On-Off Group: who we are and what we do
On-Off Group is a team of designers, facilitators, researchers and developers in Manila, founded by a UK designer in 2015. We do four lines of work: training, customer research, diagnosis, and building software and products with client teams.
On-Off Group is a Manila consultancy, founded in 2015 by a UK designer, that has trained, advised and built for banks, insurers, government agencies and large enterprises in the Philippines. The work falls into four lines: we train teams, we test products with real customers, we find where a transformation has stalled, and we build the thing that gets it moving.
Four lines of work
Training. Design thinking, UX, AI prompting and AI prototyping, in person, for teams and for the public. This is where most clients meet us first. Hundreds of people have been through our workshops, from branch staff to executive committees, and participants from our earliest sessions are now senior across the industry and book us for their own teams. Teams that want to keep going afterwards use On-Off Academy, our course app, in English and Tagalog.
Customer research. We put your product in front of real customers and watch. Five real users on video, two weeks, and at the end the moments they got stuck and a baseline number you can measure against later. GetUserInsights, our sister product, does this on an ongoing basis.
Diagnosis. Most transformation work stalls somewhere between the strategy deck and the customer. The Operating Model Diagnostic scores eleven dimensions in two weeks and shows you where, as a heatmap and a value map. The free quiz on our site is the short version. We size the gap before proposing a fix, and if the gap is small we say so.
Building. Training tells a team how. Often the faster route is to build the thing with them: an AI feature on a real customer journey, an internal tool, a flow that has been mapped for years and never shipped. It starts as a prototype people can click and becomes production software when the numbers say it should. Design sprints sit here too. For a large insurer we ran a series of five-day design sprints on customer-facing web journeys. New journeys that had previously taken six months or more to develop were designed and tested with customers in two weeks and live in four, a cut in time to market of over 80 percent. Completion rates on the new journeys rose by 80 percent and the drop-off points that had been there before were gone.
Who we work with
Banks, insurers and large enterprises in the Philippines make up most of the work. Clients include AIA, AXA, BPI, Security Bank, Metrobank, EastWest Ageas, Sun Life, Insular Life, Meralco, Firefly Electric, Tenet Health and the Asian Development Bank. Public case studies on our site cover Meralco, the Asian Development Bank, Makati Medical Center Foundation and the AFP hospitals, and ILS-DOLE.
> "It was a pleasure working with the On-Off team. They were responsive, thoughtful, effective, and delivered all tasks beyond expectations." > Dr. Christel Gudberg, CEO and Co-Founder, Hupela
> "The Design Thinking class was enriching for several reasons. It offered a structured problem-solving approach emphasizing empathy and iteration, which I found immensely valuable… I also want to commend the facilitator for his engaging, unique and informative delivery, which made the learning experience even more enjoyable." > Marie Criselle Reyes, Merchant Partnership Relationship Manager, Metrobank
> "The workshop builds up the client-centricity muscle of every employee. Therefore every employee would get to understand the needs of the clients rather than just focusing on what they want." > Gino Paolo Villanueva, Agile Coach, Sun Life
How we work
We start small and we measure. One journey, one team, one number the business would defend. Fix one thing, measure it again. That is how "did it work" gets an answer instead of a shrug.
A few views we hold: AI on a broken journey automates the failure, so fix the journey first. Training people are made to attend does not change how they work on Monday. A working prototype in an evening beats a roadmap in a quarter.
The team
A team of designers, facilitators, researchers and developers in Manila, founded and led by a UK designer who has worked in the Philippines since 2015. The people who run your workshop are the people who do the research and build the software. Sessions run in English and Tagalog.
Where to start
The free operating model quiz takes ten minutes. The courses page lists public and in-house training. The diagnostic page explains the two-week piece. If you already know which journey is stuck, get in touch.
Questions people ask
What does On-Off Group do? Training, customer research, diagnosis and software for banks, insurers, government and large enterprises in the Philippines.
Where is On-Off Group based? Manila, Philippines, founded in 2015 by a UK designer. Sessions run in English and Tagalog.
Who are On-Off Group's clients? AIA, AXA, BPI, Security Bank, Metrobank, EastWest Ageas, Sun Life, Insular Life, Meralco, Firefly Electric, Tenet Health, the Asian Development Bank and government agencies such as ILS-DOLE.
Do you build software or only train? Both. Many engagements start as training and become a prototype or a production feature built with the team.
How fast is a design sprint? Five days from problem to a prototype tested with real customers. At a large insurer, customer journeys that had taken six months or more to develop were tested with customers in two weeks and live in four, with completion rates up 80 percent.
Questions people ask
Who have you worked with?
We have run work for Philippine financial services since 2015, including AIA, AXA, BPI, Security Bank, Metrobank, EastWest Ageas, Sun Life and Insular Life, plus Meralco, Firefly Electric, Tenet Health, the Asian Development Bank and Makati Medical Center Foundation.
What kind of training do you run?
Workshops and training in design thinking, UX, AI prompting and AI prototyping. On-Off Academy carries the course app for client teams, and AI Prompting Essentials is the first course, in English and Tagalog with audio narration.
What does the building side cover?
Prototypes, AI features, internal tools and production software, built with the client team rather than handed over as a plan.
How do you find out what is wrong before proposing a fix?
Two research and diagnosis options. A Customer Reality Check puts five real users on video using your customer journey in two weeks, with a highlight reel and a baseline number. The Operating Model Diagnostic scores 11 dimensions and gives you a heatmap and value map.
On-Off Group trains teams, tests products with real customers, finds where a transformation has stalled and builds what gets it moving, for banks, insurers and enterprises in the Philippines, since 2015. Who we are.
