AgileEngine

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and your position there.

I'm the director of software development for edsembli. We specialize in building administrative software that targets the K-12 education sector

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

For what projects/services did your company hire AgileEngine, and what were your goals?

Full stack software development and testing for our HR management and Payroll solution. Our goal was to shift a hosted/on-premise software model to a SAAS-based model of operation

SOLUTION

How did you select this vendor and what were the deciding factors?

I had selected Agile Engine (AE) as I had a successful experience working in partnership with the team to realize some short term goals. Pricing was favourable for the caliber of talent

Describe the scope of work in detail, including the project steps, key deliverables, and technologies used.

Our relationship on the project began with the presentation of team members that our AE account representative felt was a good fit for our project. Candidates were interviewed by myself and members of the internal team. Those selected were made part of our development team, charged with meeting the goals for each sprint and ultimately realizing our overall project objectives. Our applications are built upon the Microsoft stack, combining C#/.NET, MS SQL and AngularJS frontend.

How many people from the vendor's team worked with you, and what were their positions?

In total, we had at any time Agile Engine members on our team, with 2-3 developers and 1 QA analyst

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

Can you share any measurable outcomes of the project or general feedback about the deliverables?

Our SaaS conversion was vastly behind schedule due to a number of factors, chief among them was staff attrition. This not only meant a reduction of resources, but knowledge loss was also an issue. The personnel that AE provided was able to quickly ramp up, minimally impacted by a lack of knowledge in the application and the industry space. Very quickly, the project began to hit projected milestones and as of now, nearly 100% complete and ready for our first round of waiting customers

Describe their project management style, including communication tools and timeliness.

Our development cycle operates on 2-week sprints, with standard daily stand ups, sprint-by-sprint planning sessions, etc. Our primary communication tool was MS Teams, with project planning done through MS TFS. TFS also hosted our GIT-based source control

What did you find most impressive or unique about this company?

I was impressed by a number of aspects of AE, such as their vast global footprint, allowing us to draw talent from virtually anywhere in the world. This was particularly valuable in the last 2 years with the global pandemic and available software development talent was scarce.

In addition, recruited talent was also highly skilled, experienced and professional having gone through what must have been a rigorous screening process at AE. Finally, I was impressed with how AE looks after everyone on the team, providing clear career objectives and opportunities for everyone to grow with the AE organization

Are there any areas for improvement or something they could have done differently?

None that I could think of at this time

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the co-founder and CTO for an organization that builds software for the industrial workforce to use wearable technology. This makes them more efficient and allows them to produce higher-quality products. 

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with AgileEngine?

We hired AgileEngine to help us rapidly scale our team. Our company also wanted to reconfigure the team quickly to meet various challenges, especially since we worked in a developing market. In the process of doing this, we also wanted to realize cost savings in some components of our workforce over domestic resources. 

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

Our team initially met with AgileEngine’s leadership group to discuss our work. We learned about the resources that they provided and how they typically engaged with their customers. Eventually, it became apparent that we could engage them in a couple of ways. In the end, we chose a model where their team members became a part of our own team. Rather than giving them a set of requirements and waiting for a finished product, we engaged their members as if they were part of our internal staff.  

From that point forward, the engagement has revolved around meeting and interviewing resources from them beyond the initial team we set up. For the software development projects, they don’t necessarily build from scratch; some elements already exist. When we have to rapidly build a new subsystem or component, we provide requirements, and then they build it from scratch. Other times, the component is already part of the product, and they simply interact with it. 

What is the team composition?

The team composition has varied over time between 3–10 people. We have contact with the entire team, but we primarily work with 2–3 team leaders depending on the workload. Those team leaders are our main points of contact. That being said, we interact with all of them on a daily basis since they essentially are members of our internal team. 

How did you come to work with AgileEngine?

I found AgileEngine a number of years ago and reached out to their management team. They made it clear how much they focused on putting together high-end resources and teams. In other words, they focused on quality over quantity — we received that message loud and clear. Moreover, they had a development mentality and way of thinking that aligned with mine. As a result, the decision to give them a try was quite easy. 

What is the status of this engagement?

We started the partnership in December 2015, and it’s ongoing. 

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

What evidence can you share that demonstrates the impact of the engagement? 

AgileEngine has delivered excellent results over the years. They’ve allowed us to flex our workforce in different directions, and they’ve brought on talents that haven’t been represented before in our team. This helps us explore areas for future development. Moreover, they’ve provided incredibly high-quality contributions to our team year after year. 

We’ve used AgileEngine’s resources throughout the areas of our engineering team, which gives us extra capacity and specific expertise in multiple technologies. Overall, the engagement has been hugely beneficial to our business through the years. 

How did AgileEngine perform from a project management standpoint?

AgileEngine’s project management skills have been fantastic. The team-wide management is integrated within our team, but the management from AgileEngine’s side has always been excellent. Their resources have been incredibly proactive and organized when it comes to communication. They have beneficial processes that don’t stand in the way of development or create extra pressure. 

To communicate, we use phones, video calls, emails, and Slack. Most of the time, we talk to the team via video calls on Zoom or Teams. Our daily interactions happen through a combination of those tools. 

What did you find most impressive about them?

The quality of AgileEngine’s resources differentiates them from other providers. By far, they’re the best nearshore developers that we’ve worked with in my career. The quality of everyone from the management team to individual developers has been truly a cut above the rest. 

Are there any areas they could improve?

No, there aren’t any. 

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

Start the relationship by thinking of AgileEngine as a part of your own team. Their resources are of high quality, so make them an intrinsic factor in your team. Think that way about the engagement from the get-go. You’ll be hugely successful if you leverage them that way. 

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m a co-founder and CEO of All4Cure, and we’re a digital health technology company with an online platform for cancer patients, clinicians, and researchers.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with AgileEngine?

Our platform isn’t a great model to follow, so I started working with AgileEngine after we created the MVP with another company. However, the product needed to undergo an extensive iteration that was directed by my co-founder, with the implementation being mostly done by AgileEngine. We’ve been working together for over 3–4 years refining, optimizing, and improving the platform.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

AgileEngine has been implementing the software necessary to achieve the designs we directed them to make. There have been a number of modifications on the frontend, with changes in the way the website appears. Different users have different permissions that are associated with the different roles, and there have also been changes on the backend.

What is the team composition?

We’ve worked with a number of software developers for the last 3–4 years, with some being relatively short-term roles, and some being in the long-term. We’ve had two project directors over the course of our engagement.

How did you come to work with AgileEngine?

I’ve learned of them from a friend who founded an AI company. They recommended AgileEngine based on their experience with them.

How much have you invested with them?

We’ve probably spent about $120,000.

What is the status of this engagement?

Our partnership started in March 2017, and it’s still ongoing.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

What evidence can you share that demonstrates the impact of the engagement? 

They implement the changes we ask and they consistently achieve what we aim for. My co-founder, Ricardo, has extensive experience in project management and he has a very clear list of things to do — which are all routinely executed by the people we work with. The clear communication that Ricardo provides, and the talent of the people at AgileEngine have been a good combination for us.

In addition, there have been times where things didn’t seem to be up to expectations, but they’ve been extremely responsive and immediately tried to resolve them.

How did AgileEngine perform from a project management standpoint?

Kateryna (Account Manager & Client Partner) and her predecessors give us realistic timelines and budget guidelines. If it looks like they can’t meet our specifications with respect to the time or budget, they’ll let us know and help us find the right solution.

Additionally, I meet with the program manager once every couple of months, and Ricardo communicates with the software developers asynchronously, through a project management tool on an ongoing basis.

What did you find most impressive about them?

I like that I can count on AgileEngine. If they say they can do something on a budget they provide, then they can do it. It’s obviously essential for me to be able to lay out a set of specifications, and feel confident that they can deliver. They've just been very strong performers for us.

Are there any areas they could improve?

I’m not sure that I have a specific suggestion for improvement — I think they’ve done a good job for us. Not every person who we’ve worked with has been equally strong on the software development side, but there are always variations on that front.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

I believe that super clear communication is important to any sort of partnership that’s trying to build something new. With good guidelines, I think AgileEngine can consistently deliver.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the president of an IT management solutions company. Our main mission is to create a procurement automation platform for both the public and private sectors. We integrate all kinds of financial capabilities and requirements for customers and suppliers to do procurement and accounting within the same ecosystem.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with AgileEngine?

We were a new company that couldn’t afford to hire our own developers yet, so we needed AgileEngine to help us with their development services.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

AgileEngine has developed our MVP from scratch. They’ve come up with the platform’s architecture and built all the necessary products and features to make the system work. Our platform’s 100% cloud-native AWS — AgileEngine used Node.js for our backend and JavaScript for our frontend. We use PostgreSQL to implement our database system and Amazon CloudFront for our CDN.

What is the team composition?

We work with four developers and one QA resource from AgileEngine’s team.

How did you come to work with AgileEngine?

We looked their name up and found that they previously worked with companies that we were very familiar with — it was important for us to hire a US-based team that had also established their name in our area through their reputation. AgileEngine had everything we needed from a risk management standpoint, so we reached out to their team.

How much have you invested with them?

We spend $450,000 for their services on a yearly basis.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started in February 2019, and our work is ongoing. We’ve recently hired an additional QA resource from their team.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

What evidence can you share that demonstrates the impact of the engagement?

First of all, AgileEngine’s lead engineer has a great sense of ownership of the platform — he takes the coding standards seriously, and that helps us meet even our long-term goals for this project. We also appreciate how prepared he is to take over when our team is not there to supervise them. Their backend engineer seamlessly handles the integration work, and the two frontend developers are really good at building an intuitive interface to complete our platform.

Second, our application is pretty complicated because we take a variety of business processes that are really arduous — and try to make them easier. AgileEngine does a good job of making things easy for us. They really think about customer experience when they interact with the system, so they build features that are easy to navigate and operate. We’ve been working with them for the past two years because they are highly reliable in that sense. I don’t want to let them go — I want to keep working with their team.

How did AgileEngine perform from a project management standpoint?

They’re very good — they always keep us in the loop. We have daily meetings with AgileEngine, and they’re very good with communication. They send frequent updates and queries through Slack. They don’t keep us waiting in terms of progress reports, so we keep the velocity of the project up.

What did you find most impressive about them?

I’m impressed with how their client support management team handles professional development — these are people we don’t directly pay for, but they always make sure that we are satisfied and that the team assigned to us progresses well to meet our business goals. They make sure that their goals for developing their resources are aligned with the goals of our company. I’d certainly want to have the same kind of experience if I were to go anywhere else. Since their resources are developed professionally, I am certain that I can transition them into bigger roles.

Are there any areas they could improve?

I always have a hard time thinking of other areas they can improve on. They’ve been very helpful to us.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

If you have your project design as early as possible, you can hit the ground running. We spent a lot of time figuring ours, so they had to do that for us and it took a chunk of time. The key step is always for you to spend more time on designing the base requirements.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I'm the COO of a healthcare SaaS company and I oversee product engineering, marketing, security, and IT, amongst other things. We provide services for pharmaceutical firms and payer clients, such as health insurance companies. We primarily leverage third-party companies like AgileEngine to support our work.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with AgileEngine?

We needed help with our advanced analytics. We collect a huge amount of data with our SaaS platform, so we hired AgileEngine to build the infrastructure and tools that provide analytics capabilities for our clients.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

We initially hired AgileEngine to help us with a single project, which involved transitioning from one data integration product to another. After that, we used their resources to build a standing analytics team as part of our product development organization. 

For more than six months, they have worked with our product team to build out the components of our broader industry product. Since they are on the analytics side, they are building models for data and data analytics, as well as reports. Alongside our platform team, they also work on integrating those reports into the broader system.

What is the team composition?

We only work with two engineers right now. It's a relatively small team, but our goal is to expand that. From an engineering standpoint, our main point of contact is one of the engineers. We also work with Kateryna (Account Manager), who is our client partner.

How did you come to work with AgileEngine?

We realized we had a gap on the analytics side among our development partners, so we started looking for a new partner. I have known the CEO of AgileEngine for a number of years, and one of my staff previously worked with them in an analytics role. We reviewed a number of companies and ended up selecting AgileEngine. 

How much have you invested with them?

We have spent about $120,000–$140,000.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working together on the initial project in late July 2020, and then we began working with the standing team that September. The engagement is ongoing.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

What evidence can you share that demonstrates the impact of the engagement? 

AgileEngine is helping us build a new product, and at this point, it's difficult to measure their impact or provide statistics. However, what we can say is that we have launched a new product — we went from zero products to one on the analytics side.

As the company grows, we’re planning to put more focus on data, and we're looking forward to scaling with the AgileEngine team.

How did AgileEngine perform from a project management standpoint?

In terms of project management, they fit in very well with our overall project and software development strategy. We use a standard approach, but they've done a great job of integrating with us quickly. My team uses the Atlassian suite, which includes Jira and Confluence. AgileEngine is very familiar with those tools and adapted very quickly to leveraging them.

Our experience with them has been very good. As a smaller company, we are not looking to hire an engineer to just sit there and code; rather, we need people who are going to understand our customers’ needs and think creatively about finding solutions. We expect them to really comprehend our business and interactions. AgileEngine has done all of this extremely well. 

Another challenge that we've had is for them to work closely with the platform team, which is from a different company. It’s difficult to get two vendors to cooperate with each other. They usually see one another as competition, and that's not good for the client. AgileEngine has done an excellent job of understanding our partnership with the other vendor and building a solid and respectful relationship with them. 

Engineers respect technical capability more than anything; personality clashes can generally be overcome if one respects the other from a technical standpoint. The platform team certainly respects the technical capabilities of AgileEngine — that has been another confirmation for me that we made the right choice in selecting them.

What did you find most impressive about them?

We are impressed with their creative problem-solving of our business challenges. Most companies similar to AgileEngine would simply come to us with a menu and ask us to choose which services and resources that we want. AgileEngine did that, but they also spent a lot of time trying to understand both our short- and long-term goals.

They helped us come up with a structure and plan, as well as initial staff to be able to meet those needs. They didn't just think about how many people we needed; they also considered how they could help us solve our problems.

Are there any areas they could improve?

A couple of times, they have acted before they understood their action’s implications. They should make sure to understand their actions’ impact on the broader organization before they make a decision. However, that was only an issue when they first came on board, and it was understandable. That is the only area I’d mention, and we’ve already talked about it.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

Make sure that you know what you’re trying to achieve as a business. Working with an offshore company is not the same as building staff internally.

Also, as you work with AgileEngine, try to integrate them with your company and don’t treat them as a mere external vendor. They've done an excellent job of understanding our customers because they care about them and what they’re trying to do. Having them as part of your company can be helpful in having them engage and achieve better results for end customers.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I'm the mobile lead of a startup company located in Boston, Massachusetts. We're a platform for truck drivers, truck owners, and construction sites. Basically, we provide a Uber-like service where the demand comes from construction sites that require trucks, and the supply comes from truck owners who can provide transportation services.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with AgileEngine?

We hired AgileEngine for QA testing and app support. 

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

The QA engineer mainly works on the manual testing of our mobile and web app. He's also involved in automation testing, creating test cases, Sprint planning, and Scrum management. He’s also responsible for our communication with engineers and product managers.

The engineer uses Android Studio to test the app on an emulator and Pearls to intercept traffic and track requests. He also uses Selenium, which is an automation testing framework, as well as Appium, another automation testing tool for mobile app development.

What is the team composition?

We’ve worked with six people from their team, including the ones that no longer work for us. We used to have 2–3 mobile engineers and a QA engineer. Last year, we decided to keep only the QA engineer. This year, we added one automation engineer from their team. We’ve also worked with two automation engineers. In the past, we also worked with iOS and Android engineers.

There are also two project managers, who kept track of how their team members were doing. 

How did you come to work with AgileEngine?

My managers interviewed and vetted contractors, and AgileEngine was one of the companies they found. AgileEngine provided us with candidates that we also interviewed. The candidates were very professional in the way they do business, and they had high-quality services. We hired them because they were good. 

How much have you invested with them?

So far, we’ve invested between $200,000–$300,000 for their services. 

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working with them in July 2019, and the engagement is ongoing. 

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

What evidence can you share that demonstrates the impact of the engagement? 

We don’t keep a record of what they’re doing, but we use Sprint to plan their work and measure the performance of the whole team. 

We check if the QA engineer has many pending tasks or if he can take on more responsibilities that are not on his job description. So far, he's achieved everything he needs to do, and he’s been doing more for us so we’re truly happy about him. He always finishes work on time if not faster. He’s also helping and working with multiple teams now.

Meanwhile, we’ve been working with the automation engineer for 2–3 months now, and we have weekly sync-up meetings to measure his progress. He has met all of the expectations that we’ve had for him, and everything he’s done so far has helped us. 

How did AgileEngine perform from a project management standpoint?

AgileEngine is always available, especially the QA engineer. Every time I ask him something, he always replies on time and almost instantly. The quality of his work is great, and everything's impressive. They have sync-up meetings with me every other week, and they always ask me what I want from them and where they can help us.

What did you find most impressive about them?

AgileEngine truly wants to provide good service. In general, the team has been easy to work with. They always want to help us, which isn't common in the contracting world. Most of the time, contractors just do their work, and they don't want to talk to us a lot.

In AgileEngine’s case, we don't feel that they're contractors. We feel like they belong to our team and they're our full-time employees, and we’ve developed a great relationship. 

Are there any areas they could improve?

No, there aren’t any. I can’t think of anything they could improve. They’re doing a good job. 

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

Don’t get carried away by communication problems and focus on the technical skills of the candidates that AgielEngine provides. The resources we have aren’t from the US. One of them is from Argentina, and the other is from Ukraine. When I first interviewed them, we had some communication problems. However, one of our engineers also spoke with them and told me they were great.

As a result, my advice would be to not focus too much on communication issues. After all, in a remote working environment, people are only going to chat all the time, and they have perfect written English. 

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the director of engineering for IGN, a publisher of video game reviews, strategy guides, and videos.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with AgileEngine?

We wanted to have a couple of quick experiments with two apps, but we don’t really have a built-out apps team. We have project managers, designers, and QA people all in-house, so the only thing we were really missing were dedicated engineering people. I hired AgileEngine to augment our engineering needs.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

We have pretty well-defined mockups and deliverables of the cross-platform apps we want. The first week, we had a bunch of kickoff meetings and daily standups with the engineers. Then we got into a groove where we’d assign tickets and mockups, let them go build for a week, and we’d check in every Tuesday morning. We asked for progress updates and gave them feedback on what they’ve built.

The apps were built in React Native, so it was important to us that they made the apps for Android and iOS, both sharing one codebase. They completed this app and we launched it, so they help us with other app work that we now have. 

What is the team composition?

They provide two engineers, one of which is full-time and the other is part-time. 

How did you come to work with AgileEngine?

At a previous company, I’d worked with AgileEngine to build out an app team focused on Android development. We’d been branching out into building our app strategy and were having trouble hiring Android engineers, so we worked with them to augment our team. I’d had a good experience working with them in the past, so they were my first call for this project.

How much have you invested with them?

They have hourly rates for their developers, so I’d say over the course of the year we’ve spent around $120,000. 

What is the status of this engagement?

We’ve been working together since around February 2020 — they still augment our engineering team. 

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

What evidence can you share that demonstrates the impact of the engagement? 

We’re all super happy with their work and have been impressed by how quickly they move. The quality of the apps they’ve delivered pleases everyone; my boss is also happy with me for choosing them to work with. The project has been a success and we’re still working with them, which shows how happy we are. 

How did AgileEngine perform from a project management standpoint?

We use Pivotal Tracker for assigning tickets and we have our own project managers who manage the work, but the engineers also all deliver on time. They are good at scoping out the work and delivering it in a timely manner. They also provide good estimates for how long things will take. 

What did you find most impressive about them?

I’ve interviewed a lot of Ukrainian development shops, and AgileEngine’s communication skills are what set them apart. They speak English very well and nothing is ever lost in translation. 

They’re incredibly easy to communicate with and their team is eager to work. One of the engineers is constantly in the Slack group, asking questions, and offering to help. It’s more like they’re a remote part of the team instead of contractors — they integrate with our team pretty well and don’t just stay off on their own. 

Are there any areas they could improve?

No, I’ve been happy with them. Even though they’re a little bit more expensive than some of their competitors, I think they’re worth it. 

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

There is a time difference since their day is ending when our day is beginning. With that in mind, have well scoped-out tickets and a clear handoff process since you’ll be asleep when they have questions. Getting that communication line established and sorting out deliverables is a good use of time. 

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

My company is Total HIPPA Compliance. I’m the chief compliance officer and a partner. We help insurance agents, medical practices and dental practices comply with HIPPA. We do the documentation creation for them, as well as risk assessment and staff training.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Agile Engine?

We have a lot of processes that were very manual, and we realized we either had to grow via hiring more people to manage the document creation and editing we do, or we’d have to come up with a system that could handle more so it would be easier on our current staff. We found it was more difficult to hire more qualified staff members to review the documents than to create a new system. It was also going to be more cost-effective to systemize it.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

They’re helping us rework our entire software platform for doing the risk assessment and document creation that comes out of that. They’ve been an integral part of the team. Not only in developing our ideas but helping us rethink the way we’re doing things. The whole project was started from scratch. The platform is built on React; we’re moving away from PHP. Our document storage is on AWS and Heroku provides app hosting. The software will be available on the web.

First, we gave them access to go through and map what we currently do, and then they came back with a plan of things that needed to be addressed. We had a two-week-long inception phase where we designed exactly what the deliverables would be. So far, they’ve been almost right on budget and their time estimations. Thanks to their use of an agile method, we’ve been able to adjust to include new functionalities that we discovered were necessary. In fact, one of their developers has been earning a security certification that will allow us to do testing. Finally, they’ve developed a whole audit procedure for us that ensures that we’re developing the code properly.

What is the team composition?

My main point of contact is Gabriel. He makes sure we’re happy. Tomas is our project manager. I’ve actually hired him to help me with other internal projects as well. They’ve extended his availability out to us through that. We’ve added that to our contract. Jorge is our project lead, and he does a presentation for us every two weeks. Ignacio is one of our junior developers; he’s stepped up and programmed at a very high level.

How did you come to work with Agile Engine?

Our lead developer realized they were in over their head, and we’d originally contacted a company a friend had recommended. When we opened the search up a bit more, our lead developer contacted some of his friends at Google and they had had a good experience with Agile Engine. They came in and blew us away with their presentation.

How much have you invested with them?

We’ve spent around $130,000 with them so far. The total will be around $250,000, I believe.

What is the status of this engagement?

We’ve been working together since June 2020.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

What evidence can you share that demonstrates the impact of the engagement?

We haven’t had a chance to kick the tires at this point, but everything they’ve shown us and everything we’ve worked through looks fantastic. It’s a huge upgrade from the manual processes that we have right now. The ultimate goal is the expansion of our business and being able to take on more clients and move into more compliance realms. Leveraging this tool will help us accomplish these goals.

How did Agile Engine perform from a project management standpoint?

We communicate in a couple of different ways. They do project management in Jira. The project manager lays out the sprints and epochs, tells us how many points each has, and how long they’re going to take. We’ve only missed one sprint, and that was with the lead developer being out on paternity leave for two weeks.

We communicate via Slack if we need to send short messages, and we’ll get infrequent email messages. We have phone calls every two weeks with the development team, and we meet with Gabriel every three weeks via video chats.

What did you find most impressive about them?

The whole team, across the board, has fit right in. I was telling them the other day that I wish the rest of my vendors were as proactive as they are.

Are there any areas they could improve?

I’ve used two remote developers before, and this is the best situation I’ve been in. It’s been such an upgrade from the two other situations. One reason is that getting a team like this and for the cost, I’m paying is fantastic. My only complaint, and it’s not big, is that sometimes the billing is difficult as they require a heavy deposit (a half month) to get started. That can be daunting as a team where we have a lot of cash tied up in escrow, essentially, because we’ve paid ahead by half a month. That’s harder for smaller businesses to handle, though larger businesses wouldn’t have an issue.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

Have a clear plan on how you’re going to move forward and what your needs are. Don’t expect to walk in and have them pull something magic out of the air. Spend time iterating your plan and figuring out what your needs are. The more frontend work you can put in and the more details you can give them the better outcome you’re going to have. That’s why we spent a lot of time and money planning on our own.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the VP of engineering. We’re in the computer network security arena. We have a B2B software network product we sell, in addition to other work we do.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with AgileEngine?

Our B2B product is a network sensor and a suite of analytics. We were looking to get a GUI for it. The best thing for us to do was to outsource those skills.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

We gave AgileEngine a list of requirements and some of the data we wanted to be displayed. We wanted an attractive design that worked well. They used React and Python.

What is the team composition?

We worked with one Python and one frontend developer. We also have a part-time UX designer and someone who was between a developer and QA. Halfway through the engagement, we had them add a project manager.

How did you come to work with AgileEngine?

I came into the company when they were signing the contract. It was negotiated by my predecessor.

What is the status of this engagement?

Our engagement with AgileEngine started in April 2019.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

What evidence can you share that demonstrates the impact of the engagement?

AgileEngine came up with innovative designs. We’ve received strong initial feedback from the first alpha customer. They’ve gotten back to us saying that this project has helped them evaluate technologies in their lab.

How did AgileEngine perform from a project management standpoint?

I initially was trying to do project management myself, but it was trickier than I anticipated. When we added the project manager to the team, it went better. He kept the lines of communication open. He suggested process improvements and handled feedback.

What did you find most impressive about them?

The team delivers high-quality work at an attractive price point.

Are there any areas they could improve?

Overall, I’ve been very pleased.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

If you have a team that’s working in a different time zone, you’re not going to see them in person. You want to empower them as much as possible to make their own decisions and work effectively with their team.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the head of engineering at a startup. I have a small team of two engineers­–one of them being from AgileEngine.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with AgileEngine?

We have a marketplace that helps with mental health support services and provides practitioners with a licensing process for them. AgileEngine was brought in before me joining the company, so I believe they were brought on board when it was clear that my predecessor wouldn’t be able to grow the business from a tech standpoint.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

AgileEngine provided me with a developer that’s based in Argentina. He’s part of my daily standups and checks in like any other employee. I have a roadmap, but since we’re a startup, priorities do shift on him quite frequently. The developer writes full-stack JavaScript code. He works with a React frontend and Node.js backend.

What is the team composition?

Along with the developer, I touch base with an account rep every month.

How did you come to work with AgileEngine?

I believe our CEO used the Techstars network and got a recommendation.

How much have you invested with them?

At this point, we’ve probably spent about $50,000.

What is the status of this engagement?

I believe we started working with them in the Spring of 2019.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

What evidence can you share that demonstrates the impact of the engagement?

The developer is on par with any senior-level developer I could’ve gotten off the market in Atlanta. He’s very dedicated and dialed-in.

Our assigned developer understands the business problem and enjoys being part of the team. That’s rare. It’s nice to have someone that’s living the journey with us.

How did AgileEngine perform from a project management standpoint?

We use Asana. We’re in constant communication, and I rarely feel oversold on anything. There have been very few surprises in terms of missing deadlines.

What did you find most impressive about them?

They’ve been very hands-off. My main concern in coming into this position was that I hadn’t had great luck with offshoring before. I was skeptical about the overall code quality and maintainability.

AgileEngine encourages their developers to weave into the fabric of the companies they’re placed at. So far, it’s been great. The developer delivers the right amount of craft and attention to detail. I’m very happy.

Are there any areas they could improve?

I don’t have any complaints right now. If anything, I could probably have fewer check-ins with the business. But, realistically, there’s not a lot of overhead in managing. I don’t have any constructive criticism for them.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

Any candidate you’re going to get will be somewhat vetted, but make sure that it’s someone who will fit in with your team well.