Let the data hunt begin with Great Asset Hunt

Thames Water, the UK’s largest water provider, has a regulatory requirement to map field assets, track their state of repair and log any associated health and safety risks.

This process of data collection quickly became costly for the business and both laborious and repetitive for engineers. Our brief was twofold: to increase productivity by making the process-heavy system more efficient; while fundamentally reshaping the nature of the work.

What we did

The first task was to modernise the collection and inputting of data – designing and building an iPad-friendly, smart questionnaire that was quick to complete (30mins vs a previous 3 hours), minimised inaccuracies, updated backend systems immediately and scaled across all assets and site types.

We then wrapped that ‘tool’ into a wider metagame – a Great Asset Hunt with badges, inter-team competitions, XP that spanned jobs and a tone that repositioned the ‘have to do’… to the ‘want to do’.

What we learnt

The Great Asset Hunt shows how the PLAY approach can drive greater productivity, engagement and performance improvements – even in the driest of tasks (data input). Before the Great Asset Hunt, an average site audit would take 8 workdays to complete. With The Great Asset Hunt, the average became 2 days, a 4-fold productivity uplift. Compliance with the established processes improved, mistakes were minimised, all while making the nature of the job more engaging for engineers.