Established pan-European experience design organisation
In 2014 I joined Salesforce as part of the global experience design leadership to establish an experience design organisation in Europe as part of Salesforce's expansion in the region at the time.
I approached the challenge from several strategic angles to set the organisation up for success:
- Convince leadership that a central design team in London would not be sufficient as EMEA was split into four self-governing regions: UKi, South, Central and Nordics. Furthermore, understanding local beahviours and customs is an important aspect of designers truely understanding their users.
- Grow 4 teams with a minimum viable team mentality. A single designer gets lonely and quickly burns out.
- Educate rest of Salesforce Service organisation in EMEA so they knew when to position design as part of customer proposals.
- Shape an define package called "Envision" to fit the EMEA market and convince leadership to give sales teams (globally) incentive to sell the package.
Results
- The organisation grew to 4 established studios in London, Berlin, Paris and Amsterdam with a headcount of 40+.
- A consistent 9.7 out of 10 in customer satisfaction.
- Had largely no benchtime
- A staff retention rate of almost 100%.
- Bonus result: 2015: The first time a project, where design had been involved, appeared at a Salesforce keynote presentation with a lead-generation app for Commerzbank.
Selected work

Grow experience design organisation and increase design maturity.

Established pan-European experience design organisation.

Strengthened experience design groups for medium segment products and design system.

Led industry-defining, collaborative solution for business users.

Advised on establishing an internal experience design team.

Conceptualised eco-system vision for small business customers.