TXI

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m an innovation methods conductor for a food production company.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Table XI?

To launch a new product, we had to come up with an idea that could be planned and executed within a six-month timeframe. We had a vague concept in mind, but most of the work still had to be done.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

Table XI collaborated with us to conduct user research and lead a design sprint. First, they interviewed several customers to uncover behaviors and needs that are unmet by products currently on the market. They used those insights to work with us on a five-day design sprint. We didn’t have a specific product idea at the start, so Table XI took us through the whole process of brainstorming ideas, presenting porotypes to consumers, and integrating feedback. By the end of the fifth day, we defined a product that could be produced within our designated timeframe.

Designing a new product is usually a lengthy process, so this was a unique approach for us. Conversely, they primarily focus on IT solutions, so applying the design sprint strategy to a food product posed a unique challenge to them as well. After the project’s success, we engaged them to assist another product’s creation by leading a design sprint.

What is the team composition?

They assigned one project manager who acted as our primary point of contact.

How did you come to work with Table XI?

The leader of our group had prior experience working with them, but I’m not sure how they originally connected. He initially considered other vendors, but we liked Table XI’s responsiveness and ability to deliver quick turnarounds. They exude the entrepreneurial startup culture that we’re trying to work towards. That attribute drove us to work with them over other firms.

How much have you invested with them?

spent between $50,000 and $100,000.

What is the status of this engagement?

The design sprint took place in January 2018. We maintain a professional relationship with them.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

The product isn’t launching for another few months, but our engagement with Tale IX was very productive. The collaboration helped us learn how to move faster within our industry. In addition to the product idea itself, we came up with a new business model and a new brand as well. Overall, we’re extremely happy with the quality of each output.

How did Table XI perform from a project management standpoint?

They were responsive, communicative, and kept the project on schedule.

What did you find most impressive about them?

The team is very approachable and easy to talk too. They were open to the challenges we presented, even if they were outside of normal operations.

Are there any areas they could improve?

No. I’m satisfied with their service.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the technical director of an online betting exchange.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Table XI?

We had an idea for a mobile application that we wanted to build in a short time frame. Our team had no experience in React Native and we wanted a team to help us begin the process.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

The main thrust of the project is an elite sports betting exchange. It’s fairly complicated and integrates with existing proprietary technology. We wanted a new experience for our clients and went to Table XI for a realistic estimation of what we could achieve before the World Cup. They taught us how to navigate React Native so we could eventually take over the project.

We didn’t want to waste time building a prototype, so we started building the actual app right away. Over the course of about a month, they taught us how to integrate our existing backend systems into the app before incorporating bigger features. We worked with senior members of their team until we could confidently take over. They empowered us with the confidence we needed to finish the build without their help.

What is the team composition?

We collaborated with Claire (Practice Lead, Project Strategy and Execution, Table XI) and Ed (Full-Stack Developer, Analytics Practice Lead, Table XI). They relayed our requests back to the development team.

How did you come to work with Table XI?

Our CEO had a prior relationship with their former CEO. They came to our London office for an initial research phase before starting on the main build.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working together in December 2017. We’ve created the MVP and we hope to launch by June 2018.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

The app is great. We’re still working on it, but we were very happy with their performance. We spoke a lot throughout the process and they were amazing teachers. They mentioned that they are getting more requests like ours and their ability to instruct is phenomenal. We still contact them to get their insight on performance and other functionality. We’ve had no major issues with the process so far and get a lot of compliments from our CEO and the rest of our staff.

How did Table XI perform from a project management standpoint?

Claire was a responsive project manager, even if we had to contact her outside of regular business hours. Their whole development team has been helpful and are still helping with issues.

What did you find most impressive about them?

I really appreciated the educational aspect of our work together. They were fantastic at keeping us in the know and building alongside us as we went. I’ve worked in agencies like theirs and was really amazed by their willingness to teach.

Are there any areas they could improve?

Nothing comes to mind. We had little differences of opinion along the way, but nothing glaring or major. The process was smooth and seamless.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m an engineering manager at Shoprunner, a company that partners with a network of retailers to provide customers with free two-day shipping.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Table XI?

We had an opportunity to build a product for our retailer partners. We needed a firm to help create a notification-based functionality to live on some of our partners’ sites.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

The purpose of the project was to give users the ability to receive notifications about out-of-stock and in-stock products they’re interested in purchasing on any of our partner sites. When we began, Table XI outlined various levers that helped us shape the project. They were things like speed, budget, quality, etc. We worked closely with Table XI to determine the best use of our resources and to get the most out of our time and money.

Once we got started, Table XI wrote some JavaScript that we embedded in our partners’ websites. They also did some backend work to facilitate a product feed from the partner to determine when an item is out of stock or low. The new feature sends an email notification to the user when that happens.

What is the team composition?

We worked with their dev lead and director of software delivery.

How did you come to work with Table XI?

Table XI knew our leadership team. I considered a few different firms, but Table XI seemed like the best fit. They had the skill, were located nearby, and were easy to work with, so we hired them.

What is the status of this engagement?

We worked together from January–April 2018.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

The open rate for our notification emails is up to 60%, and the click-through rate is at 26%. We’re extremely pleased with their results—the rates are miles ahead of our past email engagements.

How did Table XI perform from a project management standpoint?

Table XI has incredibly strong project management skills. I was impressed with their initial planning and their weekly collaborations in our agile processes. They were able to add to our workflow and make it better instead of just doing what we asked.

What did you find most impressive about them?

They’re attentive to detail and communicate well. They didn’t just want to meet a deadline—they wanted to make the best product possible.

Are there any areas they could improve?

I can’t think of anything.

Do you have any advice for future clients of theirs?

Get everyone together in the same room to do the initial project planning, if possible. It was one of the most helpful steps in the process.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I am the founder of a technology startup.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Table XI?

We hired Table XI to help us implement a novel idea, taking it from concept to prototype through to public launch and beyond.  

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

The engagement began with a detailed white-boarding session to get the team up to speed on what we were trying to accomplish. They conducted an intensive/multifaceted inception where we discussed all aspects of the proposed business such as the intended audience, core functionality, UX/UI design, backend development for security, and budget. Table XI helped us implement our idea, providing valuable input along the way while solving unique technical challenges.  Post-launch, Table XI helped us identify talent to help build out our internal engineering team and also made recommendations on other vendors and business strategy. Table XI continues to lend their expertise to help us refine the product and product vision and pursue new opportunities.

What is the team composition?

We work with a senior business leader, project manager and engineering team. Table XI has been flexible in scaling the team up and down as our needs have varied over the course of the project.

How did you come to work with Table XI?

I had known one of the principals at Table XI for many years and had been a regular reader of their newsletters. I first worked with the Table XI team on an inception for a product idea that we ultimately scrapped, but based on our experience during that inception we knew Table XI’s team would be great to work with when our larger project came along.

What is the status of this engagement?

We engaged Table XI in August 2013 and the engagement remains ongoing.  We have oscillated between being one of their biggest clients and one of their smallest clients and they have treated us like royalty at all times, always rolling out the red carpet and staying involved in our business and strategy regardless of the amount of work that we have for them in any given month.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

Table XI helped us get from concept to market in a timely manner. Their work is high quality and their ability to pull together different elements of the firm to develop, design, and implement the product impressed us.  Several key technological challenges had to be overcome to bring the product to market and their thoughtful and creative team tackled these engineering challenges to create solutions. Table XI’s team approached every problem as something that could be solved.  

How did Table XI perform from a project management standpoint?

They are highly effective at project management and we sometimes bring them in solely for that role. They understand both the needs of the client and the needs of the engineers working on the project. They also take careful note of the business direction and strategy and potential future functionality so that it can inform the design process. They balance pragmatism and client requests to find the optimal solution — often by reframing the question or objective. They are highly sensitive to the interpersonal dynamics within teams and provide ongoing input and guidance to help the team function at its best.  They manage timelines and expectations to ensure key deliverable dates are met.

What did you find most impressive about them?

We trust them with our business and trust them to always do what's in our best interest. They go out of their way to do what's best for us, even if it’s not always best for them, by prioritizing their best talent for us, often on short notice. Their partnership is core to our business and they provide the type of relationship that can survive periods of lower activity.  Their team rushes to scale up for us for a few months and then are flexible with us when we don’t require their services for periods of time. They display the hallmarks of a good partnership — honesty, candor, mutual respect, reliability, and a long-term view of the relationship. 

Are there any areas they could improve?

Overall, we’re very happy and have worked with many exceptionally talented people on Table XI’s team.  All consulting firms have a mix of more experienced and less experienced engineers, and in a few instances, we’ve worked with more junior team members on tasks that a more experienced engineer might have completed more quickly or implemented it in a different way.  In such cases, Table XI has proactively stepped in to ensure that we weren’t disadvantaged as a result.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

Companies should be as open as possible in sharing their objectives and broader business plan with the Table XI team. Table XI is able to offer advice beyond software development and can advise on business strategy in parallel with software development and implementation. Table XI has a deep set of capabilities, and the more you share with them, the more you'll get out of the relationship.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I am a co-founder and lead product and technical strategy for a smart event platform. Our goal is to transform the fan experience and optimize venue operation of live events. We love near-field communication (NFC) technology and do a lot of cool work with Apple, Google, and NXP.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Table XI?

We're looking to streamline all the activities of a game day or live event into a single vehicle that can be read using NFC. It's your ticket, wallet, loyalty card, parking pass, public transport card, access to club or VIP areas, sponsors activation or fan engagement activity (e.g. taking pictures in a photo booth or digital scavenger hunt, etc) all in one. 

At a high level, we're a credential aggregator that integrates various operational systems, both on-site and cloud-based. We need the ability to onboard users, associate smart devices in forms such as wristbands, card or digital passes, and allow people to use them at venues. The account details will be retrieved instantly in order to determine if the user has enough money for a purchase, if there is a credit card backing up the NFC device, if the ticket is valid, etc.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

We're building the backend of our smart event platform from scratch. It is an account and cloud-based platform which uses a combination of apps and NFC based Internet-of-things (IoT) to bridge the physical and digital worlds.

Table XI has been helping us build a Swiss Army knife type platform of sorts, which is critical to the third party integrations our platform requires in order to be successful. They've provided full backend, frontend, and API development, along with some crypto, design, DevOps, AQ, and product/technology strategy.

What is the team composition?

I’ve primarily communicated with my equivalent product manager on Table XI’s side.

How did you come to work with Table XI?

We selected them from around 15 companies. We found them through a mentor we worked with an accelerator program. That mentor, whom we respected greatly, had prior experience with Table XI, so that meant a lot to us. They received good references from former clients, and during the RFP process, they were also the group that challenged us the most on our ideas. We believed that they could add the most value to our development.

How much have you invested with them?

The cost of their work has been $250,000 and $500,000.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working with Table XI in May or June 2017. The collaboration is ongoing.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

We delivered the Smart Stadium experience at a big exhibit at CES. We were live for nearly a whole week in a non-production environment and things still worked great! We also had a pilot at a basketball tournament. Everything worked great in both cases. The system has been field tested and performed as expected based on the intended use and the size of the events so far.

How did Table XI perform from a project management standpoint?

They’ve brought lean startup and agile development principles along with a lot of discipline for executing them. The team has applied creativity to our decisions on whether we needed to write code for certain components, and what the minimal amount of code we could write was.We have a lot of features to develop and a lot of stories in our tracker, so we don’t want to go too far down unnecessary paths.

As we clear out old stories which have become irrelevant from our project tracker, it's evident that their suggestions to not run those stories earlier was correct. With that, they saved us time and money and spared us from bloated code.

For communication, we use Slack and have daily stand-ups and story reviews. Their project manager ensures that our meetings run smoothly and keeps track of notes and other takeaway materials. I enjoy their structured process.

What did you find most impressive about them?

Table XI is clearly a software company. They know what they’re doing and do it well. But, they don’t just take requirements; they work with the client to make sure that the product features and acceptance criteria makes sense and that we've though through our options. From my experience, this sets them apart from other shops I've worked with.

Are there any areas they could improve?

They could be less expensive.

Do you have any advice for future clients of theirs?

Clients will get the most out of Table XI if they come with an open mind. Table XI may not be the best choice if you expect them to strictly execute a concrete set of requirements. If the client is open to an outside perspective, they have a lot to gain from collaboration with Table XI. 

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m a co-founder and partner of Akara Group, a consulting organization specializing in pharmaceutical entities and their relationships with managed care facilities.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Table XI?

We had decided to move from consultation to software development, or at least offer it as a secondary service within a niche domain. As a consulting company, our challenges were a limited budget and our inexperience with building software. We also didn’t understand all the different factors we needed to consider so we needed an experienced partner to lead the project.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

We initially engaged Table XI for two months to help us build a rapid prototype that we could demonstrate to clients in order to gauge interest. Once we established there was a demand for the product, we used their team to build the back- and frontend of our app. We provided simple wireframes that laid out our ideas for the app. They assigned a UX person to help us think through what would and wouldn’t work. Their business analysts and developers also suggested other features that they thought our clients would like. They created the look and feel of the app, and developed code to ensure a fast response time.

What is the team composition?

We mainly worked with a project manager, UX person and developers from their team.

How did you come to work with Table XI?

Though I knew one of their team members from a previous company, we went through an RFP process. It came down to three companies and Table XI came out on top. Their proposal stood out partly because of the obvious care they put into it and partly because of their ability to understand our goals and craft a plan of action.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working on the prototype project in the summer of 2016. The development of the app took place from December 2016–June 2017.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

Table XI delivered exactly what they promised. I constantly changed my mind, but they were fantastic in accommodating my requests.

How did Table XI perform from a project management standpoint?

There were some scope considerations where they could have been clearer on what was possible and what wasn’t, but the overall project management was good. They did a great job of working within our limited budget and building a product that can be expanded once we have more funding. In fact, it’s possible that they worked beyond the budget and didn’t charge us in order to meet our expectations. They really took the lead and guided us on designing the best user experience. Our way of thinking was more antiquated, so that was very helpful. We also wanted to deliver the app as fast as possible. They were tremendous in managing the scope accordingly. Table XI proactively offered suggestions and flagged any potential issues early.

What did you find most impressive about them?

Their ability to lead us was really important. Table XI is a fantastic company, and I would definitely use them again. They put a lot of care and attention into what needs to be done.

Are there any areas they could improve?

Nothing really stands out as an area of improvement.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m a former senior product manager at a manufacturing company outside Chicago. I was in charge of our e-commerce site and an IoT cloud software platform.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Table XI?

We were an older manufacturing company, looking to adopt technology and marketing tools to take the company forward. For me specifically, it was about IoT services and helping us launch a platform that connected our devices to the cloud to better serve our customers.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

The first project we worked on was redoing our e-commerce site. Table XI did a ground-up redesign and backend overhaul. The previous site was outdated, so they helped us rebrand it and add new functionalities. Table XI built custom workflows based on our products and how we sold them.

We just recently updated the site to better reflect our current marketing strategy. We’re promoting things differently, so we needed new tools to reflect that. The changes were built on the original framework, but Table XI made some user interface improvements and backend enhancements.

For the IoT SaaS application, our internal engineers converted our existing hardware from local wireless communication to an IP-based network. From there, Table XI built the web entire app, from the APIs that took the data from the devices to the actual user interface. That included the server architecture, the software programming, and the app design. They now maintain the app day-to-day and advise the company on any new feature updates.

What is the team composition?

We worked with 2–7 people. We interacted regularly with the CTO, a project manager, and two main developers.

How did you come to work with Table XI?

The company was already working with Table XI when I came on. One of their founders met the owner of our company, and the relationship’s been going for nearly 15 years.

What is the status of this engagement?

I worked with Table XI from August 2009 until last month, when I left for a new position, but TableXI continues to do work for my previous employer.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

Our e-commerce site brought in millions of dollars of revenue for our company. It was a robust e-commerce store that did everything we needed it to. The second version improved our marketing, focusing on things like web ranking and SEO rating. I don’t know the numbers, but our ratings increased, and we were landing higher on searches. A lot of that was due to Table XI’s work.

The software as a service (SaaS) app is likely the future of the company. The application drove millions of dollars of hardware and software revenue. Table XI helped our 90-year-old manufacturing company step into the 21st century and enabled us to move forward with cloud IoT projects.

How did Table XI perform from a project management standpoint?

They were fantastic. They had me in their communication channels and proactively brought up issues before they became actual issues.

What did you find most impressive about them?

They were a relatively small organization but had a deep bench of skills and knowledge. Whenever we needed a certain resource, they could be called upon to provide it.

Are there any areas they could improve?

Better defining some of the work upfront would’ve been beneficial. We improved by the end of my time working with them, but it definitely reduces the amount of work you have to refactor.

Do you have any advice for future clients of theirs?

If you don't understand something, ask questions. They’re phenomenal at explaining unclear concepts and want you to pushback if you don’t agree with or understand a certain approach. They're very open to conversation, so speak your mind.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I'm the founder of the company, which has three areas of focus. We invest in startups and help them build technology statistics, offer digital marketing and web development consulting services, and buy and build digital assets.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Table XI?

We needed to create several sales-focused digital assets for our client. We needed to redesign their site because it was poorly designed and a disservice to their brand. We also needed to develop a sales app tool for their representatives to take into the field and use as a digital catalog selling tool.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

They served as the lead developer for the website. They helped us choose a platform that fits the client's IT needs. They also helped improve user experience and develop the site’s software. They found a lightweight solution for the sales app that we were able to implement quickly and inexpensively. They handled any additional design and development for the app.

They helped build a roadmap for our work process, which we use to uncover problems and architect solutions to bring us to the next phase of our projects. They also worked to solve internal problems that focused on education and customer service.

What is the team composition?

We had two main points of contact.

How did you come to work with Table XI?

I’ve known them for over 15 years, so I've progressed in business alongside their founder. I’ve always admired what he's done with his peers, and I seek opportunities to collaborate with them any chance I get. They're really smart people.

How much have you invested with them?

We’ve spent over $1,000,000.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working together August 2014 and still collaborate.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

We've been able to significantly increase our client’s online sales, and their sales will probably reach 10% of this year’s revenue. Our client’s presence online has increased by 500%, and their exposure and traffic have increased.

How did Table XI perform from a project management standpoint?

They’re extremely responsive and communicative. They take communication seriously and update us on each and every development in order to avoid issues. They’re also great at defining the problem and bringing all of the stakeholders together to agree on the problem. After hearing every stakeholder, they come back with a proposed solution that meets the concerns of everyone involved.

They're amazing on all fronts, and their development team is particularly amazing. Their project management is great, and their ability to understand the business problem motivating a project is incredible.

What did you find most impressive about them?

Nowadays it’s hard to find a partner you can trust, but they’re definitely a trustworthy company. They will do everything in their power to develop a successful project, and they're an extremely reliable partner.

Are there any areas they could improve?

No.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I am the product manager for Subscribers, which is a web push notification platform. Design, user research, and user experience all go through me.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Table XI?

Before I came on board in August 2017, the company had a different U.S.-based dev shop build out the platform, and although it was not a complete disaster, it was close to it. We needed a new development team to be able to come in, fix all of the extant problems, and then work to maximize and perfect the product we wanted to put into the marketplace. The end product aims to create a platform to better enable websites to utilize web push notifications, allowing them to send their customers messages on any (non-iOS) device rather than requiring individuals to download a separate app first. Using this technology is relatively new and there is a lot of room for growth in this space, of which this platform aims to take advantage while the technology itself matures and grows in the marketplace. Our team is heavily focused on marketing, so we aim for this to be another tool to add to our marketing stack to offer to our clients.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

The first couple months of our engagement with Table XI consisted entirely of them fixing bugs and scaling issues that were left from the previous team. Table XI did a fantastic job of going through the entire codebase and figuring out what we needed to fix and scoping out the amount of work that they thought was likely, which allowed us to prioritize accordingly. Then, they prepared the product to make sure it would be able to scale to a much larger level than was currently feasible. Over the past four months or so, we have been adding a lot of features based on the research that my team and I have been doing alongside Team XI.

Since the advent of the new year, we have been building a load-testing environment to adjust for the growth of the platform. Some of our current users have been beginning to test the boundaries of the platform, and the immediate goal is to address strain issues and figure how to solve them going forward. Table XI reconfigured our team, including bringing in an outside expert to augment their team, and scoped out the entire environment for us. Now we have two developers working on building, testing, and troubleshooting it part-time. Table XI has built a system that’s allowing us to easily test the platform both vertically and horizontally, as well as allow us to get ahead of our user base by fixing any potential issues before they can arise.

What is the team composition?

We have our own dedicated project manager, and then we currently have two developers working on our product. The team has scaled up and down throughout the project work, depending on what we need at any given time and for individual tasks.

How did you come to work with Table XI?

Our founder was referred to Table XI from a friend of his, although I was not here when they made the decision. I do know that them being in the U.S. and having a time difference of only two hours was a big advantage during our consideration process. Their relative proximity makes for a much easier working environment for us all. When we first began looking into hiring Table XI, our office had them do a full code audit for us, and it was after the success of that exercise that my colleagues decided to engage them.

What is the status of this engagement?

The engagement began around July of 2017, and the work is ongoing.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

It is hard for me to say anything regarding results yet, because we haven’t marketed the product except to a very exclusive group of people. I would hope to have a more concrete answer to that question in a couple months, but for the moment, the only metrics we use are how much dev work they are completing on a week-to-week basis in our sprints. All of that also depends on the scope of the work and who is assigned to the team at any one point in time, so the relative productivity changes fairly drastically on a regular basis.

So far, the quality of the work is really good, and we have never come across significant problems. Every development project is bound to have some bugs, and any issues that do arise, they fix promptly and effectively. They think carefully through any problem before jumping into a solution.

How did Table XI perform from a project management standpoint?

Table XI has a really good approach to project management. Everybody gets a dedicated project manager on their team, which helps move the work along smoothly. It also frees me personally from having to do a lot of the day-to-day organizational work, allowing me to focus on higher-level strategic tasks, and ensures that the project progresses smoothly. The project manager they assigned to us, Judith Sol-Dyess (Delivery Principal, Table XI), is fantastic. She takes the lead on organizing all of our meetings and sprint planning sessions, and the two of us talk multiple times a day. Our teams have a stand-up meeting three or four days a week, and we have a two-hour planning session every Tuesday to go over the sprint for the following week. Judith helps me organize all of those meetings and keeps us on track if we start going off-topic during one session. She fills a role that we don’t have a single person dedicated to on our in-house team. When they first brought on the outside developer to help with load-testing environment, they were able to onboard him very quickly, and he has been working extremely well with their other developer since January. Table XI provides us with the staff that they think is best suited to tackle any individual task or issue.

They run everything with a very Agile, lean approach, which we really appreciate because it allows them to be both flexible and adaptable, no matter what big changes we throw at them at the last second. Their team members are always happy to accommodate our preferences and schedules, and they do everything they can to make the collaboration as easy as possible on us. They have never balked at anything we have asked of us; instead, they just figure out how to complete what we have requested.

What did you find most impressive about them?

In general, they are just a good, smart group of people to work with. Table XI is great at helping me prioritize what we should be working on that could add value to our business. They are not your typical dev team that just follows orders; they challenge you and make sure that you are thinking about your project in the most effective way, and that you have thought everything through before implementing any changes. Having them challenge us when they feel that it’s necessary has been a refreshing and atypical approach for a dev shop to take. If you still want them to do what you had originally requested, they will do so, but they voice their concerns first. I personally truly appreciate that, because we have a small internal team and our ideas might not be best suited to the project from a development standpoint.

They encourage taking the project one step at a time rather than rushing to the finish line. Because of their measured approach, we are building a much better product. Table XI has done a fantastic job of managing the project and building the platform fairly quickly. They are able to scale up and down on short notice, and have done so for us a number of times and at a fast pace. We are very happy with their work right now, and that is what stands out to me the most.

Are there any areas they could improve?

They are a little pricier than a lot of other vendors, but their level of service and quality of work generally makes up for that differential, and they have occasionally been flexible with our budget.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

Be prepared for them to challenge you in order to create the best end product possible. Come into it with the approach that they’re a part of your team.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I work in the marketing department of Discover Financial Services, specifically on the team responsible for digital user experience.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Table XI?

We planned to launch a pay button feature on our website that not only placed us at parity with our competitors, but also set us apart. We wanted to conduct a design sprint before investing in the development process to understand what features customers would consider valuable differentiators.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

We engaged Table XI for not only design and development, but also as a strategic partner. During an eight-day sprint, they worked with us to test a number of hypotheses. They advised us on what our product could realistically include based on existing technologies and we added new features based on their expert recommendations. They helped create the pay button’s UX design, a prototype to test with customers, and a blueprint for development.

What is the team composition?

We had a team of three. Alicia [Drucker, Director of Software Delivery, Table XI] served as our primary project manager, and we also worked with Rex [Chekal, Director of Digital Strategy, Table XI] and Noel [Rappin, Senior Software Developer, Table XI].

How did you come to work with Table XI?

We work with a few agencies on a week-to-week basis, but it’s sometimes helpful to hire new vendors who can offer solutions from an outside perspective. One of my colleagues discovered Table XI at a design sprint conference. They were one of the presenters and they seemed to have an in-depth background in solving high-level problems during short sprints. We were also impressed by their portfolio.

What is the status of this engagement?

We worked together between October 2017–November 2017, but we plan to engage them on a regular basis.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

The goal of the sprint was to narrow the focus of our product in order to cut costs during development. While we had a number of lofty ideas, Table XI’s technical expertise was very helpful in determining what was realistically feasible. Their research will allow us to reduce development time and ultimately create a better product for our customers.

How did Table XI perform from a project management standpoint?

We were operating under a strict eight-day timeline, and during that brief window, Table XI was able to create a fully-functioning prototype for user testing and a revised prototype based on an initial round of customer research.

We communicated through Slack and their team was highly responsive, even after conventional office hours.

What did you find most impressive about them?

We've gone through similar sprints with other agencies. One of the biggest differentiators with Table XI is that they played an active role as a strategic partner. Rather than follow rote instructions, they suggested revisions and gave professional input based on their experience in the digital field.

Are there any areas they could improve?

Nothing stands out.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

Make sure you understand your priorities. Our team involved multiple product owners. Each of these owners had to be aligned and adjustments were sometimes needed to ensure we were all on the same page. Table XI was always able to pivot, but it would have made things easier for them if all of our stakeholders had a clear understanding of our goals from the beginning.