Software Development for Financial Technology Firm
- Custom Software Development
- $50,000 to $199,999
- Sep. 2018 - Aug. 2019
- Quality
- 5.0
- Schedule
- 4.0
- Cost
- 4.5
- Willing to Refer
- 5.0
"There was a trust in Software Mind’s definition of “done” and of meeting requirements."
- Financial services
- Hamburg, Germany
- 201-500 Employees
- Phone Interview
- Verified
Software Mind provided dedicated, remote software developers to work in a multi-technology environment. Their resources participated in front- and backend development of a customer-facing website.
Beyond tangible technical contributions, Software Mind contributed to team cohesion in many ways, including their participation in daily communication and authoring of thorough documentation. Their ability to gear up rapidly and deliver robust solutions the first time around is notable.
A Clutch analyst personally interviewed this client over the phone. Below is an edited transcript.
BACKGROUND
Introduce your business and what you do there.
We’re Germany's second-biggest FinTech, with a valuation of about €1.1 billion ($1.2 billion USD). My job there was the executive director of engineering, running all the software development services.
OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE
What challenge were you trying to address with Software Mind?
I had to scale the department by 300%, which, in Germany, is very difficult to do. Getting decent engineers locally is expensive and time-consuming. We identified what countries we could outsource some software development to, and Software Mind was one of the companies that we contacted.
What we wanted to solve was the scaling of some parts of team while maintaining some type of team cohesion and identity—not just pushing out projects to a company that delivers what they thought we needed several months later. We wanted them to be part of the day-to-day interaction with the internal team.
SOLUTION
What was the scope of their involvement?
Software Mind came on board quite quickly. The lead time to get the team up and running was very short. We brought all the team over for a week to stay with us in Hamburg and work during the day. I sent them out to get to know each other because I wanted them to be a fully integrated team, and that worked really, really well.
We used Software Mind as an augmented software development team. Rather than outsource our project to them, we integrated them into our software development teams. The department was split into multiple teams, with different focuses per team, and we integrated Software Mind with some of those teams, as actual members. They took part in the planning and daily standups, albeit remotely, and they were completely onboarded into the company infrastructure, with company email addresses and so on.
Everything we use is based on Linux, MySQL, and Java. There are some microservices, but it’s usually just a classical stack. Software Mind was involved in two teams, one of which was in charge of the front- and backend of the publicly-accessible site.
With banking in Europe, there’s a lot of compliance we have to go through daily. They were fixing a lot of compliance issues, as well as taking on new feature developments and planning. They were active members of the team and gave us their feedback on how to design and build new API end points and other elements.
What is the team composition?
There were four or five people from their team assigned to us. We didn’t just want cheap code writing resources to throw specs at; we wanted people to challenge us. We got very experienced people from Software Mind, as well as some junior people. There was a good mix of abilities and experience.
How did you come to work with Software Mind?
I ran three experiments with companies in Poland, and, after six months, I ran an anonymous survey within my company on a number of metrics. We then compared each of the providers. Software Mind was a latecomer to the process. We reached out through our network to find credible people through people who’d worked with them.
There were three companies on the list originally, and I dropped one because I didn’t have confidence in them. One of the investors in Software Mind is also an investor in our company, and he recommended them. There was no pressure from the investor or anything like that; it was just a case of them making an introduction for us. Seeing as how I’d dropped one option already, and I wanted to have candidates for three experiments running in parallel, I reached out to Software Mind and went to visit them.
I spoke to their people and saw how they worked, and I really liked the attitudes and positivity of the team. The quality of their English was excellent, which is a major concern, even in Germany, because we work in an international environment. I’m the only native English speaker in the company, and everyone else is communicating in a second language. That means that the quality of the language everyone's speaking has to be very high.
One of the other benefits with them was related to the European GDPR regulations. They are a massive issue in Europe, and having their team in Europe, as part of the EU, was a massive load off of us. We experimented working with companies outside of the EU, but it was just a nightmare when it came to GDPR. We canned that experiment very quickly.
How much have you invested with them?
We spent between $50,000–$100,000 with them.
What is the status of this engagement?
We worked with Software Mind from September or October 2018 until August 2019.
RESULTS & FEEDBACK
What evidence can you share that demonstrates the impact of the engagement?
I ran an anonymous survey within my company after about six months, and Software Mind came out on top in every metric, and not just a little bit on top. They were miles ahead of the others we were experimenting with. The quality of their work was excellent, they were robust and professional, and they actually implemented solutions, rather than just doing what the product manager thought we needed. Without a doubt, the quality of their work was very, very high. I’m happy to recommend them to my network; I’ve done so, and I will probably use them again in my next project.
How did Software Mind perform from a project management standpoint?
We worked in two-week sprints and used Jira as our tracking system. They were very effective at using it for communication and ticketing, which they had to be, because they were remote. If I can’t go talk to someone, I might have to sit and write everything down. Additionally, their participation in the standups (with big screens and webcams) and the whole agile ritual was very strong. We always had quick, positive communication through Slack, and it was very common to see our engineers in Hamburg on a call with their engineers assigned to us in Poland, working through something together.
They were also able to estimate with reasonable accuracy. If we bring anyone new into a software development project that’s already seven years old, it usually takes more than a couple of months for them to understand the whole system. Quite quickly—after about the first two sprints (four weeks)—they were able to estimate the size of the task with reasonable accuracy.
They always knew what they were working on, and they were robust, and not just in software development skills, but also in how mature their approach to the work was. That comes from their hiring. When we were building the team, they sent me a list of CVs, obviously with personal details removed. I was able to look through the experiences of the people they were putting in as candidates. We went through an almost classic interview procedure, which meant that we got people who fit exactly right.
What did you find most impressive about them?
Companies in Software Mind’s area and industry experience a lot of turnover, so, when I went to speak with them I addressed the stickiness of their employees. I wanted to know whether I needed to worry if they’d lose an employee to another company in three months, and I’d have to onboard someone else. In reality, the retention of their employees was very strong, actually stronger than our own employees. They have a good culture there. People enjoy working there, and they identify with the projects they’re working on.
Some of their resources are quite young, but they’re professional, thorough, and not just the “Let’s tackle it and see what happens” sort. I’ve worked with outsourcing companies from across the world, and seeing this level of professionalism with people who stay a long time is quite rare.
Working in finance, people get really upset if you lose their money. Making sure that what we deliver is well-tested and robust was key, and my team leader quickly got a degree of confidence that, when they said it was done, we wouldn’t have to wonder if it really was, and check it in depth. There was a trust in Software Mind’s definition of “done” and of meeting requirements.
Are there any areas they could improve?
No. Their communication was very good, including at the management or engagement management level, and they quickly proposed, after 3–4 weeks, that we have a review to make sure everything was on track and that we were happy. It’s not just that the developers themselves were good, but that the commercial engagement was very strong.
If there was something that went wrong during the onboarding, it was that I got sick and couldn’t finish the negotiations. That made things a bit chaotic, but, from their perspective, I think it was really good.
Do you have any advice for future clients of theirs?
Clients should be honest with them and not be scared of using a remote team; Software Mind genuinely wants to solve a problem. I don’t think they’re the most affordable option, but, if the client wants good quality, Software Mind offers the best I’ve seen.
Trust them and really use their skills. If someone is looking for a provider that’s just going to slap together some code to do this and that, Software Mind probably isn’t for them. If the client wants to have access to people who are really engaged in the product and want to actively support them, Software Mind is the right team.
RATINGS
-
Quality
5.0Service & Deliverables
"Easily."
-
Schedule
4.0On time / deadlines
"Just because they were still in the process of learning various parts of the system when they got it wrong."
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Cost
4.5Value / within estimates
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Willing to Refer
5.0NPS
"I’ve done it.
