Beating The Odds

A case study on PricewaterhouseCoopers and how we made the impossible possible

Your client has given you a tight deadline. Bets are being placed as to whether or not it will be met. You need a development partner that can meet your needs, keep your client happy, and deliver the goods on time.

The Right Partner

Eoin Russell was a director at PwC, the global consulting powerhouse. His focus on social media, mobile, and cloud projects frequently brought him into situations where clients needed to act rapidly. A recent project for a Fortune 1000 financial institution was one of those times. In order to kick start its new developer program, Russell’s client needed to roll out an online contest that would entice developers to join the program and come up with creative ideas for new applications. All this had to be done under a tight deadline.

“A team that could take a high level requirement and iterate rapidly”

Russell knew that in order to make a successful contest, he would need the right development partner. He needed access to a team that could take a high level requirement, analyze it, fill in the blanks, and iterate rapidly.

Business Savvy

Having partnered with productOps on previous projects, Russell knew productOps had the blend of business savvy and product development skills he needed. “Even so,” he recalls, “I was astounded at how quickly they leaped into action.” The productOps team rapidly rolled out iterations, working with Russell and the client, turning broadly defined functionality into working prototypes, then into a staged production rollout.

The contest portal incorporated features that allowed participants to sign up, submit their ideas, vote for their favorite entries, and comment on submissions from other participants. Contest managers could easily add content and review usage statistics, view the most active accounts, and manage the progress of the contest.

The Results

The results more than impressed the client. “They were stunned,” said Russell. “Not only did we get the product out the door in time, it actually had more capabilities than what we all initially expected. I attribute that to the way productOps releases software early and often and is continually refining, checking back to be sure they’re on the right track.”

“Not only did we get the product out the door in time, it actually had more capabilities than what we all initially expected”

After launch, productOps continued to add new functionality on a scheduled timeline. Russell knew he had scored a big win when he discovered that there were a few players up the management chain at the client that had actually wagered with each other whether the project would release on time with such an aggressive schedule. When it launched ahead of the deadline, he was suddenly a hero.

Project Overview

Apps

• The Drupal development framework was used to create the portal, which worked on all modern web browsers.

Development

• The portal was built using Agile methodology.
• Functionality was demonstrated early and often in the development process.

OPS

• productOps managed the deployment, maintenance, and upgrading of the portal from project start to the conclusion of the contest.