Transforming Industry

42 43 RETAIL Remote coffee delivery Established in 1753, International coffee company Jacobs Douwe Egberts (JDE) serves customers through a portfolio of iconic coffee brands in 100 countries. When the Covid-19 crisis hit in early 2020, JDE was forced to quickly adapt so that its workforce remained connected and its business continued, ensuring a constant flow of coffee to consumers across the globe. The sudden and sustained need to run the business remotely meant that JDE had to quickly migrate more than 14,000 associates from Skype for Business onto Microsoft Teams. JDE was already using most of the features of Microsoft 365, which had been implemented as part of a longstanding, trusted partnership with Accenture and Avanade. It had also discovered the benefits of digital tools during its 2018 rollout of its internal enterprise social networking platform. However, it hadn’t yet embraced Microsoft Teams and the robust video capabilities it offers. Accenture, Avanade and JDE’s teams launched the rapid migration with a full week of virtual workshops with key functional experts around the world. This process was used to guide the company through the strategy, technical details and potential challenges of migrating thousands of associates onto a new platform in a short amount of time. Because of physical distancing regulations and work-from-home orders, the entire project had to be done remotely. “This project was a combination of technical know-how and kicking open the door. When we’re in high-pressure situations where we need to do something impossible, we turn to Accenture and Avanade,” says Alexander Min, CIO, Jacobs Douwe Egberts. During preparations for the migration to Teams, Avanade and JDE collaborated on a comprehensive, virtual change management program to ensure its people were comfortable using the new tool. A dedicated SharePoint site was built to house FAQs, tips and tricks, one-pagers and other helpful materials created in 11 local languages so that all associates were getting the same information. In addition, 150 JDE ‘champions’ – associates with existing Microsoft 365 and Teams expertise – from IT, communications and HR were assigned to help colleagues get familiar with the tool. Remote training sessions were held both globally and locally via Teams. Three weeks later, nearly 85% of JDE’s associates were migrated to Teams, while the remaining users adopted the tool shortly after. Within a few weeks of activation, associates had conducted more than 82,400 video calls. “The success of any digital program requires user adoption and leaders as role models,” says Orr. “In this case, the adoption was super strong because there was overwhelming support. We were offering something that people truly believed would give them the tools needed to feel safe, stay connected and do their jobs.” Read the full case study >