Intranote

The Danish it-company Intranote was established in 2001 and employs more than 50 people. Intranote develops software used for knowledge sharing in private companies aswell as public institutions. Intranote began outsourcing to Ukraine in 2005 and has currently 22 employees in Kiev.

Contact	Bent C. Kjeldsen, Development Manager
Website	www.intranote.dk
Head Office	Copenhagen, Denmark
Service Type	IT Consulting, Own Development Center / Team
Team Size	22 IT specialists
Technologies	ASP.NET, Asp.Net-Webservices, SQL-Server-2005, Visual-Basic-(VB-.NET), XML

Ciklum Consulting for Intranote A/S: Using Comparative Agility Measurement System and Scrum Training to Improve Efficiency and Response Speed

IntraNote A/S have been working with Ciklum for a number of years and as part of their continued interaction a Comparative Agility Measurement System (CAMS) analysis was recommended as part of the regular monitoring checks for Ciklum clients.

The CAMS analysis managed to pinpoint a number of areas for improvement, and most specifically it identified that Scrum methodology was needed to be implemented as current practices had started to generate confusion in the development process. In addition, team collaboration was being impacted by the amount of documentation being produced. The workload for the Product/Project manager also needed to be balanced. The team needed a better process for dealing with emergencies and needed to appreciate how these can be integrated with Scrum.

IntraNote A/S were actively seeking training in Scrum methodology to consolidate the approach with the option to train in Denmark, Ukraine or an alternative country but factoring in the whole team. The recommendation proposed by Ciklum was to proceed with training in the Ukraine based on the cost advantage and the very impressive and highly recommended profile of the Ciklum trainer. The two days training was completed with the entire onshore and nearshore teams together, focusing on:

Agile philosophy

Scrum methodology in detail

Collaborative team work

Estimation and Planning

Requirements handling in Agile way with User Stories

Results of the training achieved:

IntraNote A/S increased productivity from the first sprint dramatically as it became very easy to overview and plan the most critical parts of its 3 month release.

The introduction of 2 week focused sprints gave visibility of achievable release goals enabling “Just- in-Time” decision making and reducing delays by focusing on critical tasks.

The creation of task boards per location synchronized via Skype increased team collaboration on tasks and full team collaboration towards the sprint plan.

The results above helped ensure self-organized teamwork from the very first day of implementation

In conclusion, the Scrum training performed by Ciklum was an invaluable experience that has helped to improve efficiency and speed of response amongst IntraNote A/S’s staff.

Thomas Kjærulff Knudsen
Manager of Development, Intranote A/S

Reference date: October 2011

Outsourcing Without Travelling

Thanks to firm cooperation with Ciklums human resource department, Intranote managed to set up an entire outsourcing department in Kiev without having to go there physically. Instead Intranote spend their energy training the new employees in Denmark.

When Intranote established an outsourcing team in Kiev in 2005 it was done without visiting Ukraine . Thanks to thorough preparations and firm cooperation with Ciklum's professional human resource department, Intranote was able to deal with the challenges of setting up an entire development team in Ukraine.

"Actually we didn't go there at all," says B us iness Manager at Intranote, Bent C. Kjeldsen. "Instead we had our new employees in Denmark for training. That meant that Ciklum took care of the entire recruitment process and everything that lies behind such a project."

Ciklum plays a very important role in the start-up phase, explains Bent C. Kjeldsen, who found that finding the first person together with Ciklum was the most important task. That person is now the leader of Intranote's team in Kiev , and he has played a major role in building up the rest of the team and choosing between the candidates, that Ciklum's human resource department found.

"It went very well, and Ciklum has done a fantastic job evaluating the candidates," says Bent C. Kjeldsen.

From relying almost entirely on Ciklum's human resource department in the beginning, the team is now up and running, and Intranote has relatively little communication with the Ciklum administration.

Now Intranote representatives travel to Kiev to evaluate once every three months, while the everyday communication is done by e-mail or phone.

"This is possible beca us e Ciklum have the entire organization in place. Not only the human resource department, but a an established system which takes care of even the smallest things that is needed to run an organization like that. They handle all the things you normally would have to take care of," says Bent C. Kjeldsen.

"For us outsourcing has been at good way to get new resources fast."

Intranote plans to expand their team in Kiev to between 10 and 15 within three years.

Reference date: January 2007

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