MVP for HR Service Delivery

I like MVP because it quickly provides value, rapidly enables a new capability and allows for a more focused solution in the first release. If the solution is a fit, continue to build on it. If it missed the mark, the investment was small, which allows for a pivot. In the context of HR Service Delivery, we don’t often get to talk about MVP, much less design one.

Our team was asked to do just that for a major airline, transforming the way they onboard the 10,000 candidates each year who accept an offer to work for them.

They are solving two significant business opportunities for their HR administration and talent acquisition teams:

1. Provide visibility into tracking the numerous background checks and clearances a worker must complete prior to starting work, and
2. Shorten the onboarding cycle to retain more candidates.

These opportunities defined their MVP - “Let’s build a product that solves these things first.” Observing each component:

1. Just enough features -- Eight activities between offer acceptance and start date. Not day one, week one, day 30, or day 60 activities.
2. Early Customers -- HR Administration and Talent Acquisition teams are the early customers, not hiring managers or recruiters, IT, finance, or facilities who would otherwise be a player in onboarding, not even the candidate.
3. Future product development -- We’ve already identified a backlog of features for subsequent phases that will improve the overall candidate experience.

Enter ServiceNow’s Enterprise Onboarding and Transitions product. Onboarding is designed to capture sets of activities configurable by customers who define what worker onboarding means to them. Often, these activities happen prior to a worker’s start date (e.g. tax documents, direct deposit, drug screen, order IT equipment, etc), on a worker’s start date (e.g. orientation, set up voicemail, lunch with the hiring manager, etc), and after a worker’s start date (e.g. complete training, draw up a personal development plan, 60-day review, etc). In this example, the customer wanted to focus on a small but impactful set of activities that are completed after an employment offer is accepted and prior to the start date.

Designing the MVP has:

1. Defined guardrails for the project. This is in, that is out.
2. Set achievable expectations for go-live. Remember, we’re solving for 10,000 accepted job offers per year.
3. Provided a baseline for future investments based on the success of the initial engagement.

With a focus on the MVP, we have set the stage for future successes that wouldn’t have been possible if we tried to solve for every issue at once.

The Anti is a world-class service company on a mission to improve the worker and customer experience, powered by ServiceNow.