Master Thesis - Evaluating Agile Design in Practice

Essity is a leading global hygiene and health company and the home of brands such as Libero, TENA, Libresse, Tork, Sorbact and JOBST. We are offering an exciting and challenging master thesis opportunity for students who want to contribute with expertise, energy and creativity.

About the job

Are you interested in how innovation methods translate into practical and sustainable business value? Essity's Agile Design is a mindset supported by a methodology that unlocks efficient value creation through a human-centered approach to innovation. This master thesis offers the opportunity to assess Agile Design in real development cases and examine how its core dimensions contribute to successful outcomes.

Your role

You will investigate how Agile Design supports product, service and process design and development. Working with selected cases, you will gather and compare perspectives from project members, stakeholders and decision-makers.

You will collaborate with Essity colleagues from relevant business and specialist functions and receive support and guidance from dedicated thesis supervisors. Your analysis will help identify how Agile Design can be applied more effectively in future initiatives.

Background

Agile Design is a human-centered approach to value creation and aims to balance three dimensions throughout the development process: desirability, feasibility and viability.

Desirability: whether the solution addresses relevant user or customer needs.

Feasibility: whether the solution can be developed, produced, implemented and operated with available technical, manufacturing and organizational capabilities.

Viability: whether the solution supports business objectives and can create sustainable value.

Although these dimensions are central to Agile Design, their relationship to the value achieved in practice is not always clear. Essity therefore wants to understand how these dimensions are balanced and which aspects of the methodology contribute most directly to value creation.

Project

The thesis will investigate how Agile Design contributes to value creation by developing a deep understanding of the relevant problems to solve and by balancing desirability, feasibility and viability in product, service and process development initiatives.

The work is expected to include a review of relevant research, selection of suitable Essity cases, and interviews with project members, stakeholders and decision-makers. The cases will be compared to understand how the three dimensions were addressed and how participants describe the resulting value.

The expected outcome is a set of identified patterns, success factors and practical recommendations for future Agile Design initiatives. The final scope and case selection can be refined together with the student(s), supervisors and university examiner.

Your profile

We are looking for one or two master’s students in a relevant field, such as product development, industrial design engineering, technical design engineering, innovation management, business development, service design or a related discipline.

You should have an interest in human-centered development methods, innovation methods and value creation, as well as the ability to plan and conduct structured research, including interviews and case analysis. Strong analytical, communication and collaboration skills are important.

The thesis will be carried out through a combination of on-site collaboration at the Gothenburg office and remote work. Regular presence at the Gothenburg office will be required and will be agreed with the supervisors based on interviews, workshops and project needs; the work is not intended to be fully remote.

What you will be a part of

You will work in an international environment and engage with colleagues involved in innovation, design and development. The thesis gives you access to practical cases and different stakeholder perspectives while contributing knowledge that can support future Agile Design initiatives at Essity. You will be part of a learning-oriented setting where your academic perspective can contribute to how we continue to develop and apply our innovation methods.

Application

Interested? If you are up for the challenge and think this sounds like you, apply online today. Kindly note that, due to GDPR, we cannot accept applications by email.

If you apply as a pair of students, please submit one application each and clearly state in your application which person you intend to complete the master thesis with.

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