Quote-to-Order · Schneider Electric
From two days of emails to a 25-minute quote.
Replacing a legacy configurator, Excel sheets and long email threads with one guided flow for partners who order electrical switchboard equipment. Problems get caught while configuring, and standard quotes approve themselves.
- Role
- Digital Product Lead
- Company
- Schneider Electric
- Timeline
- 2022 to 2023
- Team
- 1 designer, 2 PMs, 9 engineers, sales operations
- Platforms
- Partner web portal, Salesforce, ERP integration
1Problems show up next to the field that caused them
2Every rule violation comes with a one-click fix
3Standard quotes approve themselves
2 days → 25 min
Median time to a valid quote
−72%
Order errors reaching the factory
+34%
Quotes that became orders
78%
Quotes approved automatically
The problem
Partners configured switchboards in a 15-year-old tool, priced them in Excel and waited for internal sales to check every quote by email. Mistakes were found late, sometimes at the factory.
What I did
I mapped the whole process across five departments, redesigned the configurator around live validation with one-click fixes, and worked with engineering to decide which approvals a machine could make and which needed a person.
What changed
Median time to a valid quote fell from two days to 25 minutes. Errors reaching the factory dropped by 72%, and 34% more quotes turned into orders.
01 · Context
Thousands of valid combinations, and some very expensive wrong ones.
Panel builders and electrical contractors buy switchboard equipment from Schneider Electric for their own customers' buildings. A single switchboard can have dozens of components, and a busbar that's too small for its breaker is a safety problem.
- 01Partner requestEmail, phone or old configurator
- 02ConfigureLegacy tool, 38 fields
- 03PriceExcel price list, version 7
- 04Sales checkEvery quote, by hand
- 05ApproveEmail chain, 1 to 3 days
- 06FactoryErrors sometimes found here
Where most of the waiting happened
02 · Problem
Most of the two days was waiting for someone.
The service blueprint made it obvious. Of the two days a typical quote took, less than two hours was actual work. The rest was waiting for someone to check, approve or answer an email.
The question we worked on
How might we let partners build a valid, priced quote on their own, and catch every mistake before it costs anyone money?
03 · Research
Five departments, one process nobody owned.
I ran blueprinting workshops with sales, sales operations, pricing, the factory and customer service, interviewed 18 partners and 9 internal sales reps, and analysed 2,300 order corrections from the previous year.
Errors were predictable
Five categories of rule caused 80% of corrections, and every one of them could be detected at configuration time.
“It's always the same five mistakes.”
Partners wanted fewer questions
Partners know their products. The tool slowed them down by asking for things it should already know from their history.
“I've ordered this panel forty times. Why do you ask me the voltage again?”
Approvals were a black box
Partners couldn't see where their quote was, so they emailed, which slowed approvals down even more.
“I send three emails per quote just to ask where it is.”
| Rule category | Share of corrections | How the new flow handles it |
|---|---|---|
| Breaker rating above busbar rating | 31% | Live warning with a one-click fix |
| Enclosure too small for the components | 19% | Suggests the next size up, with price difference |
| Wrong voltage for the region | 14% | Defaulted from the project address |
| Missing required accessories | 9% | Added automatically, shown as a line item |
| Discount outside policy | 7% | Routed to a person with the reason |
04 · Process
Where should a machine decide?
The interesting design question was not how to automate, but where. I ran a series of workshops with sales operations and finance to sort every approval rule into three groups: things a machine can decide, things a machine can prepare for a person, and things that stay human.
Full automatic approval
Finance needed a person to sign off on non-standard discounts and custom enclosures.
Manual review for everything
The status quo. Slow for partners and expensive for us.
Rules first, people for exceptions
Standard quotes approve themselves. Exceptions reach a person with the reason highlighted.
05 · Design decisions
Every error comes with a fix.
Problems appear next to the field that caused them, with a fix
Rules run live while the partner configures. A breaker rated above the busbar shows a warning right under the busbar field, with a one-click fix: 'Use 630 A busbar'. The explanation is written so a partner can forward it to their own customer.
Legacy configurator
- ✕Validation after submit
- ✕Error codes like E-2041
- ✕Sales checks every quote
- ✕Status by email
New flow
- ✓Live checks per field
- ✓Plain explanation and one-click fix
- ✓Standard quotes approve themselves
- ✓Live status page for every quote
Ask the fewest possible questions
Defaults come from the partner's order history and the project type. Every field had to justify itself in a review with sales operations. We went from 38 required fields to 11.
Exceptions reach a person with the reason attached
Sales operations now see only the quotes that need them, each with a highlighted reason such as a discount above the limit or a non-standard enclosure. They can approve or ask the partner a question without leaving the queue.
A status page that ends the 'any update?' emails
Every quote has a live timeline that partners can open at any time. It ended most of the status emails that used to slow sales operations down.
06 · Outcome
Faster quotes, fewer mistakes, more orders.
Errors reaching the factory dropped 72%, quote-to-order conversion rose 34%, and 78% of quotes are now approved automatically. Sales operations moved two people from checking quotes to helping partners with complex projects.
“I configure it, it tells me what's wrong, I fix it, it's approved before my coffee is cold.”
“I finally spend my day on the projects that actually need me.”
07 · Reflection
What I learned.
Process automation is a design problem. The hardest decisions weren't about screens. They were about where a machine should decide, and where a person should.
I'd involve finance earlier next time. Their approval rules shaped the whole flow, and we only discovered two of them during the beta.
Tools on this project
Figma, FigJam, Miro, Salesforce, Power Automate, Jira
Names of the people quoted have been changed to protect their privacy.
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