In UX strategy, transformation refers to the process of changing how organizations operate, make decisions, and deliver value to customers. It involves both external transformation, which focuses on improving customer experiences, and internal transformation, which addresses organizational structures, processes, and culture. A successful transformation initiative aligns business objectives with customer needs. This requires collaboration across departments, strong leadership, and a commitment to customer-centered thinking. UX strategy helps guide these efforts by ensuring that organizational changes lead to meaningful improvements for both customers and employees.
UX Strat Europe: Transformation inwards and outwards
Our summary of the UX Strat conference 2017.
UX Strat attracts leading experts on UX Strategy from around the world.
This year’s UX Strat Europe tackled the topic of human centred design by splitting the conference across two days, covering two different, but interlinked themes: transformation inwards and transformation outwards. Having heard about the insightful experience my colleagues had at UX Strat 2016, I jumped at the opportunity to attend this year’s event with 13 other Foolproofers. It was my first time at UX Strat and I absolutely loved the collaborative, energetic and supportive vibe throughout the conference.
The first day of the conference really spoke to me as a practitioner, as the presentations and conversations were around making sense of the world and human behaviour. As practitioners, we know that real innovation comes from user centred design – it is all about creating human experiences. This means designing for behaviours, rather than products/services.
The second day of the conference offered a great perspective on how companies can start to integrate and imbed a UX first approach within their businesses. Being customer oriented and creating products/services for people first not only requires a UX focused team, but a cultural change within a business, underpinned by a shift towards user-centred design.
If, like me, you have an interest in designing for and understanding human behaviour, take the time to read the presentation overviews below. This is my top 5 list, which includes presentations that I found the most innovative and challenging to conventional thinking:
Designing intelligence into everyday life
Paul-Jervis Heath shared with us his perspective on our developing relationship with technology, the changing effects it has on our environments and how it can impact the relationships we have with each other. He feels that the current generation of devices are insensitive and there is plenty of room to move to a more human view of technology. His presentation includes interesting examples of how to design appliances that improve everyday life and the human factors of those experiences.
Experience strategy for digital conversations with customers
Apart from the fact that Gregory Ek is an intriguing and engaging speaker, his presentation offered us an interesting perspective on how conversations can take normal banking experiences to a new level. He gave us great insight into the design journey ING are currently embarking on to leverage the conversational paradigm by designing conversations with a human touch.
Adapting Research and Design Methods For Unfamiliar Contexts
Zach Hyman talked us through an interesting research project, where in situ research proved to be essential to create a valuable experience/product. What better way to start designing for human behaviours than by living with, eating like, and talking to the people you are designing for? Read this presentation to better prepare yourself for conducting in situ research, as Zach provides us with key insights derived from his own experiences.
Turning BMW into a Customer Oriented Mobility Services Provider
For a company to become customer focused they must change their culture, mind-sets and habits. This is probably one of the most difficult challenges of all and takes time, especially for companies who are less flexible in their reaction to change. Martin Kulessa captures this challenge nicely in his presentation by talking you through BMW’s journey to becoming more customer oriented.
Creating an Adidas Ecosystem Experience Design Strategy
This presentation was one of my favourites, as it really forced me to think outside the box and re-think my usual processes. Willem encouraged us to create chaos in our design processes and thinking, by becoming a designer that embraces the beauty of dissonance. There are many things in this world that we do not understand and do now know, Willem challenges us to explore them and embrace the unknown. If we do not, we may risk end up doing more of the same and therefore less innovative.
All presentations from this year’s conference are available on Slideshare. Additionally, each presentation has been distilled as a one-page sketch-note by Chris Spalton, our in-house doodler. You can download the complete set.
If you are interested in knowing more about UX Strategy, you can read more on our journal, or listen/watch our interview series with leaders in UX Strategy. Ensure you don't miss the next UX Strat event by following @uxstrat on Twitter.
UX Transformation - FAQs
Customer experience improvements often require changes to internal processes, systems, and ways of working. If organizations attempt to improve customer-facing experiences without addressing internal barriers, transformation efforts may struggle to achieve lasting results. Organizational change supports cross-functional collaboration, encourages customer-focused decision-making, and enables teams to act on insights more effectively. Aligning internal operations with customer needs helps businesses deliver more consistent, efficient, and valuable experiences across all touchpoints.
UX strategy provides a framework for understanding customer needs and connecting them to organizational objectives. Through research, journey mapping, service design, and experience measurement, teams can identify opportunities for improvement and prioritize initiatives that create the greatest impact. This strategic approach helps organizations make evidence-based decisions and focus resources on solving meaningful problems. By incorporating customer insights into transformation efforts, businesses can improve customer satisfaction while driving operational and commercial success.
Culture influences how people collaborate, innovate, and respond to change. Organizations with customer-centered cultures are often better equipped to adapt to new challenges and deliver meaningful experiences. A culture that values empathy, experimentation, and learning encourages teams to prioritize customer needs throughout decision-making processes. Without cultural alignment, transformation programs may encounter resistance or fail to generate long-term impact. Strong cultures help sustain change and ensure that customer-focused practices become embedded across the organization.
Customer insights provide the evidence needed to understand what customers need, where pain points exist, and which improvements will create the most value. Without this understanding, organizations risk investing in initiatives that fail to address real customer challenges. Insight-driven transformation enables businesses to focus their efforts on outcomes that matter. It also helps teams evaluate progress, refine solutions, and ensure that transformation initiatives remain aligned with customer expectations over time.
A major lesson was that transformation extends beyond technology implementation or service redesign. Organizations must also transform internally by improving collaboration, processes, and decision-making structures. Customer-centered change requires alignment between internal operations and external experiences. The conference reinforced the importance of combining strategy, research, leadership, and organizational commitment to achieve sustainable transformation outcomes and measurable business results.