Ecotech

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

The company at which I worked with Ecotech was called QueSocial Inc, and I was the founder and CEO.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Ecotech?

We needed an ongoing partner to manage and continue to build out our technology platform.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

Their primary role was the maintenance of the platform, but they did a significant amount of work on its infrastructure as well. We were a .NET framework, and they were able to strengthen that significantly. Not only did they keep us up and running, but they also helped us to stay market leading as well.

The platform originally leveraged SharePoint for a lot of our processes, but as our business needs started to change, they helped us take the huge step to migrate to a more streamlined LMS. They also did a lot of work evolving the game engine and game logic around our content delivery for social sharing, as well as reporting and user interface.

What is the team composition?

Our senior contact was the CEO of their company, and he was always available to us if we needed him. We had a point person as well, and between the two of them were critical in helping to manage their team working on our projects despite some of the personnel turnover that we experienced over the course of the collaboration.

How did you come to work with Ecotech?

We had developed a technology platform with a partner in the US. Once that was complete, we realized that the ongoing support and maintenance that we were receiving from that company was more than we needed and a little too expensive to maintain.

From there, we decided to look for a more cost-efficient partner that would be able to keep pace with us when we needed it. We interviewed a number of different firms in different countries, and Ecotech had a terrific process for prioritizing business requirements that we knew would be really helpful to us.

How much have you invested with them?

Our base was about $5,000 a month, so we ended up spending a little over $60,000 a year.

What is the status of this engagement?

I would say we worked together from about 2013–2017.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

The biggest benefit we’ve experienced from their service is that as we continue to build on the platform, we continue to lead the market for our industry. In 2014 and 2015, we were named Technology of the Year by Human Resource Executive. We were really focused on the HR tech market at the time, so being recognized in that market was pretty spectacular.

How did Ecotech perform from a project management standpoint?

They were always really responsive, which I really appreciated. When you’re working with an offshore company, there can be different cultural expectations and differences. Fortunately, we were able to establish a relationship where we provided them with all of the information to know what we wanted, and they were able to deliver on those needs. That success was a credit to the hard work put into managing the project from both of us.

What did you find most impressive about them?

When I think about Ecotech and our time together, I appreciated all of the commitment that they demonstrated to our partnership. What we were doing was new, so they had to learn a lot of different ways to apply the technology and write the code, but they always put in the effort to develop in ways that benefited the project.

Are there any areas they could improve?

One of the biggest challenges we faced was the turnover, where teammates would develop a knowledge base on our product and then leave, and we would have to transfer all of that expertise to a newer person. I don’t think that was really Ecotech’s fault as it was just the realities of the tech market at the time.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

I think it’s really important to make sure you establish a formal process of check-ins and milestones to make sure that you are hitting all of your objectives as you go. It’s something that vendors and their partners should always be more cognizant of, in my opinion.