Oshyn

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the Chief Strategy Officer for the Texas County & District Retirement System (TCDRS). For more than 50 years, TCDRS has been a model for providing reliable retirement benefits. Benefits are responsibly funded, which means costs are not pushed to future generations. We are one of the best-funded retirement plans in the nation. We do not receive state funding; rather, each plan is funded by investment earnings, the employer and its employees. We also work with more than 760 county and district employers, providing benefits to over 294,000 Texans, including 64,000 retirees.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Oshyn?

We needed a partner to assist our organization in continually improving the customer service we provide on our website, building new tools for our members and employers and helping us increase usability from mobile devices.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

Our initial project involved Oshyn developing a tool called the Plan Customizer that allows our employers to run various scenarios so that they can make informed decisions about their plan. Every year, our employers can use the Plan Customizer to review their plan, run different plan option scenarios to see potential changes in cost, and submit changes if needed. This tool was very well received, and employers could use it at their convenience.

In 2015, Oshyn helped us redesign our website with a focus on improving the information and usability of our Investments section, refreshing the design of all public and customer-facing pages and adding new features. The site was built using Sharepoint and .NET.

And most recently, Oshyn assisted us in delivering a redesigned member portal. Changes centered on making the portal mobile friendly, adding multi-factor authentication and other security enhancements, and integrating new features like document upload. A second phase is currently underway that provides additional online services to our members.

What is the team composition?

It depends on the effort, but typically the team has 8-10 people covering development, QA, and project management.

How did you come to work with Oshyn?

Our previous design partner recommended Oshyn. They did so well on the initial project that we’ve continued to partner with them.

How much have you invested with them?

We’ve spent over $1 million over the years.

What is the status of this engagement?

We’ve been partners since 2013.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

We continually receive great feedback from our members and employers regarding the work we have partnered with Oshyn to deliver.

How did Oshyn perform from a project management standpoint?

The financial and reporting side is always accurate, and they do a good job communicating with the project team. We mainly communicate via email, phone, and status reports.

Equally important, they are flexible. So, as the project evolves or we encounter challenges, they are easy to work with to adjust scope, resources, and schedules.

​​​​​​What did you find most impressive about them?

They do great work, but they also take the time to understand what we are trying to do as a business and how they might help, which makes them a good partner.

Are there any areas they could improve?

No. There isn’t anything major I’d change about them.

Do you have any advice for future clients of theirs?

Maintain excellent communication to optimize the partnership.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m a developer at Wolters Kluwer, a medical education company for physicians, nurses, and other healthcare professionals.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Oshyn?

Our legacy environment was outdated. We wanted to completely revamp our system with .NET and C# development. The platform we came up with is called Platinum. The previous environment had no place for community members to access all of their content and listen to it on mobile devices, and we needed a tool that allowed for that.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

They developed the new environment for our customers. We had the whole project scoped out, but we quickly discovered that our projected timeline wasn’t possible. We started with the e-commerce component first, so we could concentrate on marketing and sales while the next phase was in development.

It was difficult to meet our initial goals, so when the membership platform released, it was separate from the e-commerce platform. We decommissioned our legacy environment in April 2018, merged both new domains, and attached them to our existing URL. They were instrumental in making all of this happen.

What is the team composition?

We had between 10–15 team members at any given time. Christian (Software Consultant, Oshyn) is our lead, and Vicki (Director of Delivery Services, Oshyn) was our design consultant. There were two business analysts, and the rest were either web IT developers or mobile developers.

How did you come to work with Oshyn?

We wanted to use Sitecore as our development platform and CMS. We interviewed several companies, but Oshyn was at the top of the list of recommended Sitecore developers. Our panel looked over customer testimonials and asked them about their ideas for our project. After comparing them to the other possible vendors, they were the most appropriate fit.

How much have you invested with them?

We’ve spent $5 million on this project.

What is the status of this engagement?

The project started in 2013 and work is ongoing.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

There is no comparison to our legacy environment. Online sales have increased by 1,000% or more. Previously, 80% of orders were processed through the phone, but most of those transactions now come almost exclusively through the new environment.

How did Oshyn perform from a project management standpoint?

They’re phenomenal and always available. A lot of their developers work in Ecuador, which is three hours ahead of us, but all of their business analysts, designers, and support staff are in the Los Angeles area.

We worked in sprints and could view the entire process, from planning to QA testing and production. There were daily status call updates at the beginning, which have since changed to two calls each week. We provided feedback and they gave us information about any changes. We used Confluence and Jira to store documentation and submit tickets.

What did you find most impressive about them?

We have an almost familial relationship with them. They’re very involved and feel like friends. They took ownership of the product and are very knowledgeable about our process. The partnership with them is very special.

Are there any areas they could improve?

No; it all worked so well.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

Give them all the pertinent data, copy, environment, customer scenarios, and user case studies, and make sure they have a complete picture of your company, your process, and your customers. If you don’t give them what they need, you may not get what you want. That said, they were interested and reached out to get all the information that they needed to complete our project.

BACKGROUND

Could you briefly describe your company?

We’re a global manufacturer and marketer of network testing and performance analysis tools, hardware, software, and services. We operate in a number of markets including network equipment manufacturers, telecommunications providers, and service providers. We operate in the Americas, Europe, Middle East, and Asia Pacific.

What is your position?

I’m the corporate marketing manager. I run the team responsible for our marketing operations, which includes the website, email and marketing automation systems, and a number of data systems operating behind all of those things.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

Could you describe the business challenges that you were attempting to address when you initiated the relationship with Oshyn?

Yes, our website runs on a content management system called Sitecore. At the time we gave it to Oshyn, we were looking for someone to take over the development part of our website. We don’t have a development team in-house. As a result, we engaged Oshyn as a Sitecore certified developer to take that on for us. They essentially function as our extraneous Web development team.

Why did you select Sitecore as your content management system?

That decision was made before I was here. However, I do understand the rationale. Sitecore is a global leader in the CMS space, and they offer a product that is enterprise ready and very adaptable due to its reliance on the .NET framework. It’s highly customizable and programmable at the same time. It provides an ideal environment to maintain and monitor content and users across multiple sites and integrated systems.

SOLUTION

Could you describe the scope of the project? For instance, did it involve custom visual design, backend development, training, or support?

There are two types of work that we would do with Oshyn. One is Sitecore maintenance and operation. Consider that keeping the website up and running on a daily basis. If there are small changes we need to make, like the template of a specific page, make some configuration changes, or sometimes we change the hosting environment, such as upgrading a server, they handle that. Anything related to administration and infrastructure, we delegate to Oshyn.

On top of that, when we have strategic projects, we engage with them on a statement of work type of arrangement. A couple of examples of those are we switched our blog platform and the look and feel and design of the blog a couple of years ago, and Oshyn handled that project, so both the design and then the technical side. More recently, we conducted a redesign of the overall branding look and feel of our website, and Oshyn did that, too. They worked on both the design side of it as well as the technical deployment.

How did you select Oshyn as your solution partner?

I went through a fairly rigorous RFP [request for proposal] process. My starting point was the vendor Sitecore and looking at the partners on their website that operate in North America because that’s where our Web operations are based. Then from a long list of those providers, conducting secondary research, reviewing their websites and services, I short-listed a set of them. I think there were four potential vendors on that short list.

We went through a proposal process, understanding their capabilities and their costs. Part of the optimized choice was locale. I’m in Southern California, and Oshyn is based in Southern California, [That, along with] their cost model and business model for this type of work, and their capabilities in terms of certifications. They came out on top of that evaluation, based on their location, skill set and the cost of their business model.

Could you provide a sense of the size of this initiative in monetary terms?

Again, we have two ways of doing projects with them. We have a monthly retainer basis. I don’t know how comfortable I am talking about what that is in exact figures. But, in terms of hours, we contract for 40 hours a month on a regular basis. Then, when we do the large statement of work level projects, they can range anything from a $5,000 project to a $30,000 project. Again, it depends on the scope. We usually do two to three of those a year.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

In terms of results, could you share any statistics, metrics, or user feedback that would demonstrate the effectiveness of the work they’ve delivered?

Let’s see. Again, from my point of view, when you balance the quantity, quality and responsiveness of the work they do, they definitely meet all of the parameters that we went into the relationship with.

On the statement of work type projects, like redesigning the website, again, after the project was done, it’s all positive feedback in terms of people within our company.

The one metric we could look at is we had some stability problems with our website before we were working with Oshyn. We’ve measurably improved the uptime of our environment by both upgrading the versions that we had and getting everything up to best practice levels, recommended version levels and distributing the Web servers in a different fashion within the data center. I’m very happy with the improved uptime there.

When working with Oshyn, is there anything you would consider unique or special about them compared to other service providers with which you’ve worked?

Again, when we approached Oshyn we weren’t in search of a marketing partner. We really needed an exemplary development team to augment our own capabilities. A lot of the certified partners for Sitecore are more akin to marketing agencies that can develop on Sitecore, rather than Sitecore developers, per se. We knew what we needed going into the relationship, and they’ve been able to deliver.

In retrospect, are there areas you believe Oshyn could improve upon, or are there certain things you'd do differently as a client before initiating projects of this nature?

In any of these relationships, you have to sort of tune them and understand how both sides work. One of the lessons we’ve learned is that given the business model of the retainer relationship and their skill sets, we need to do more preparation. As an example, we can’t just give business level requirements to their team and say, “Here’s what we want to do.” We have to think it through a solution and give them more technical requirements, and then they can execute it pretty flawlessly.

I think that gap is where, as marketers, we’d like to be able to give business level requirements, if that makes sense, and then have someone else to figure out the technical side of things. We’ve found that we have to provide a little more of what would normally be business analyst level task in between, translating the business requirements into technical specifications. When we do that, everything works out fine. When we submit business level requirements to them, it could be a hit or miss.  

BACKGROUND

Could you briefly describe your company?

The California Teachers Association is a labor union in California representing public school teachers and staff members. We offer benefit programs to those members, similar to what you would see from AARP or AAA, including life and disability insurance, auto insurance, and discount programs. CTA does a lot of work influencing legislators to support public education and developing curriculum and standards for teaching.

What is your position?

I’m the manager of the member benefits department, which administers the benefit programs I described before.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

Could you describe the business challenges that you were attempting to address when you initiated the relationship with Oshyn?

I’d say that there were two. One was that we needed to start promoting and presenting our product offerings in a manner that’s consistent with the 21st century. We had been doing a lot of stuff through paper and printed documents as well as training programs where we go out and meet with our members one-on-one or in groups. Those practices are resource intensive. We wanted to be able to leverage our digital presence so we could increase the volume of people we interface with. We had a basic website, but it wasn’t generating the traffic or interest that we wanted or needed. We decided to build a separate website exclusively housing the member benefits offerings we have.

SOLUTION

Could you describe the scope of the project? For instance, did it involve custom visual design, backend development, training, and support?

On the first round of the project, Oshyn built the member benefits website that I was talking about. They did it from front to back. We started with a conceptual design, and then went to requirements, wireframes, and began building the site, developing it, launching it, and maintaining it.

The second part of the project revolved around the development of our mobile app. Oshyn didn’t develop the application for us, but they worked alongside the consultants building the app. Oshyn essentially deployed our content. Once that mobile app was live, Oshyn built mobile pages that the app would link to, enhancing the functionality of what the app was offering, and turning the app into a control device for the mobile pages Oshyn was building.

How did you select Oshyn as your solution partner?

There was a twofold process to that. The group responsible for managing the primary CTA website had some issues with their previous vendor, had put out a request for proposals, and were seriously considering Oshyn. Around that time, I was working with my counterparts at NEA Member Benefits, and they were working with Oshyn, albeit with a different CMS [content management system]. After having conversations with both of those groups, I was convinced that Oshyn was definitely the vendor to go with.

Could you give a sense of the size of this project in monetary terms?

I’d call it about a half-a-million dollar project.

When was the project completed?

The first website that we built was launched about a year and a half ago. I would say it was the spring of 2012.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

In terms of results, could you share any metrics, statistics, or user feedback that would demonstrate the effectiveness of the work they’ve done?

I don’t have a lot of testimonials. What we’re seeing is a lot of traffic from the CTA website to the member benefits website, which was kind of what we were hoping for when we built the separate site: that we would have more details available and more flexibility. When we see that traffic, it tells us that people have been enticed, and are pursuant of more information.

How do you think Oshyn has performed on this project?

I thought they performed very well on the first project because we were trying to do single sign on, and because we were attempting to link several different websites being administered by different teams, using different content management systems. There were a lot of external dependencies involved. If you’ve ever worked on a project like this, you know that external dependencies are the most difficult ones to mitigate during the process. Oshyn demonstrated a lot of flexibility in this area, and they were consistently doing everything in their power to maintain the agreed project timeline.

Do you think Sitecore has performed adequately for your business needs?

Yes, I do. We had a lot of trouble with Sitecore to begin with because we hadn’t worked with it and didn’t have a whole lot of experience with CMS. It’s not that easy to find ways to get up to speed on Sitecore.

We’re very happy with the fact that we’ve been able to use Sitecore for the main website as well as the mobile pages. Having all of these platforms able to deliver the same dynamic content to the user while still tracking key information on the backend has been an incredible advancement for us. 

We’re also happy with Sitecore from the point of view that we’ve been able to run fairly lean with it. We haven’t had to dedicate enormous resources to its maintenance and operation.

In retrospect, are there areas you think Oshyn could improve upon, or are there things that you’d do differently as the client before approaching this type of project?

Yes, one of the things that I learned along the way was how much time and effort it can take to get content built inside of a CMS. Oshyn’s strength is really more in building from the foundation and templates and not putting that in. I would probably, before going into a project like this again, make sure that I had somebody who was more up to speed in terms of getting that stuff in quickly because it’s probably not efficient to pay a consultant to do it regardless.

Other than that, they use a sprint approach. I think the sprint approach has its strengths and weaknesses, and they’re pretty much the same thing. In one way, it limits the flexibility in that the teams that are assigned to do various tasks are only assigned for set chronological periods. That can be problematic when you’re hitting dependencies that you don’t have control over. But, at the same time, I think that it also puts a framework around the project and forces it to keep moving forward, which is always good.

BACKGROUND

Could you briefly describe your company?

We are an educational marketing organization that markets products and services to members of the National Education Association.

What is your position?

I’m the director of digital strategy.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

Could you describe the business challenges you were attempting to address when you began working on project(s) with Oshyn?

We were attempting to upgrade our website and digital marketing capabilities. We didn’t have an effective, accessible platform for being able to turn around marketing-focused information related to our products and services quickly.

SOLUTION

Which platforms did you develop on?

They’ve worked with us since we implemented our OpenText CMS.  

How did you select Oshyn as your solution partner?

Oshyn was selected out of a candidate pool of certified OpenText developers. There were a series of four or five different development organizations like Oshyn that were provided to us on a referral list from the vendor. We selected Oshyn after a brief introduction to their team and services offerings.

Could you describe the scope of this project? For instance, did it include custom design, backend development, training, or support?

It included all of those components. They were selected and helped us do a complete site redesign that included backend work, CMS implementation work as well as frontend design and development. That site has been recently redesigned as well. Oshyn was heavily involved in the redesign. They were also involved in between the two redesigns in various pieces of functional development and enhancement. We’ve had a strong, consistent relationship with them since they helped us do the initial redesign.

Is there any particular reason why you chose OpenText as your preferred CMS instead of some of its competitors?

At the time, most of our editorial teams had little in the way of technical resources. It didn’t have expansive programming capability, and the user interface inside OpenText at the time was extremely visual.

What parts of these projects did you contribute to directly with your in-house expertise?

We have our own development team working alongside Oshyn on every piece of the website. It’s often been collaboration as opposed to a project management exercise. We usually set the software architecture, set the sort of the design approach, and then we work with Oshyn and others to develop the technical design and then conduct the implementation. 

Could you give me a sense of the size of these initiatives in monetary terms?

Anything from small point kind of projects $25,000 up to complete redesigns more probably in a $500,000 range.

When was the most recent project completed?

June of this year [2013].

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

In terms of results, do you have any statistics or metrics you could share that would demonstrate the effectiveness of the work they’ve delivered?

I could give you a general indication of increases in site traffic, but we’ve also changed a lot of the marketing, so I’m unsure how directly relatable it would be. Oshyn built this for us, and we now receive nearly a million page views versus a 100,000 before the redesign. That wouldn’t be a fair representation of dynamics at play. I would say the only thing we would really have is traffic numbers. In any case, we’ve been quite pleased with our website redesigns. We receive overwhelmingly positive feedback from our users, both internal and external.

Do you still believe selecting OpenText as your CMS was the correct decision?

It was the appropriate decision for where we were as a digital organization. That was going back seven years now. At the time, it was the right decision. OpenText remains an integral part of our day-to-day and long-term business. Sure, we run into barriers from time to time, but it’s never been a deal breaker, and it’s yet to compel me to consider platform transition.

How do you think Oshyn has performed on these projects?

Overall, I would say very well. They’re very good about taking suggestions, course corrections, or minor changes in direction throughout the project. More importantly, when those things do arise, it rarely affects their ability to deliver a solution on time. They’re very flexible and nimble in terms of being able to get the right thing implemented.

In retrospect, are there any areas that you feel Oshyn could improve upon, or certain things that you’d have done differently as the client?

We probably should have had more stringent project management control over some of the earlier projects. Until we found our natural flow together, we would run into issues with ambiguous requirements and then misinterpreted implementations. However, it’s also to some extent the nature of the beast. Efficient collaboration doesn’t take place immediately: people need time to get to know one another.

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and position.

I am the Executive Producer of the company. 

Describe what your company does in a single sentence.

We’re an integrated group of performance marketing experts. We help brands overcome the cost and complexity of acquiring and converting consumers to loyal customers to drive measurable business growth.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What specific goals or objectives did you hire Oshyn to accomplish?

• To replace a website development company that could not complete a website that was in its development phase and needed to be launched in two months.

SOLUTION

How did you find Oshyn?

Referral

Why did you select Oshyn over others?

• Close to my geographic location
• Referred to me
• Company values aligned

How many teammates from Oshyn were assigned to this project?

20+

Describe the scope of work in detail. Please include a summary of key deliverables.

Digital transformation for a healthcare system into a new Sitecore platform. A total of sixteen websites were integrated to produce two websites. Easy-to-use CMS for Client's marcom team to manage thousands of pages, photos and videos for Client's providers, locations, services and conditions, blogs, classes & events and other sections.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

What were the measurable outcomes from the project that demonstrate progress or success?

Completion of all required items and functionality per SOW.

Describe their project management. Did they deliver items on time? How did they respond to your needs?

Very attentive and professional BAs/project managers. Extremely understanding, available, and flexible.

What was your primary form of communication with Oshyn?

• Virtual Meeting
• Email or Messaging App

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

All of their employees were experts and very supportive.

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

None.

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and position.

I am the President of Axis Studios

Describe what your company does in a single sentence.

We provide digital marketing production services.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What specific goals or objectives did you hire Oshyn to accomplish?

• Complete a web site build

SOLUTION

How did you find Oshyn?

Referral

Why did you select Oshyn over others?

• High ratings
• Referred to me
• Other

Describe the scope of work in detail. Please include a summary of key deliverables.

Oshyn was brought in to consult and provide critical development support to help us get a website project to completion. They provided expertise to develop back end applications, and to set up a CI/CD pipeline.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

What were the measurable outcomes from the project that demonstrate progress or success?

• Successful completion of all tasks
• Provided expert knowledge even beyond scope

Describe their project management. Did they deliver items on time? How did they respond to your needs?

Oshyn's team is excellent from a management perspective, and their communication is also top-notch. Their response time and attention to detail were peerless.

What was your primary form of communication with Oshyn?

• Email
• Messaging App

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

How quickly they were able to onboard with us, and how expert their developers are, particularly in the Sitecore universe.

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

No