Pontem Innovations

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the co-owner of a group of companies called the CSF Asset Management Group. We’re an independent debt-buying firm.

What challenge were you trying to address with Pontem Innovations?

We hired them to do data analytics for us to help us use our data better.

What was the scope of their involvement?

We engaged their team to assist us in the coagulation, organization, and use of data of all of our underlying assets. So, they’ve helped us develop reporting metrics, make strategic decisions based on data and information, and organize and catalog our data. 

We have a ton of data and we hadn’t been very good at using it in the past, so Pontem provides consulting services to help us make better decisions within our business by using our data better. 

What is the team composition?

We work with five people from time to time. We have two main points of contact, including Rick (Co-Founder) and Cameron (Director of Operations), but depending on the complexity of the data, they bring in 2–3 other teammates. 

How did you come to work with Pontem Innovations?

Rick and I did our MBAs together at school, so I used our alumni network. 

How much have you invested with them?

We’re in the arena of close to $100,000 CAD (approximately $75,800 USD). 

What is the status of this engagement?

We started these ongoing projects in September 2018 and we’re still working together. 

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

The quality of their work is excellent. I’ve used consultants in the past and haven’t felt like I was getting value for the dollar. With Pontem, I feel like I’m getting excellent value relative to the expenditure. We’ve taken on several projects with them and we’re going to do several more because the work they’ve provided us with is exceptional. 

How did Pontem Innovations perform from a project management standpoint?

They’re exceptional. They do everything a consultant needs to do, which is managing the client. I’ve had no issues; they’re prompt, true to their word, and follow up when they need to. They keep us on track and are excellent. We mostly communicate by email, phone calls, and a lot of video conferencing for the past six months.

What did you find most impressive about them?

They broke our data down into digestible formats, which is key for us since we have so much data and need to know how to use it. They’ve helped make sense of a huge amount of information. From a consulting perspective, they’re a pleasure to work with. They set out objectives, follow up on them, meet the goals, and bill us accordingly. I get a lot of value from the relationship and have built a lot of trust in them as business partners. 

As a small business, the idea of using data analytics to enhance my business always sounded like something that would be extremely costly, and only something large corporations could do. Pontem makes it so that we can utilize the resources and information to the best of their ability. 

Their outsourced model is quite flexible, so it allows us to tailor the requirements and needs alongside our budget, which is a big part for us. We were able to tailor that spend to match their services, so we receive exceptional value for our dollar. 

Are there any areas they could improve?

There’s absolutely nothing they could do better for us. There’s nothing I would change and we’re going to continue working with them. 

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

Don’t hesitate. Every business should be working with them. There is value and skill that they can bring to every business. For small businesses, this is a great way to help companies scale and get value from their services without having to take on the full committed cost. I’d recommend everyone to work with them with no reservations. 

Please describe your company and your position there.

I am an director of the company and the Vice President of Sales and Projects. I oversee the bidding/estimating process and the project management of all our major projects.

For what projects/services did your company hire Pontem Innovations?

We hired Pontem to develop and interactive and up to date version of our KPI Scorecard.

What were your goals for this project?

We use a material tracking system for our production process as well as SharePoint for our estimating/bidding process. We released that we had over the year collected a lot of data but didn't have any great way to share this data or view this data in a effective way.

We wanted the data to be more interactive so that we could utilize it to make more informed decisions and set targets for our employees to help them measure both their own growth and our companies growth.

How did you select this vendor?

Pontem came recommended to us by our business coach. When we started this project we didn't have a very clear idea of how to would develop but Pontem clearly understood our values and our goals and was willing to work with us to create something that made sense for what we were looking for but also for the size of our company.

Describe the project in detail.

We started setting Key Performance Indicators that would help guide our business as we grew and help us make more informed decisions on the direction of the company. We had the data to track these Key Performance Indicators but we had no way to display them in an effective manner.

Moreover, as a medium sized business we didn't have the resources just to hire someone to be consistently collecting this data for us so we wanted something that would be more 'automatic.' Pontem suggestion that we could us PowerBI to mine our data and then display it in a 'Scorecard' format that would clearly and quickly show us if we were hitting our targets.

Moreover, if we wanted to, we could 'deep dive' into those specific targets and view our data over a certain period of time or within certain filters to get a real idea of what is going on within our business.

What was the team composition?

We met with Rick Dowel and Rick Feser, Rick Dowell handled more of the project management side of the project and Rick Feser worked on the development portion of the project.

Can you share any outcomes from the project that demonstrate progress or success?

The most significant outcome that came out of this project was that we realized that as a medium sized business we can still find affordable and useful ways to utilize the data we collect to help build our business.

So often we think that it's something that is out of reach or not affordable but Pontem made it possible. It also made us start thinking about the ways in which we can use data effectively and; more importantly, have important conversations about what data really matters and what data doesn't.

Lastly, it's given us a way to share the important data about our business with our employees to inspire them and make them aware about our growth and how we can all grow together.

How effective was the workflow between your team and theirs?

Workflow was very effective - they sent us weekly reports with tasks lists and responsibilities. We had frequent meetings about progress and they always sent minutes following those meetings. They were quick to respond to any questions and made sure to follow up with things when the ball was in our court.

What did you find most impressive about this company?

They actually listened our values and our goals and were able to create something that was actually useful to day to day operations of our business. There were also very aware of our budget and made sure our time wasn't wasted going down roads that lead to dead ends.

Are there any areas for improvement?

No. I really think they did an amazing job.