Portfolio management support

The challenge

Support us with the setup and optimization of our strategic portfolio management.

Which change projects are we going to work on? Which are most impactful? And which projects will we skip? Joost
temporarily supported NS with their portfolio management.

Our fresh perspective

Portfolio management at NS

In multidisciplinary teams, Nederlandse Spoorwegen (NS), the Netherlands’ principal railway operator, is working on innovating its digital services. Almost every change requires an IT solution.

But which changes are most important? Which require immediate action? Which are best postponed? And which should be skipped entirely?

At NS, a group of strategists is responsible for the portfolio process. Together, they discuss and prioritize all change projects. There were many ideas to improve this process, but the capacity to act on them was lacking.

Getting to work on portfolio management

Our Fresh Force, Joost, became part of NS’ strategy team. In this role, he didn’t have just one foot, but both feet, in the organization. By joining them in their work, he became increasingly familiar with the portfolio process. He kept the process running and supported all involved parties by making sure they had all the information they needed.

Process optimization

Change means taking action! From his role within operations, Joost started to optimize the portfolio process. He identified areas of improvement from within the organization, pinpointed opportunities, and ensured their implementation. The result? After several months, the portfolio process has become a lot less time-consuming. On top of this, the improvements Joost has implemented help NS to make the right choices and justify them.

In brief 🧺

“I truly became part of NS. In my free time, I can often be heard sprinkling my environment with NS facts. For example, did you know that Platform A is always in the direction of Amsterdam?”

Joost, projectmanager Frisse Blikken

The fresh perspective of…

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Arcadis

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Ministerie van Economische Zaken en Klimaat

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Aegon

Digital Escape Room

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Increasing employee engagement

The challenge

FrieslandCampina Ingredients asked us to create an experience to increase the sense of pride among their employees worldwide.

“Why do we do what we do? How does our work impact the lives of our consumers?”
We built an experience to increase employee engagement around the world.

Our fresh perspective

Employee engagement

We wanted to find a unique way to show the impact that FrieslandCampina Ingredients’ employees have on the lives of their different target groups. To achieve this, we developed a new concept – “the Black Box.”

Audiovisual experience

The Black Box is an audiovisual installation with video screens on three sides, which we used to place viewers quite literally in the middle of end users’ lives.

The Black Box experience featured four different storylines, all of which helped to make the impact FrieslandCampina Ingredients’ products have on the lives of their end users visible and tangible.

We assisted FrieslandCampina with both the construction of the Black Box and the creation of the video.

Internal communication worldwide

To give all FrieslandCampina Ingredients’ employees the opportunity to experience the Black Box, it travelled all over the world. From Veghel to Shanghai, from Bedum to Singapore, the Black Box visited every FrieslandCampina Ingredients location.

More than 2,000 employees worldwide experienced the Black Box, making a deep impression on many of them. By clearly showing why their work is so important, the video increased employees’ sense of pride in their work and their esteem for their colleagues.

“Frisse Blikken displayed flexibility, creativity, and a strong desire to make the Black Box into a success. I’m incredibly proud of what we accomplished together.”

FrieslandCampina

In brief 🧺

Our team

Jonathan

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From complex story to inspiring narrative

The challenge

The Dutch Ministry of Economic Affairs and Climate asked us to devise and load an appropriate narrative for their multiyear energy policy.

How do you make a complicated story tangible? Doing so requires creativity. We organized an interactive event, wrote an inspiring spoken word, and produced its accompanying video.

Our fresh perspective

An appealing narrative

Working in collaboration with many different partners, the Ministry of Economic Affairs and Climate is currently working on the National Energy System Plan. The aim of this plan is to show what the Netherlands’ energy system will look like in 2050.

The consultation phase, during which partners were able to give their input and feedback, had already ended. We were tasked with translating the existing content into an inspiring story that would also build a bridge to the implementation phase.

From a long report to spoken word

With ‘Our energetic country’ as its common thread, we wrote an inspiring spoken word summary of the core of the report, supplemented with appealing video images produced by one of our co-creation partners.

Interactive event

We organized a large event to keep all parties, including energy suppliers and Y, on board after the consultation phase. After all, they’re the ones who will have to execute the plans.

To kick the event off, the spoken word – an encouraging call to action – was recited live. Six break-out sessions, facilitated by experts from the field, were also part of the program.

In brief 🧺

Our team

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Nestle

A gamified onboarding

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Ministerie van Economische Zaken en Klimaat

From complex story to inspiring narrative

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A gamified onboarding

The challenge

Can you help to engage our new colleagues with our culture and our core values in a fun refreshing way and challenge them to share their fresh perspective on our organization?

Nestlé is the world’s largest food company and a leader in Nutrition, health & wellness. The organization employs approximately 1,200 people in the Netherlands, with over 150 people starting in their new jobs every year. Nestlé would like to offer all of these new employees the same onboarding experience.

Our solution

Approach

We started by talking to the target audience and defining and prioritzed the most important goals for the renewed onboarding program in our team. We came up with ideas to engage new Nestlé onboarders with the culture and the core values in surprising ways. And we incorporated ways to gather starters’ fresh perspective on the organization. With this as our design principles, we created a revamped onboarding journey in which starters get to know Nestlé better on two different levels: the individual and team level.

Result

A renewed journey that involves starters in a storyline that fits well with the organization. During their journey, they follow the story and journey from ingredient to full-fledged Nestlé product and see first-hand how the renewed Nestlé strategy impacts that journey. After signing their contract, starters are given an interactive magazine to guide them through the experience. During their first day on the job, they play a collaborative office game together, to really get to know each other. Followed by a strategy challenge in Teams. One month later, they have pitch day where the different teams compete and pitch their fresh perspectives on the Nestlé’s strategy.

Our team

Britt

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Arcadis

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Arcadis

Digital Movement ‘Dare to be Digital’

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Digital Movement ‘Dare to be Digital’

The challenge

What story and which marketing materials can help us to simply and powerfully connect Arcadians to the Digital Strategy and thus claim a position as Thought Leader within the industry?

Our solution

Background

We worked in co-creation with a multidisciplinary team from Arcadis. Together with our network of graphic designers and IT partners, we created a combination of various on- and offline tools and interventions to include employees in the Digital Strategy.

Approach

In order to connect the Arcardians to the strategy, we formulated a clear story covering questions like ‘what does this strategy entail, for whom is it intended and how does it translate into practice?’ Based on the researched needs of the target group, an appropriate communication plan was drawn up. We then divided the strategy into six digital priorities, which we communicated through podcasts, infographics and videos. Employees could also experience these priorities through different interventions, which enabled them to not only understand, but also feel and convey them. The Digital Week was in perfect alignment with previous communication and interventions. During this five-day programme employees could join live session at four different locations in the Netherlands or participate online. The sessions included master classes, interactive workshops, a ‘house of commons’ debate and a hackathon. In the special ArcaDigital App participants could find event information and earn points for participation. To claim the position of Thought Leader, several video’s that showcase client projects are shared externally. These video’s now serve as a showcase for potential customers, to show to what extent Arcadis is developed digitally and what opportunities this offers them.

The result

300

People participated in Digital Week

500

Users on the app

Podcasts

Video’s with more than 6000 viewers

Our team

Thijs

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Lamers Installations

From DNA to rock-solid employer brand

Arcadis

Employer branding Arcadis

Nestle

A gamified onboarding

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Beyond the Money

The challenge

"How can we train people to apply Customer Due Diligence (CDD) standards in an effective, innovative and fun way?"

Our solution

Background

Beyond the Money is a kind of interactive Netflix series, where players make their own choices and determine how the story develops. The choices and trade-offs correspond to what employees encounter in reality, but players are placed in different roles in the game. For example, in that of an investor, a quiz participant or a futuristic RaboCob.

Approach

Together with Rabobank, we designed an extensive, blended development programme that consists of ten interventions. In this programme, we focus not only on knowledge but also on awareness and skills. The most important intervention in this programme was an E-learning module combined with an online game: Beyond the Money.

Beyond the Money is like an interactive Netflix show, in which players make their own choices and determine how the story progresses. The choices and considerations correspond to what employees face in reality, but players were given a different role in the game. For example, the role of an investor, a quiz participant or a futuristic RaboCop.

The result

We trained 3,000 people in 31 locations worldwide with this programme. The target group is diverse, from front-office employees to CDD analysts, everyone follows the same training. The programme received excellent reviews from participants and is being used within the bank as an example of how to train employees in an innovative way.

Watch the case video below, in which we explain more about Beyond the Money.

Our team

Klaas Jan

Thijs

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Culture and values trajectory

Rabobank

Beyond the Money

Portfolio management support

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Employer branding Arcadis

The challenge

Arcadis wanted to increase their brand awareness and better reflect their true DNA in job market communications.

At the start of the project (2019) Arcadis Netherlands was growing fast, and had even bigger growth ambitions for the following year, 2020. This meant that they had a large short-term need for recruitment and selection of new talent (from different target groups).

Our solution

Question

This project was made up of three phases: 1) analysis; 2) deepening; 3) design and development.

Our role at Arcadis Netherlands started with an investigation into the organization’s employee journey. The request we were given was to help create an inventory of the phases of the employee journey in need of extra attention. One of the outcomes of this inventory revealed that Arcadis Netherlands could improve the way in which it was attracting new talent.

We delved deeper into this theme with the questions, “What is Arcadis Netherlands’ current employer brand?” and “How can Arcadis Netherlands position itself as a more attractive employer to attract new talent?”

We then went to work on developing a campaign concept to increase brand awareness of Arcadis Netherlands. During the employment-market communication campaign, tools were developed for both a broader target audience and for specific strategic audiences.

Background

Arcadis Netherlands was growing fast at the start of this project in 2019 – with even greater growth ambitions for the upcoming year (2020). This meant that Arcadis Netherlands had a tremendous short-term need for the recruitment and selection of new talent (from among different target audiences).

To achieve the intended goals, Arcadis Netherlands wanted to increase its brand recognizability as an employer. In addition, the organization was noticing that its true DNA was not being communicated well enough in its communication towards the employment market.

Our approach

During the assessment of the employee journey, we used depth interview, questionnaires, and focus groups to assess all steps of Arcadis Netherlands’ internal and external employee journey.

We subsequently delved deeper into attracting talent. In doing so, we looked at how (potential) candidates view Arcadis as an employer, which strategic target audiences we can distinguish within the organization and what the needs and characteristics of these target audiences are, and how Arcadis wants to position itself in the market to attract the right talent.

To achieve this, we used questionnaires across a period of two to three months, conducted one-on-one depth interviews, and organized focus groups.

During the follow-up phase of the project, we zoomed in on the information needs of the strategic target audiences. What do the different groups want to know about Arcadis Netherlands as an employer, and how can we best reach them? Per strategic target audience, we spoke to different employees and invited them to participate in the campaign.

After answering the above three spearheads, we got to work on developing an employment-market campaign. We developed and presented two conceptual directions, after which we continued developing the concept Arcadis Netherlands selected. The campaign contains general content that is deployable for a wide target audience and content aimed at the more specific target audiences.

While developing the campaign, we paid attention to two important subjects:

We wanted to show that our projects truly contribute to improving the living environment in the Netherlands, and with this, underline the social importance of Arcadis. We not only wanted to show that Arcadis is building technical bridges, but also that Arcadis is helping people get from A to B.
We wanted to show the people behind our projects and spread a personal message. This design principle was drafted after our investigation showed that many people perceive Arcadis Netherlands as a listed, rather than personal, company.

The result

Despite the challenge of the pandemic, we were able to strongly position Arcadis Netherlands’ employer brand. Employer branding is not being seen as a short-term solution but is now contributing to the long-term recruitment and selection of new talent.

For Arcadis Netherlands, the launch of this employer brand means potential candidates can now find the information about Arcadis on its renewed website. New content has been created for the different target audiences that better aligns with their needs.

Through this employer brand and its associated campaign, Arcadis Netherlands has enhanced its reputation as a personal and socially driven organization.

We developed various different tools on top of the renewed career website as part of this campaign: a creative, innovative brand video about Arcadis Netherlands; testimonial videos per specific target audience; a 360-degree virtual experience of a project; balance stories in which we portray Arcadians outside of the context of their work; and various campaign images and texts that can be used for different purposes.

New career website

Creative, innovative brand video about Arcadis Nederland

In het kort 🧺

Our team

Britt

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Culture and values trajectory

The challenge

“Can you help us design and facilitate a tangible and practice-oriented program that will ensure more result-oriented collaboration between and within our teams, helping us as an organization transition from a culture of talking to one of doing?

ABN AMRO Insurances was looking for a suitable follow-up to a previously initiated trajectory that was deployed to increase awareness on result-oriented work and collaboration. The trajectory had to be practically applicable, connect employees around this theme, and provide a genuine and tangible handle on how to achieve result-oriented collaboration from one’s own role.

Our solution

Our approach

used the Lencioni Pyramid as the theoretical framework and support of the tangible program. Within this, three central streams existed: communication to convey the message, a digital learning to bring everyone’s knowledge to the same level, and a team cycle to truly work together. The daily practice of managers and employees played a central role in shaping the different segments, allowing for their immediate integration within these roles.

Using several targeted sessions, managers were prepared to run through the team cycle with their own team. Teams were given access to a team toolkit featuring various interventions that they could use. A zero measurement was specifically directed at their challenges in terms of result-oriented work/collaboration. After the first cycle, teams were able to set up and run through the next cycle on their own.

The result

The Lencioni Pyramid can be used as a theoretical framework to generate insight into where a team’s challenges lie. The tangible tools help managers work on result-oriented work/collaboration and move from talking to doing. The team toolkit with tailor-made interventions is often used by teams to improve their result-orientedness. The zero and subsequent measurements showed that the various interventions contributed to increasing awareness of the strategy and result-oriented work/collaboration, and that employees were able to apply this in their own role.

In het kort 🧺

Our team

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Portfolio management support

Arcadis

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From DNA to rock-solid employer brand

The challenge

Lamers Installations is growing, but finding talented professionals was proving to be a challenge. They turned to us with the question whether we could help them position themselves as a rock-solid employer for technical talent. Of course we could!

Lamers Installations provides high-quality engineering and installation solutions. For the company, professionals are an indispensable link to growth. Working together with Lamers Installations, we developed a distinctive campaign to improve the company’s standing on the labor market, so that the right candidates would know how to find them.

Our fresh perspective

Employer Value Proposition

When they approached us, Lamers Installations were unclear how they wanted to be seen as an employer by potential talent. After extensive research, involving employees and customers, we mapped out how Lamers is currently being perceived, thus determining their Employer Value Proposition. These insights formed the backbone of the distinctive employer brand.

Distinctive concept

Using the knowledge we obtained from our preliminary research, we developed a distinctive campaign under the heading “Connect Now” – a denominator perfectly aligned with Lamers Installations’ DNA. The catchy slogan ‘it flows through our veins’ plays on the passion that Lamers Installations look for in their people and winks at the distribution systems they work with every day. The campaign embraces their candidate’s journey – from first encountering the Lamers Installations name while driving or through an online advertisement, to their job application. The website, which contains the core values of the company, employee stories, and job vacancies, is the in-depth centerpiece of this journey.

Perfect cooperation

Our cooperation with Lamers Installations was simply amazing. Although this theme, process, and way of working were completely new to Lamers, that did not detract from the chemistry between us. The common denominator in our collaboration was clearly a shared passion for entrepreneurship – evident from the short lines in communication and the capacity to rapidly switch gears and make quick decisions. The final campaign is the result of genuine co-creation.

Indispensable employer brand

The employer brand is now rock solid. Featuring both on- and offline elements, a golden mix of channels and resources has been in place since October 2023. These include images on Lamers Installations’ vans, street signs, banners at technical schools and trade fairs, the use of all popular social media, Google Ads, and a new website.

“Frisse Blikken did a great job of challenging us to think about who we are as an employer and what kind of talent we want to attract. The team guided us through this process, which was new to us. We’re incredibly happy with the result.”