Design Thinking Workshop: Optimizing HR Admin Processes

A leading Austrian healthcare holding engaged binder|consulting to accelerate the digital transformation of its administrative HR processes. Through an intensive one-day Design Thinking Workshop, diverse stakeholders collaboratively identified critical user pain points and co-created practical, employee-centered solutions,  establishing a prioritized roadmap for efficient, user-friendly HR services.

1. Healthcare
   
   1. Industry
2. 7.6 Million
   
   1. Insured People
3. <100
   
   1. Health Facilities
4. <20,000
   
   1. Contract Partners
      

The Initial Situation

The healthcare holding's administrative HR processes were hampered by fragmented tools (e.g., SharePoint, SAP, and persistent paper forms) that created significant friction across document access, approval workflows, and information transparency. Pre-workshop interviews across a diverse stakeholder group revealed deep systemic frustrations: unintuitive SharePoint navigation requiring constant HR support, unclear approval statuses leaving employees guessing about request progress, excessive email/paper handling overwhelming both staff and leadership, and overly complex forms that demanded extensive guidance to complete accurately. These inefficiencies not only eroded employee trust in HR  but also diverted critical nursing and administrative capacity from operational priorities.

The Critical Challenges

The healthcare holding faced the challenge of bringing together multidisciplinary teams to identify real user pain points from different perspectives. Building on insights from the interviews, the goal was to jointly develop realistic and feasible solutions. At the same time, the organization needed to balance quick wins with long-term digital transformation initiatives, ensure alignment across stakeholders, and coordinate with parallel IT projects. To address these challenges, a creative but structured Design Thinking workshop with continuous feedback and feasibility checks was conducted within a single intensive day.

How We Supported the Client

Therefore, binder|consulting designed and facilitated an interactive Design Thinking workshop with more than 20 stakeholders from different departments. The format followed a structured six‑phase approach, from targeted pre‑interviews and joint problem framing through ideation and prototyping to testing and roadmap definition.

In cross‑functional teams, participants worked on three strategic focus areas, using personas to keep solutions anchored in real user needs and iterating rapidly with peer feedback and defined gatekeeper roles. The resulting concepts were validated through concise pitches, leading to a set of prioritized quick wins and a clear, jointly agreed implementation roadmap.

The Impact Delivered

The workshop turned a long list of scattered pain points into a clear, feasible digital transformation agenda for HR. More than 50 issues were consolidated into a small number of targeted solution clusters, each linked to concrete business impact, ownership, and a realistic implementation horizon. Immediate quick wins were released for fast rollout, while medium- and long-term measures were sequenced to ensure alignment with the existing IT and digital HR roadmap to avoid “shadow projects” and safeguard budgets.

The outcome was a tangible uplift in HR process efficiency, significantly improved transparency for leaders and employees, and a noticeable step forward in digital employee experience and employer attractiveness. At the same time, the co‑creative Design Thinking Workshop format built strong cross‑functional sponsorship and genuine employee buy‑in, positioning the organization to drive HR digitalization as a business‑critical transformation rather than a standalone IT project.