with the ability to implement fixes and enhancements in a timely manner.

The ability to quickly bring new applications to market has given Waitrose & Partner’s customers a better shopping experience and allowed applications to be developed for use on any customer mobile device.

Through our technical expertise & guidance, Waitrose & Partners achieved their end goal of having multi-device support. This in turn, allowed us to help Waitrose & Partners establish a mobile centre of excellence.

“One of the key benefits to working with a trusted partner is that they recognised that one size doesn’t fit all. They provided a team and approach that was bespoke to the organisation which could be successfully delivered to provide a solution to meet Waitrose’s business and technical needs.“

Jon Mayes, IT Development & Operations Manager, John Lewis Partnership

CONTACT US

If you have any questions or want to learn more, get in touch today.

Live Passenger Data for Govia Thameslink

Posted on:

THE CHALLENGE…

Reduce station dwell times by directing passengers to the best possible parts of the platform in advance
Improve customer experience and accessibility by making it easier to find seats, toilets, and bicycle storage
Capture and distribute live information on passenger loading and actual train consist

THE SOLUTION…

Govia Thameslink Railway (GTR) won Rail Safety and Standards Board (RSSB) funding to pilot a new system, and appointed CACI as technology partner
15 different data sources – including carriage telemetry, shoe-counting cameras and mobile device addresses – were combined in a CACI-developed back end database
The system used algorithms developed by the University of Southampton to calibrate the data and create live, accurate information for each train
The live data was fed directly into new fields in the rail industry’s information engine, Darwin, to populate downstream systems

THE RESULTS…

Live information on train loading and consist appeared in customer apps – enhancing the travelling experience
A new, CACI-built system helped station staff to direct passengers to the best areas of the platform, reducing dwell times
The concept – a world-first combination of data capture technologies – was proven to work
The project was declared a success by the RSSB

READ THE FULL CASE STUDY

Read the full case study now. If you have any questions or want to learn more, get in touch today.

Helping the British Business Bank scale its guarantees portal

Posted on:

British Business Bank was thrust into the spotlight when it suddenly needed to provide the government’s coronavirus business support loans to provide support to the UK’s smaller businesses. It had to rapidly scale and redevelop its lending platform to deliver the new products and cope with huge demand. With pressure mounting, flexible support from CACI helped the Bank to accelerate design, testing and implementation in weeks, instead of months.

THE CHALLENGE…

Scale and redesign the existing lending system, under intense time pressure
Handle a dramatic increase in volume of applications
Test and implement new features – including a lender API
Document all changes and tests in line with regulatory standards

THE SOLUTION…

CACI moved quickly to provide enhanced infrastructure and new development and test environments
Dedicated resources – including an embedded DevOps specialist – supported the Bank’s Agile team
Concurrent design and implementation further accelerated the process

THE RESULTS…

Businesses across the UK have to date benefitted from 1,559,226 government-guaranteed loans worth £70.7bn to support their cashflow during the crisis through schemes delivered by the British Business Bank
Asynchronous database execution handles increased workload without delays
Lenders can access the system directly via API, further accelerating the application process
Further refinements are being developed and tested

“CACI went above and beyond to make sure we could deliver. Their hard work and flexibility have helped us turn a high-pressure situation into a success story.”

Martin Jones, IT Solution Delivery Director, British Business Bank

READ THE FULL CASE STUDY

Read the full case study now. If you have any questions or want to learn more, get in touch today.

Lessons Learned: Test, learn, repeat. Discover the backbone of digital services

Posted on: 9 July 2021

As I’ve covered in my previous two ‘lessons learned’ blogs – How Three Major Organisations Used Challenges to Drive Digital Change and Three Ways Our Clients Pre-Empt Their Challenges to be More Proactive – challenge-driven innovation is at the heart of all great digital transformation projects.

But at the heart of it all lies one thing: test-and-learn. Test and learn programmes are how we work with our clients to ensure new solutions work. They’re also how we help clients innovate and push their boundaries.

There are lots of ways this can work in practice: here are four examples of how our clients used test and learn to achieve very different outcomes.

#1 – TEST AND LEARN FOR A FOOTFALL APP EVOLUTION

Footfall can provide critical information for organisations. Not only does it show how peoples’ movements are changing over time, but it can also identify footfall growth which can have significant safety implications.

For one of our clients in the transport sector, an increase in footfall can indicate the need to alter floor layouts or even influence the design of future buildings.

While shift managers already recorded footfall information each day, they were using paper-based processes which were time consuming and highly inefficient – often preventing the managers from carrying out some of their other daily routines.

Working with our client’s dedicated digital innovation division, we helped to build an app that makes it quick and easy to upload footfall data and supporting documents. Through testing each version as we went and using what was learnt for the next iteration, we refined the app so that it became part of the shift managers workflows – even developing it to allow high-resolution photo evidence to be captured, giving far clearer context to the data that was being recorded.

Through this app, the data is now more easily accessible for senior executives. This means the information can be used to make more accurate decisions around public area design, while helping ensure compliance with health and safety legislation.

#2 – ONGOING CONSULTATION – THE PERFECT PAIRING WITH TEST & LEARN

At CACI, we understand the importance ongoing consultation plays in our client relationships. Rather than working on a job-by-job basis, we prefer to partner with teams over the long term and foster deep relationships that help create greater value for our clients.

When we helped University College London Hospitals NHS Foundations Trust (UCLH) launch and develop its tuberculosis symptom screening app, that was just the first step in our relationship.

Using regular dialogues and feedback workshops to test and learn what improvements needed to be made, we now work closely to make constant iterations of the app based on direct user feedback. This makes the app more responsive to the health trust’s needs.

As a result, the NHS is gaining access to large amounts of data-driven insight – critical information to justify funding in a budget-focused organisation.

#3 – TEST AND LEARN FOR ONGOING IMPROVEMENT

Fully managed services can help some organisations to outsource their biggest development challenges, while also gaining new skillsets in the process. They’re often the most effective way to work with an outsourced vendor.

Following a successful redesign of its website environment, dedicated CACI teams continually enhance and build new features for Mitchells & Butlers’ guest facing platform using a test and learn methodology.

For example, the team has developed new functionalities which are helping each of the company’s brands to streamline the customer experience – especially during busy periods where service can be more challenging.

These include:

Pre-order – enabling direct POS integration to help customers pre-order food and drink at busy times, for a more efficient service
Alternative venue – offering customers a suitable nearby alternative if there’s no availability at their first-choice location
Order at table – giving customers the ability to order and pay on their mobiles for food and drink at any location

This evolving website approach has proved a huge success for Mitchells & Butlers. As well as satisfying customers directly, the company’s agility is also helping it continuously improve its operational performance.

#4 – OPTIMISATION USING MACHINE LEARNING

For supermarkets, perishable wastage can be a significant and avoidable drain on revenues – not to mention the negative environmental and social impact it has. One of the best ways to help avoid this is by improving stock control accuracy in a way that combines customers’ shopping pattern data with Machine Learning.

When Waitrose & Partners wanted to reduce waste, we applied Machine Learning to accurately map out when customers would most likely buy a variety of perishable products – helping to make sure the right amount of produce was delivered and on display to keep likely wastage to a minimum.

By working out the most effective times of day to reduce the price of stock approaching its “display until” date, Waitrose & Partners has not only been able to reduce its wastage, it’s also helped to eliminate any unnecessarily large discounts before they’re needed.

And because Waitrose & Partners is using Machine Learning, the process is only likely to get more accurate as its systems learn more about customers’ shopping patterns.

TEST AND LEARN HAS LIMITLESS POTENTIAL – IT’S TIME TO TAKE FULL ADVANTAGE

While these clients used test and learn programmes to help them optimise established projects, test and learn can be used at any scale, whatever the project. If you can test different variables based on previous results, you’ll likely see positive outcomes.

But test and learn is only part of the story. If you want the complete picture beyond test and learn programmes, stand by for my last blog in the series where I’ll talk about fully managed digital services that are proven to get results.

Boosting Heathrow’s Departure Efficiency

Posted on: 8 July 2021

THE CHALLENGE…

Minimise aircraft turnaround delays – often the main cause of airfield congestion
Optimise aircraft stand and taxiway provisioning
Move away from manual aircraft-to-tower communications as the primary method of aircraft routing on the ground

THE SOLUTION…

Working with the University of Nottingham – who developed new algorithms – CACI’s Digital Solutions team developed the Target Start-up Approval Time (TSAT) pre-departure sequencing system
The solution uses a tailored algorithm to analyse multiple variables and suggest optimal aircraft movement times
Aircraft stands are now allocated well ahead of time and take-off slots are decided based on several factors including wake turbulence and aircrew checklist completion
Using TSAT, aircraft are now held at their stands for longer based on slot allocation and engine start is delayed – significantly reducing fuel burn and, therefore, the cost to airlines.

THE RESULTS…

100% of aircraft stands allocated 20 minutes before arrival
Improved customer satisfaction and airport performance
Decreased fuel burn is saving airlines millions in costs
Project was a key factor in our partners 2019 Real IT Award win for Turning Data into Insights

“The Airport Collaborative Decision Making system ensures that the correct number & type of aircraft leave the gate and arrive at the runway at the right time. This increased throughput and reduced congestion. With the complexity of the operation at Heathrow, we needed to use the most advanced systems to deliver the benefits we were seeking and CACI provided just that.”

John Crook, Business Support Manager, NATS Heathrow

READ THE FULL CASE STUDY

Read the full case study now. If you have any questions or want to learn more, get in touch today.

Rail Data Platforms

Real-Time Airport

Secure home working part 2: Three more key questions to ask your technology team

Posted on: 21 June 2021

Every team faced new challenges during COVID-19 disruption, but your technology team might also have faced the monumental task of transitioning everyone in the company to home working. It’s impressive how quickly everyone adapted – but as we explored in the first blog post of this series, that speed has left many companies with some worrying gaps in their security profiles.

Now the dust has settled, and employees are into the rhythm of remote working, it’s time for technology teams to take a step back and assess their security measures. To keep your teams and data sets safe, your technology team should be regularly backing up your data, managing user privileges, and updating your security patches and signatures. If these key maintenance processes are ignored, it could put your entire company at risk.

To help put your mind at rest, we’ve gathered some key security questions you can ask your technology team to ensure they’re keeping your company safe.

QUESTION #1: HOW OFTEN ARE YOU AUDITING USER PERMISSIONS?

While setting teams up for remote working, it’s likely your technology team needed to grant new users access to various applications and storage locations. But now that remote working has become a new normal, it’s important to go back and regularly audit who has access to specific data sets.

And it’s not just about setting the right privileges. It’s also about actively monitoring when certain documents are being accessed. If your company experienced a data breach, it would be difficult to track down the source that caused it without accurate records in place. These logs and ledgers should be managed by your IT administrators, and analysed often to check that important data isn’t being accessed by the wrong users.

Luckily, these steps aren’t difficult. Most cloud storage providers and security solutions offer easy-to-use tools for tracking user privileges and data access reports, and even enable IT administrators to set up alerts for any suspicious activity. But it’s still important to make regular audits and remove permissions when they’re no longer needed – especially at a time when it’s difficult to determine who has access to your employees’ devices.

QUESTION #2: IS OUR DATA BACKED UP – AND CAN WE RECOVER IT WHEN WE NEED TO?

Storing your data on a cloud service isn’t a case of uploading and forgetting about it. Instead, you need to make sure you understand your responsibilities for backing up and protecting your data.

All cloud providers follow the “shared responsibility model”, which dictates which party has responsibility for specific security measures:

As a customer: you’re responsible for everything in the cloud – including your data, the firewalls you use to protect it, and the users you grant access to.
As a cloud provider: they’re responsible for the security of the cloud – including the compute, storage, and networking capabilities.

This distinction means that if an important data set goes missing, it’s not likely you’ll be able to hold your cloud provider accountable. So, whether you use native capabilities built into your cloud platform or create a physical data backup location for critical data sets, it’s important you have a strong replication strategy in place to protect yourself against permanent data loss.

QUESTION #3: ARE OUR SECURITY SIGNATURES AND PATCHES UP TO DATE?

Everyone knows how frustrating updates can be – they take valuable time from the working day, reduce productivity, and are often prompted when it’s inconvenient for the user. And due to these frustrations, many employees don’t keep their devices regularly updated with the latest security patches. But sometimes, a small compromise in productivity can save the stress and cost of a major data breach.

If patches and updates are ignored, it can create some major gaps in your security profile. In fact, in last year’s Security Boulevard report, it was revealed that 60% of data breaches were linked to a vulnerability where a patch was available, but not applied.

It’s down to your technology team to make sure all patches and security signatures are being kept up to date across your entire team. That means making mandatory, scheduled update bookings – ideally out of working hours – and maintaining a clear visibility of every employee device on your network. And the same process should be made for your cloud platforms too, ensuring you’re effectively protecting your data where it resides.

PROTECT YOUR DATA DURING THE REMOTE WORKING PERIOD

There’s a lot to think about when it comes to data protection, and it can quickly become overwhelming if you haven’t got a clear strategy in place. But don’t worry; we’re here to help.

We’ve created a short, one-page checklist that covers the key points you need to think about when assessing your security profile.

And if you missed the first blog post in our series, take a look to find out how you can strengthen your data management strategy.