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Loriel Tsiu | Executive Head: Innovation, Vodacom
“Innovation is the backbone of where Vodacom started… The Altron platform has really been amazing in helping us unlock innovation.”
0
new ideas from across Africa to drive innovation for millions of subscribers
0billion
earned from a combination of cost-savings and new products
0%
of winning ideas are in production or are already being implemented
Client
Hungry Lion
Location
Johannesburg, South Africa
Type of industry
Quick Service Restaurant
Business Unit
Digital Business
About Vodacom
Vodacom Group Limited (Vodacom) is a South African mobile communications company that connects South Africa by providing connectivity, digital, and financial services to over 51 million customers.
Launched in 1993, Vodacom was one of the first mobile service providers in South Africa. It has grown its operations across Africa to cover over 500 million people across the DRC, Egypt, Ethiopia, Kenya, Lesotho, Mozambique, and Tanzania. Vodacom is majority-owned by Vodafone (65.1% holding), one of the world’s largest communications companies by revenue.
The culture of innovation shared among its staff sets Vodacom apart and drives its growth. For instance, Vodacom was the first to launch 3G and 4G and prepaid airtime in South Africa, and it has introduced revolutionary customer support and functionality through the VodaPay and M-Pesa platforms.
Innovation is such a crucial part of Vodacom’s DNA that Chief Executive Officer Shameel Joosub offers a R1 million reward for exceptional ideas that deliver value to its objectives.
Watch their #epicingenuity story
A platform-based collaboration tool
that enables staff members to propose solutions or innovations
that would deliver value to Vodacom's objectives.
The business challenge
A small Group innovation department was formed 10 years ago, and it had to develop processes and governance to collate the ideas staff members shared manually. Unfortunately, information was fragmented across spreadsheets and emails, and scoring was manual.
This caused frustration for staff members and the business.
For staff: The manual process prevented accurate feedback on ideas, and due to siloed governance practices, staff felt their ideas were being lost or simply unacknowledged.
For Vodacom: The company could not track the value of innovative implementations and ideas, nor the time it took from ideation to delivery.
Additionally, that lack of transparency threatened to harm the business-critical culture of innovation and collaboration.
"What's so important for organisations to remember as you are building out innovation is that you have the right leadership support, that you create a culture that breeds innovation and people are not afraid of failing. That's really where Altron has been able to help us in delivering and solving some of the process issues. So that's what I would really encourage organisations to do as they build out and start using the Idea Trigger platform"
Loriel Tsiu | Executive Head: Innovation, Vodacom
The solution
We presented Vodacom with Idea Trigger, a platform-based collaboration tool that enables staff members to propose solutions or innovations that would deliver value to Vodacom’s objectives:
- Added value to customers
- Simplified processes
- Business growth
Full transparency
Every Vodacom employee can submit their idea and track its progress at every step, from reviews to scoring, with credit accurately attributed.
Enhanced collaboration
Vodacom challenged us to develop a way to rapidly and powerfully support internal collaboration. So, we created the Bench.
This portal lets staff members list skills, interests or ideas to support existing submissions. At any point, a staff member who has submitted an idea can connect with any Vodacom employee worldwide and leverage their advertised skillset.
Accurate idea scoring
Using Idea Trigger, Vodacom can direct submissions to the correct subject matter experts for review. This process ensures that every idea is seen by the people who can best see its value, regardless of the department or country the idea originates from.
Streamlined process
Idea Trigger instantly removes all manual processes involved in collating, reviewing, scoring and rewarding innovations.
Trust
All submitted ideas are visible to every Vodacom and Vodafone employee. People can comment on and ‘Like’ ideas, share ideas, and work on ideas collaboratively. Most importantly, Idea Trigger supports Vodacom’s ethos of getting things done together, experimenting, and learning fast.
The correct approach
Idea Trigger enables Vodacom to ask the correct questions, get the proper people to score the ideas, and shortlist the best ideas.
The benefits
- Idea Trigger enabled Vodacom’s internal idea hack-a-thon to grow from South Africa and reach all African operations.
- In 2023, over 500 ideas were submitted for the hack-a-thon
- Vodacom’s parent company, Vodafone, has adopted Idea Trigger to support its innovation drives.
- 50% of the winning hack-a-thon and Idea Trigger initiatives have been implemented and are in production
- In a combination of cost-savings and new revenue streams, Idea Trigger has helped Vodacom realise R1 billion in additional revenue.
- Staff members from Ghana, Tanzania and Kenya, who otherwise would never have been able to connect, collaborated on an M-PESA project that has earned Vodacom R1 million over the last three years.
If you have an #epicingenuity challenge
we have the solution.
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