Why does Reece need to build a UX Design capability?
Since I started at Reece about four months ago, I’ve been on the receiving end of a few raised eyebrows when chatting to different UX and Product folk across Melbourne.
“Reece? The plumbing people? Why do they need to build a UX capability?”
I guess it’s a fair question. After all, before responding to an alluring job ad on SEEK, Reece wasn’t exactly front of mind when I was considering my next career move. The job ad though was very well written, and after an initial chat with our CTO Marcos, I was quickly obsessed with the opportunity in front of me.
A quick overview for those of you who haven’t heard of Reece Group— Reece’s purpose is to improve the lives of our customers and our people by striving for greatness every day. We operate Australia’s largest plumbing and bathroom supplies business, as well as many other businesses including water works, irrigation, and heating/cooling. We have 8,000 people in 800 branches across Australia, New Zealand and the United States, and we generated $5.5 billion in revenue during the last financial year.
Some of you will know the first thing I did when I joined Reece was spend 10 weeks behind the counter in our Box Hill Plumbing branch (and 1 week in Metalflex Boronia) learning how to serve our customers. Most people who know this seem to be under the misapprehension that this was my idea. It wasn’t (although I’ve embraced the idea enthusiastically). Our newly hired Chief Experience Officer Ben Chan is spending six months in a branch doing the same. New grads to the Reece group spend up to 12 months in branch learning the ropes. Experiencing our business and our customers firsthand is part of the induction process. As a result of this deep customer immersion, there’s a customer service mentality and DNA here that I’ve not seen anywhere else. While Reece is just starting on a more strategic approach to UX, there has always been a hell of a lot of customer interaction, co-design, and experimentation in the way we work. Involving the customer in the product process is part of the company DNA.
When asked to set-up and embed a UX function in most organisations, you first have to diagnose the core company DNA (sales, marketing, business…) and then work your strategy around the existing backbone. But what happens when the backbone of the company is already the customer? An opportunity to interwind UX processes into an already customer focused company seemed too good an opportunity to pass up.
The success of Reece Group has to date been delivered via a focused customer service and product obsession in the analogue world. Like most companies, we now need to adapt to ensure we can deliver this same great experience in the digital world. As a result, there’s an opportunity to evolve our in-store customer experience, play a role in setting up new business lines, innovate how we maintain our existing customer focus, and build upon the online offering. To do this, we need to continue evolving the way we work, how we identify new opportunities and bring them to life, and how we attract and retain our amazing people.
My first few months in the business have exceeded even my high expectations. Now my branch time is over, I’m excited to really sink my teeth into the opportunities ahead. 2020 looks like it’s going to be big. If you’re keen to join the ride, reach out for a chat.
