Kinetech Cloud

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I am national vice president of operations for an employee benefits practice group and insurance broker.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Kinetech Cloud?

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

They are creating the interface for our team to work on all their aspects of client management. It’s still in pilot mode, but we’re taking our processes and best practices to establish a central hub for documents and renewal strategies.

We’ve built a vendor tracking module that will ensure the system works properly. We’ve already integrated it over our agency management system, BenefitPoint, where we track our accounts and commissions. We plan to transfer our access from read-only to read/write. We’re also leveraging a platform called Eos for document generation. They’re integrating that into our Mendix platform to push information and generate turnkey documents.

Most of Kinetech’s work is strictly developmental. We outsourced UX to another team and do most of our protocol testing in-house. They follow our guidelines to do some preliminary testing before they deliver each element.

What is the team composition?

I have one full-time developer that my systems manager interfaces with. We’re considering expanding to two full-time staff, but that hasn’t happened yet.

How did you come to work with Kinetech Cloud?

Mendix recommended a list of developers, Kinetech among them. We evaluated a number of organizations and felt they had the best understanding of the platform. They were flexible and small enough to partner with us and respond to our needs.

How much have you invested with them?

We’ve spent about $80,000.

What is the status of this engagement?

We began working together in September 2017. We’re in the midst of a three-year project.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

The platform will have a massive impact on our organization. We hope to leverage integrations with other tools and systems to improve our overall productivity by 10%. Based on early results, this target still seems realistic. We believe it will improve our employee experience through a centralized focus on a single-point of entry for data information from disparate systems and spreadsheets. We love our employee culture and by streamlining the way our work is done, this is an opportunity to make us even better.​

​​​​​​How did Kinetech Cloud perform from a project management standpoint?

They do everything we ask them to do. I didn’t have enough time to devote to the project, so I hired a systems manager. I’m very happy with their level of availability, communication, and documentation.

What did you find most impressive about them?

They focus on what we need and make sure we’re happy with what they produce. As a development firm, they’re the perfect size. They’re small enough to dedicate time to us and maintain a consistent, responsive relationship through fixed points of contact. 

Are there any areas they could improve?

As they grow as an organization, they could consider building out their UX resources.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

We are the sales organization for a manufacturing company, serving as the link between the production facilities and our customers. I’m the company president.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Kinetech Cloud?

We wanted a more sophisticated system to track inquiries and projects. The data collection we did was previously Excel-based, but we wanted a program that could do everything we needed from one place.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

They created a Mendix-based database. They imported data from our old Excel files and developed a user-friendly interface within their system. We ran the old Excel system parallel to the new set up until we confirmed they matched. Then, we took the old process offline.

What is the team dynamic?

We mainly worked with Ricky [COO, Kinetech Cloud] and Michael [CEO, Kinetech Cloud]. They worked inside our office while they were writing the program, which turned out to be very beneficial.

How did you come to work with Kinetech Cloud?

One of our employees knew Ricky, so we discovered them through that personal connection.

How much have you invested with them?

We’ve spent somewhere in the $10,000–$50,000 range.

What is the status of this engagement?

The project took place quickly—over a matter of months—in 2015. We’re still their customer for other projects, and they make adjustments as we need them.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

The database is a much better tool than the system we had before. Our access to the data and our ability to measure it is key. All we need to do is push a button and we get a complete and accurate data report.

How did Kinetech Cloud perform from a project management standpoint?

They are very timely. Even today, if we want to make changes, they respond quickly. They stuck to the timeline they set up at the beginning of the process, and we had an easy time sitting down with them to ask our questions and review the progress.

What did you find most impressive about them?

Their responsiveness and their can-do attitude really stand out.

Are there any areas they could improve?

The output format does not come out as well as it would from Excel, but it’s a small price to pay for all the benefits.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

If you can tell them what you want, Kinetech will provide the product you expect.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I am a project executive of Corporate Concepts. We are a 34-year-old furniture company and have had DIRTT [Doing It Right This Time] for about the last 7–8 years. DIRTT is a technology-driven manufacturer of highly customized interiors. It utilizes technology as a tool to price, design, engineer, and ultimately manufacture interior spaces such as hospitals, classrooms, hotels, etc.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Kinetech Cloud?

We were looking for customization of a project management tool.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

Kinetech Cloud created a database that enabled us to create efficiencies by streamlining our workload from tracking opportunities, to sales, to order entry. The application was pretty robust, but there were specific pieces within the app that were very active too. In construction and architecture, quotes are set up with industry-specific language such as terms and conditions and qualifications. We submitted feedback to request that some of the pieces within the app be more in line with industry standard language and how companies used the app and the output. As we provided that feedback, they developed and refined those pieces.

How did you come to work with Kinetech Cloud?

We were one of the very first few partners to adopt the software. I don’t know if it was common knowledge that they existed, and I believe they called on us. It was completely designed to work with DIRTT from a sales tracking opportunity, to quoting and entering the orders, and this drove us to adopt the software. We were the second or third company to adopt their project management tool. We have been using them for the last 2.5 years. Corporate Concepts have been using them for about 1.5 years.

How much have you invested in them?

We have spent between $10,000–$50,000.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working with them in March 2015, and we are still using them.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

The app has a feature I use a lot for quoting projects early on in an opportunity phase, which helps me to track profit margins very tightly and have a holistic understanding of where our profit margin is at any point within that quoting process. This enables me to remain competitive when I know we need to be at certain budget numbers.

Additionally, because we have separate people who do order entry versus myself more on the sales side, there is less of a chance for miscommunication when it goes from a sales opportunity to an actual order and gets handed off to other people. All of the information is embedded into each opportunity, and there is a lower likelihood that communication will be lost or a number transcribed incorrectly because it is all pushed from an opportunity into the order. After a project is complete, all of that information stays embedded into that database. I am seeing it reduce errors in communication for the duration of a project.

Also, at the beginning, we were looking to hire a project manager and had a huge workload that was fairly complex. Ultimately for us, we were able to put off that hire by about 6 months because of the efficiency and database created using Kinetech.

How did Kinetech Cloud perform from a project management standpoint?

Initially, we set up several GoToMeetings where Morgan [Partner and Director of Sales] ran us through the entire app. She was proficient and interactive in the training. There were very few things they didn’t have a solution for. They changed things as we needed them to change. Fortunately, Morgan lives locally, and she comes to our office if we have questions or new employees that need training.

What did you find most impressive about them?

They took a complicated process, which was prone to a lot of errors that cost us time and money, and made it user-friendly. The user interface became very simple, and once datasets were created within the app, it became repeatable simply and easily. The appeal for us was that it streamlined our process, reduced the number of errors, and saved us time and money when we placed an order. They were very responsive to our feedback to make the tool even better.

Are there any areas they could improve?

A more robust CRM tool would be helpful. At Corporate Concepts, we started as a furniture dealership and now have a completely dedicated DIRTT team. As a company, we recently launched a CRM tool, but the way we track sales cycles and opportunities in DIRTT is unique, and we have to adapt to the furniture mentality. If Kinetech had a more robust CRM capability, we would use it a lot more, both for personally tracking our own pipelines and also as a team understanding who is contacting who. There tends to be a lot of overlap between contacts within architecture firms, clients, general contractors, and brokers. We have not figured out a clean and easy way to communicate that with each other, and there is efficiency that could be gained from having that tool.

Also, we would like to coordinate with our backend accounting system. Within the app, we are able to issue purchase orders, but there is no backend accounting to it so we are still using another program for all accounting purposes. In the past, they said this doesn’t align with Kinetech’s purpose, but they have been talking about ways that the software could communicate with other software programs.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

Michigan State Housing Development Authority (MSHDA). Statewide housing related foreclosure prevention program. 

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What business challenge were you trying to address with the vendor?

Stand up a new federally funded program to mitigate housing delinquent expenses and prevent mortgage foreclosures.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement? 

IT Software provider; develop an on-line application portal and system of record.

What is the team composition? 

MSHDA internal IT group, State IT group and program’s operation staff.

How did you come to work with the vendor?

Reference from other MSHDA teams that set up a federal funded rental assistance program with same developer. 

How much have you invested with them?

Program costs < $300,000

What is the status of this engagement?

System created, finalized, launched and now just maintenance

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

Record speed to create and launch program.

How did the vendor perform from a project management standpoint?

It was an excellent job, easy to work with, understood our Program goals. 

What did you find most impressive about them?

Ease of working with programmers and quick response time. 

Are there any areas they could improve?

None.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

Guido Brothers Construction is a general contracting firm in the vicinity of San Antonio. I'm a Senior Project Manager.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with KineTech?

Our existing project management software contained some inflexible tools and was growing outdated, so we were looking for a company that would be responsive and adapt our system.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

They used Mendix to build our software. Some of the features they worked on included data capture of daily materials like reports or worker timesheets, while other changes were financially related. They enabled us to capture "change-order" information, which updates the original contracts and affects how projects are billed. The software also handles our monthly billing, which can be hundreds of line-items long due to the detail required on some projects, so it's a huge resource for our company.

I think in the future our company's looking to tie the CMS directly into our accounting software. It may be too expensive, but it would help as far as sharing information internally.

What is the team dynamic?

I don't know how big the whole team was, but I communicated with the project manager. He's a great listener and works to understand the process that he's trying to address.

How did you come to work with KineTech?

Our company had an existing relationship with their owner and had a lot of confidence in his skills, expertise, and ability to deliver the final product.

How much have you invested with them?

I’m not entirely sure, but definitely over $50,000.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working on the project in February 2013, and we're still working together.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

Having a proprietary product helps us sell our business to potential customers, because it shows that we custom-tailor the software to our needs and style of business.

How did KineTech perform from a project management standpoint?

On our side, we have a committee of 2-3 people who clarify our needs and ensure that our users understand the product. That team communicates regularly with KineTech's software writers in order to keep the whole project going smoothly.

What did you find most impressive about them?

They're good listeners, and receptive to questions or critiques. It's nice to work with men and women who are open to collaboration like that.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

Maintain a close working relationship, because they listen well and will work hard to find the best solution to your problems.