£5,000 was saved and the website engine has now gone gold
Working with SMEs and Third Sector Businesses
A start-up struggling to meet go-live deadline
An internet start-up with an innovative trading model was struggling. The owner contacted GreenBOLD and explained that he was experiencing the following issues:
- He was unable to commit to go-live dates due to problems with code delivery and was about to default on a particular customer deadline for which he'd have to repay £5,000.
- The relationship between the owner and the developers was rapidly breaking down.
- The website engine was not delivering the anticipated features and functionality required by the owner
- Faults reported by beta testers were not being resolved in a timely manner.
The owner of the start-up is, historically, a salesman. His skill is in seeing solutions and providing high level ideas and objectives, it is not in seeing these ideas through. He inherently trusts people to meet their targets and expects his ideas to be translated into actual requirements and design by the developers - without further consultation. As a result, the deadline was slipping.
GreenBOLD were brought in to bring control to development, ensure delivery of v1.0 enablingcommitment to customer delivery dates and to address the lack of fault management.
During discovery, it was found that the development team was too small to deliver within previously agreed timescales. In addition the team were vastly over-engineering the solution and scalability was being prioritised over work enabling a quick go-live. At that time it was highly likely that the owner would have to repay the £5,000.
Setting Achievable Deadlines
GreenBOLD recommended that considerable effort was required to repair the relationship along with agreeing new and realistic deadlines. This would enable the owner to commit to go-live dates and possibly retain the £5,000. Then a full review of strategic direction, requirements and functionality was needed. The fault reporting and resolution could wait. These observations and recommendations were accepted by the owner.
GreenBOLD addressed the lack of requirements and started repairing the relationship by working closely with the owner to define a simple document that both the owner and the developers could understand. This was done over a period of a few weeks working closely with the development team. For the first time, the development team gained a complete understanding what was required of them and the owner had a clear set of deliverables along with mutually agreed deadlines.
To help drive delivery, it was agreed that the developers would decide delivery dates and deadlines with GreenBOLD undertaking project management duties. At this time, GreenBOLD told the owner this strategy would put at risk the continued involvement of the Development team in the project. Sadly this is exactly what happened; the team were unable to meet agreed deadlines and walked away from the project. Without GreenBOLD's support this would have been the end for the owner, but with GreenBOLD's help it became a positive experience.
In conjunction with GreenBOLD, the owner met a number of development teams and using the requirements previously defined as an RFP it enabled a speedy selection process and ramp-up.
Overcoming Teething Problems
There have been further teething problems along the way, particularly between the development team management and the owner, but with the GreenBOLD consultant working as a go-between and providing advice and guidance to the CEO and development manager these have been resolved amicably and the first customers go live during the first quarter of 2011.
The owner now realises how important it is to have someone capable of driving the operational part of the business and directly managing teams. He has also come to realise that sometimes it's important to get involved in the detail, trusting people to just deliver is often a mistake.
Without GreenBOLD's help, this internet start-up would never have got to launch; it would have been another failed business. As it is the £5,000 was saved and the website engine has now gone gold allowing it to go live with several new clients. GreenBOLD is very pleased to be associated with this business and is currently discussing how to help the business going forward, particularly with the operational side of the business.
GreenBOLD is very pleased to be associated with this business and is currently discussing how to help the business going forward, particularly with the operational side of the business.