How EssilorLuxottica used design thinking to reimagine critical employee resources

On its face, the question for the EssilorLuxottica team was simple enough: How do we create a safe and enjoyable working environment? The answers were unexpected — but as the layers continued to peel back, so was the real problem to be solved. 

Identifying the challenge 

It was November 2024, and the team was taking part in a design thinking workshop facilitated by CONTROLTEK. The issue of incident reports came up when considering inefficiencies. But it wasn’t just the flow or quantity of reports that was the problem, said Millie Kresevich, vice president - asset protection North America with EssilorLuxottica, during a session at NRF PROTECT 2026. 

 “What we figured out is, most of the time, our team is being bogged down with calls from the field that can be answered elsewhere,” Kresevich said: “‘I don’t know how to use my camera system,’ despite the fact that there’s a manual on the desktop. ‘I don’t know how to burn a video.’ ‘I’m not sure where to find what to do if I have a shoplifting.’ ‘I’m not clear on when I should call the police,’ despite there being a pop-up when the incident report comes up.” 

The constant flow of questions has been a “huge challenge,” Kresevich said, especially since each field person has an average count of 300 stores. “We can’t have inefficiencies.” 

Into this environment, B.E.C.K.I. was born. 

Creating a path to progress 

The design thinking workshop provided more than just a chance to brainstorm. Over a day and a half, it provided a structured, iterative process to help participants better understand the challenge and imagine as many solutions as possible in a safe and creative environment. The goal is to develop an actual solution, leading to a rapid prototype and testing with end users.  

B.E.C.K.I. (“Business solutions, Education, Communications, Knowledge and Intelligence”) is now a single source of truth for asset protection inquiries, strengthening safety through consistent, scalable information. The virtual asset protection manager has an intuitive, conversational interface, and users can easily access guidance on safety, shrink reduction and process optimization. 

The roadmap to innovation started with internal engagement, then platform and team preparation. Data strategy and design followed, then building and configuration. 

Having the right people in the right job was essential. “That’s a key ingredient in the success of any project that you’re leading,” Kresevich said. “Do you have the right people on the committee that can actually bring the process, the project, full circle? You have to have someone who can drive it to the end.” 

The project driver must also be interested, and have the right skill level, Kresevich said. “You can’t force it.” 

She was shocked, she said, by how fast everything came together. “I was amazed at how well everybody was working together, and how well things were coming along. It was an exciting challenge for all of us, and I think our people enjoyed it because it was their idea.” 

Empowering employees 

Kimberly Price, director, asset protection with EssilorLuxottica, drove the B.E.C.K.I. project. In solving the pain points, Price said, the end goal became a centralized, real-time asset protection resource. 

Information was already available to employees in a toolkit, she said, “but you still have to log in. You still have to know where to go in the toolkit to get the information. We thought, ‘Why can’t the employee just ask the question, and then get the simple answer back?” 

Having quick access to accurate information allows employees to make good decisions to reduce risk to the company and increase their safety. Besides, she said, it’s empowering. “It feels good as an employee to say, ‘I made the right choice in this moment.’” 

Price admitted that she didn’t know a lot about AI chatbots when she started. “But I know how to drive a process to the end.” She started looking around for who could help deliver. Who was interested in AI? Who was passionate? Who had the technical skills? 

“The other thing that I would challenge you with, if this is a road you want to go down: Do you currently have an AI solution within your organization? We were lucky that we had already begun to do AI chatbots in different divisions of the organization. So we were able to leverage our internal teams and meet with them, and say, ‘What did you do, what worked and what didn’t work?’” (And yes, B.E.C.K.I. will soon be integrating with those bots, too.) 

The design-thinking advantage 

Taking part in the workshop, the panelists said, allowed the generation of enough ideas to find a solution that would really work.  

And CONTROLTEK CEO Tom Meehan, CFI, continues to be inspired. 

“I get this question probably more than anything: Why does CONTROLTEK facilitate design thinking workshops?” Meehan said. “We want to be partners for the industry. We want to move the industry forward.” 

The investment continues after the workshops, too; there are ongoing check-ins on progress. “If you’re doing this process, you need a partner that’s going to drive it, that’s going to ask, and is going to remind you that it’s iterative,” he said. 

As someone who creates products and solutions himself, Meehan continued, to see something go so quickly from workshop to concept to actual deployment is simply “remarkable.”  

Overall, Kresevich added, it was an easy, executable program that is now directly benefiting the lives of her team — and she encouraged audience members to consider the same. All it takes is a spark of an idea.