A global leader in oil, gas, wind and solar energy as well as low-carbon solutions, Norway-based Equinor is one of the most innovative solution providers in the world, with a deep commitment to turning natural resources into energy for people and progress for society. Heavily invested in
the Microsoft Business Applications stack, the company partnered with HCLTech to expand an already robust internal citizen developer program.
The Challenge
Advancing towards organizational excellence in Power Platform journey
Equinor made a significant investment in Microsoft Power Platform, acquiring licenses for every employee and implementing Microsoft’s starter kit for a Power Platform Center of Excellence to grow its citizen development program. With governance guardrails in place and a palpable excitement about the potential of the intuitive suite of low-code tools, the organization was poised to become one of Europe’s foremost adopters of Power Platform.
Naturally, there were a few challenges, as well. An internal analysis revealed two central concerns. First, there was a common misconception that while the technology was useful in solving small and individual pain points, it had limited potential in terms of wider organizational business process issues. Second, contrary to the fundamental idea of citizen development, employees who surfaced innovative ideas weren’t always inspired to see those ideas through to completion, instead expecting more seasoned IT professionals to pursue the initiative. The business needed a spark to elevate its citizen development program to a place where they are consistently maximizing the potential of both the Power Platform and Equinor’s employees.
The Objective
Create Power Platform certification to boost citizen development engagement
After successfully establishing a Power Platform Center for Enablement, Equinor recognized the importance of a sustained commitment to growing user adoption, advocacy and evangelism. A partnership with HCLTech was a natural next step based on the fact that we routinely place adoption and sustainment at the very heart of all Power Platform engagements to ensure organizational success. Together, Equinor and HCLTech articulated a fundamental objective for the project: identify five key user employee personas to target, and then explore how adoption can be maximized for each. A critical component of achieving that objective would be highlighting – on a persona-by-persona basis – all the ways the Center for Enablement supports the development of innovative ideas, as this would address the challenge of citizen developers not seeing their ideas through to completion. The ultimate goal was to design and facilitate a series of elective end-to-end training and certification workshops devoted to teaching Power Apps, Power Automate, Power BI and Dataverse for Teams, as well supporting idea process management and ongoing development. To generate excitement for these non-mandated workshops, we would create a catalog of case studies and other PR collateral aimed at showing employees that the program would support citizen developers all along their learning journeys, helping them evolve from potentially interested advocates to confirmed active evangelists.
The Solution
A robust Power Platform training program built on innovative and interactive tools
Leadership and training teams from Equinor worked hand in hand with adoption and sustainment experts from HCLTech to create a series of training classes and workshops designed to showcase the full cross-organization potential of Power Platform. Built on the foundation of Microsoft’s own recommended curriculum, the 14-hour certification course was purposefully enhanced with Equinor- specific workflows and use cases, as well as a slate of soft skills designed to meaningfully engage employees in learning the necessary skills for – and the true art of – citizen development. The coursework covers all aspects of Power Platform development, from canvas apps, model-driven apps and process flow automation to Power BI report building and Dataverse use.
As part of the broader program, HCLTech also worked with Equinor to:
- Establish, teach and strategically reinforce a set of development best practices to guide new developers on their innovation journeys
- Install a more complete governance and security structure to safeguard the organization as the volume of citizen development initiatives skyrocketed
- Maintain a deliberate focus on end-to-end development to ensure employees consistently manage their innovations all the way through the design, build, test and implementation processes
While many of the courses are delivered virtually, they are designed to be extremely interactive and fun. Bringing such a modern dynamic to the learning process adds an important level of energy and creative stimulation to the workshops.
The Impact
In the first year, Power Apps development has doubled
Jointly, the Equinor and HCLTech teams have delivered more than a dozen workshop series in the first year of the program, certifying in excess of 270 citizen developers. Usage of Power Apps has already doubled across the organization, and enrolled employees have achieved 100% compliance in class attendance and certification requirements. In fact, the certification workshops now have an extended waitlist of eager employees as word spreads and enthusiasm grows. “The certification and training enables Equinor to take the citizen developer program to the next level, upskilling the organization and enabling wide adoption of the platform,” says Espen Norevik, Power Platform Center for Enablement & Citizen Development, Equinor. Moving forward, the plan is to incorporate new interactive and innovative tools to keep the certification process current, fresh and engaging. A potential next phase of the project is to make the Power Platform coursework mandatory for a persona-driven subset of employees in an effort to empower additional citizen developers through an ownership stake in enhancing and streamlining their operational process responsibilities. The tremendous success of this collective initiative to drive Power Platform adoption, certification and sustainment has delivered important positive results for both sides of the partnership. Equinor has emerged as one of the European market’s flagship Microsoft Business Applications adopters, and HCLTech is reaping the benefits of a stream of impactful referrals in Europe from our coveted Norwegian partner.
- 270 newly certified citzen developers
- 2x Power Apps usage
- 12+ workshop series
- 100%employee compliance
