SOK’s agile transformation created a joint direction, placed the customer at the center, and enabled online stores’ continuous growth and development

In brief

Customer

SOK

Challenge Accelerating the online stores' development and bringing the customer to the center of everything.

Results Continuous growth of online operations.

Benefits Now, SOK can react to customer needs quickly. In addition, the organisation's experts are fully empowered to take charge in their area.

SOK renewed its online operations’ way of working and based it on jointly created agile principles that fit SOK's culture. The experts’ courage to embrace new ways of working, persistence in advancing towards the goals, and deep commitment to the change have led to successful online operations and personnel’s positive feedback on the new operating model.

SOK and Nitor started their agile journey together in 2020 when SOK needed to renew their online stores quickly. The existing organisational structure did not support agile development, and work progressed slowly. In addition, SOK needed a unified way of working. Simultaneously, the company's competitiveness was suffering as there was no way to hear what the customers had to say. It was high time to renew the whole operating model of online operations.

Jointly created agile principles form the framework for the transformation

Implementing a new operating model into an organisation requires time. It is essential to ensure that the new way of thinking is long-lasting and creates a capability to build sustainable businesses for the future.

The cooperation had clear objectives: continuous growth and efficient processes for online groceries, as well as bringing the customer to the center of all operations.

However, the timing of this large-scale transformation was challenging. The dire need for online grocery shopping had emerged in the middle of a global pandemic. People were working remotely, and most of the experts had never even met each other. Adopting completely novel working methods in such a setting seemed daunting.

During the first six months, SOK and Nitor created a set of agile principles that fit SOK's needs. These principles acted as a framework ensuring that daily work served the online stores' objectives. Prioritisation of work started to be guided by customer data, and decision-making would be decentralised so that the teams with the relevant skills and real-time information also have the power to make decisions. Investments in competence development and systematic retrospectives helped good teams amplify their learning effort: the one who learns fastest often wins the race.

In addition, these jointly shared principles played an essential part in replacing hierarchical leadership with servant leadership through change support and cooperation.

Photos: SOK and Antti Haataja, Laura Vesa, and Sami Heiskanen.

Placing the customer at the heart of everything

SOK needed to undergo a substantial structural change to reach the set goals. In the former, more traditional organisation, people did not have a way to cooperate naturally, and individual experts were pulled towards many different directions as multiple programs were worked on simultaneously. Work progressed slowly, and customer feedback on new development programs was insufficient.

A systematic and broad-ranged collection of customer feedback was initiated, and the new agile operating model allowed SOK to react quickly.

Earlier, the teams had been almost entirely technical. Now, technology, customer experience, and business work together. New solutions are built in an outcome-oriented way based on customer data, making them customer-centric and technically sound.

New cross-functional teams were built around the customers’ experience in each of SOK's online stores. As a result, the customer finds the site quickly, ordering is effortless, and the goods are delivered quickly. The teams own their work, making decisions and bearing responsibility for achieving their objectives. The renewed operating model enables continuous customer feedback collection, quick experiments, and continuous learning. The same principle has also been harnessed elsewhere in SOK’s organisation.

New roles offer opportunities for growth

With the transformation, the experts' roles have changed significantly. Product owners, business analysts, developers, and designers have replaced the traditional roles of project managers, giving people more responsibility.

After experimenting with the new ways of working, people quickly realised that short development cycles and customer-centric development work extremely well.

- Kirsi Saarikko, VP IT and digital development, SOK

Many things have changed for people in the online organisation. In the previous hierarchical operating model, managers told teams what to do. As a result, most people were not used to making decisions about their area of expertise, and SOK wanted to offer practical, systematic support from the start. The change was definitely challenging, but people in the organisation now feel more empowered. They value the new way of working, where they can see how jointly crafted agile principles come to life in everyday work.

Agile coaches' support has been instrumental in this success. They have ensured teams adopt the new working methods in their daily work and assist overcoming the inevitable practical challenges. The agile coaches have also worked with top management and helped them embrace and incorporate the change. Strengthening servant leadership has been central to the agile coaches' work throughout the organisation.

Leading with objectives increases a sense of collaboration and encourages the experts to find the best solutions

SOK needed the transformation to progress as quickly as possible, so creating a positive atmosphere where people work together towards a common goal was essential. It was also important that the experts could witness the results of their work frequently. Ensuring that customer feedback is visible to everyone has been one key factor in deepening the motivation and pride for one's work.

The team experiences a great sense of success when they see how a customer praises our online grocery store and, as a result, can spend more time with their family on a Friday evening.

- Suvi Ihaksi, Agile Lead, SOK

Two-month development cycles are another way to increase the sense of success. In two months, it is possible to finalise jointly prioritised and planned work and deliver something meaningful. OKRs (Objectives and Key Results) are a great way to support this, together with longer-term yearly planning.

Joint objectives gave people a common direction, leading to an increased sense of togetherness and meaning of work in our organisation.

- Suvi Ihaksi, Agile Lead, SOK

SOK's online stores' key learnings for a successfull transformation

SOK's online stores have reached multiple major goals three years into the transformation. The most significant ones are online grocery's continuous growth and development speed and quality.

For SOK's customers, the changes bring a reliable online store. Before the transformation, problems could not be solved internally, as many of their solutions were in the hands of external suppliers. Now, however, the teams are self-directing and can quickly solve challenging situations.

Agile is a much more cost-effective way of working, and it has allowed us to focus on developing new products and services instead of keeping the focus on administration and maintenance of our systems.

- Heini Dahlström, VP, Loyalty, SOK

Today, continuous learning is present in SOK's everyday work, and they have identified multiple learnings and keys to success for agile transformations:

1. The cooperation between business, technology, and customer experience is essential for competitiveness. Active commitment and collaboration between these functions also help progress the transformation quickly.

2. Collecting and reacting to customer feedback from the start allows creating value long-term. SOK launched their new online grocery store quickly to collect customer data and continue the development work based on the feedback. Work was then prioritised based on what the customers found most valuable.

3. Competence development is key. As the experts are adopting new roles and ways of working, it is essential to strengthen the needed competencies in the organisation consistently. New leadership practices, product leadership, and learning through experience empower people and lead to a self-directing organisation that generates ideas and solves problems quickly.

4. Agile coaches support the teams in their daily work and help them deliver and improve continuously. SOK has consistently grown its internal Agile Master network, offering practical support for the teams throughout the transformation.

5. It is important to build a culture where it is safe to fail and share the learnings from the failures with others. At SOK, the agile principles crafted during the first six months of the transformation helped achieve this.

Most of all, having the courage to start an extensive transformation, believing in it, and having the right partners with practical experience were key success factors in the change.

Nitor's Marko Setälä has worked with SOK since 2020. Marko's practical experience in agile transformations and knowing what works in practice and what remains theoretical have helped SOK to develop its online grocery.

Especially during the first six months, Marko's role was pivotal. We would not have had a chance to take things forward without someone like him.

- Jarkko Kyttänen, Digital & Transformation & Growth, CDO SOK Retail eCommerce

The experience from online stores’ success is a great asset for SOK as they continue harnessing the benefits of agility in their organisation.

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