British Army
Sector: Public sector, Defence
Roles: UX/UI Designer, Project manager, Team lead
2021 - 2023
Objective
Establish a shared discovery capability that allows personnel across Army Headquarters to surface complex problems early, generate credible insight quickly, and translate lived operational experience into informed decision-making. The aim was to close the gap between strategy and reality by giving the organisation a reliable way to listen to itself.
Responsibilities
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Operating model design
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Service design
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Product definition
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Information architecture
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UX and UI design
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Low-code development
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Stakeholder engagement
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Capability building
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Training and teaching
Brief
Large organisations often fail in predictable ways. Strategy is set at the top. Complexity lives at the edges. Between the two, reality becomes distorted as it travels up formal reporting lines.
Inside Army Headquarters, this gap between ambition and ground truth was visible again and again. Critical challenges were surfacing too late, or in forms so diluted that meaningful action became difficult.
Discovery work existed, but it was slow to start. Eight weeks was a typical lead time before real insight gathering could even begin.
More importantly, there was no clear pathway for personnel to raise complex problems themselves. Responsibility for improvement was implicitly reserved for senior leadership and expert consultants. Those closest to the problem were positioned as reporters, not authors of change.
The organisation lacked a reliable way to hear itself.
Strategic ambitions collapse without ground truth
Working inside Army Headquarters, I repeatedly saw strategic initiatives falter because real challenges at the ground level were not properly heard.
Issues were distorted as they travelled up the chain of command. Discovery work often started too late and took eight weeks to initiate. Personnel had no clear pathway to raise complex problems, and responsibility for solving them was assumed to sit with senior leaders rather than those affected.
The organisation needed a way to surface accurate insight quickly, directly and consistently.
A 'front door' for the service, built for clarity and accessibility
Discovery was reframed as an open, service-led capability rather than a request-based activity, led by me as a core design initiative. A single digital gateway created a clear route into discovery for anyone, triggering structured support from a multidisciplinary team.
Through cross-unit workshops, I defined core principles around access, triage and scalability, translating these into lightweight prototypes that captured key context without friction.
As adoption grew, I took on leadership of the Digital Discovery team, shaping prioritisation, delivery rhythm and communication to enable consistent, scalable discovery across the organisation.
Understanding and assessing problems faster to keep up with demand
As submissions increased, I created a rapid pre-discovery process built around three facilitated workshops: stakeholder interviews, stakeholder mapping, and a Lean UX Canvas. I formalised this approach as First Look.
This halved the time required to assess new problems, reducing initial analysis from eight weeks to four and improving responsiveness across the organisation.
Building digital literacy to enable ownership of solutions
Software training was embedded into each delivery so that stakeholders understood how their new tools worked and how to adapt them.
I also ran open problem-solving sessions with developers, which grew into a voluntary citizen developer community of 500+ members.
Alongside training, I established governance to support wider participation in solving operational challenges while maintaining quality and control.
Faster, clearer and more honest insight across the Army
Discovery as a Service delivered measurable improvements in how the British Army approached problem definition and solution development.
Discovery happened faster and with greater clarity, leading to better-defined problems and more appropriate solutions.
An active citizen developer community ensured solutions were built and sustained by those closest to the work.
Discoveries completed (first 18 months)
64
Discovery throughput
+75%
Time to complete discovery
-50%
Citizen developer community
500+
Redesigning who has the power to make change
Discovery as a Service reshaped how the Army surfaced, understood and acted on problems. By embedding accessibility, sustainability and capability-building, it created lasting value beyond individual projects.
My focus then turned to transitioning ownership to civil servants and military personnel, documenting processes and coaching new leads so that the service continued as part of everyday operations.
Ultimately, this work helped establish a platform that made improvement something everyone could take part in.