Changing Methodology to Improve and Accelerate Service for 106 Million Members
A national federation of 36 independent, community-based and locally operated healthcare companies that collectively provide healthcare coverage for more than 106 million members wanted to adopt Agile processes to enhance their member portal and other products. xScion successfully worked with them to develop and implement Agile within the organization to improve and accelerate service for its members.
The Challenge
The client wanted to transition from Waterfall to Agile to build products iteratively while promoting adaptive planning and enabling improved customer participation but faced inertia after decades of using a Waterfall approach. There were differing opinions and perspectives across the team on what Agile was and what specific practices should be adopted.
The Change
xScion helped the client develop and implement a Proof of Concept (POC) using the principles of Agile. A pilot project was identified within eService, the portal for its members, to build a two-way secure messaging application between members and Customer Service Representatives.
A team of seven members (one Scrum Master, one Product Owner, three Developers and two Testers) was created. A monthly Sprint was agreed upon and a product backlog was prepared identifying all the underlying user stories. For each Sprint, the team worked on a specific number of user stories and xScion presented the incremental functionality to the client. All feedback was incorporated in the succeeding Sprint sessions.
The Value
The client gave a “thumbs up” to xScion’s successful pilot test and stakeholders agreed to transition to Agile methodology. They successfully transitioned to Agile and continued to roll out the methodology across multiple business functions and are using Agile for eService, Digital Experience, Single Sign-On and all other pertinent projects to improve speed-to-market and customer service. xScion continues to support the client and its vendors in embracing Agile for future growth.