”Yes, back when we started, we were a bit concerned at the thought of outsourcing as far away as Pakistan. We were concerned about the difficulties in language, culture and communication. We knew that situations could arise where we had to get things done very fast.”

This statement from a TEO customer largely covers the considerations many Danish managers have in general when thinking about global software outsourcing. This is why TEO is taking care of many other factors besides just providing the right team with the right competencies for the project.

Our goal is to maximize quality and performance while saving costs. All three factors. Processes, communication and integrated systems must be designed with both the distributed team environment, the project itself and the collaboration between company and national cultures in mind. Our development process is optimized towards smaller and mid-size Danish organizations. It builds upon known work processes from the IT industry and known tools.

Usually, the collaboration between the customer and TEO takes its start from the initial meeting where TEO explains about the opportunities in international software outsourcing. Secondly, the customer shortlists a project as the first assignment. In the second meeting, the scope and competencies required for the project are discussed.

When the parties have discussed the collaboration details and signed an agreement, the infrastructure and key persons are allocated. TEO presents a Software Development Plan (with milestones, interfaces, success factors, responsibilities etc), and when agreed upon, the preparations are started for kickoff.

One project manager from the customer, and one from TEO, are allocated as soon as possible. Meetings now start taking place between the customer’s project manager and architect, and TEO's project manager and technical team lead. The onsite TEO Project Controller leads all meetings, send out decisions from meetings and ensures all deliveries regardless of whether they have to come from TEO or the customer.

"We have to be 100% sure about our requirements before we can start the project."

Many software development companies will tell you to state your requirements in detail before any activity can take place.

At TEO, we prefer instead to start our work based on a high level requirements specification and a clear project vision. Documented requirements are a means for planning and setting a shared vision. It is very unusual to find set-in-stone requirements or 100% clear requirements. In real life, requirements evolve with development and by sharing visual models with end users.

The first job for the TEO team is to detail the requirements, and more importantly, to know about your vision. After understanding the purpose and goals of the application, the project backlog is drafted and the log of the first sprint is discussed in detail. The process then proceeds with the formal kickoff. It is during kickoff (1-2 weeks) that the first small chunk of code is designed and reviewed together.

In brief, we control quality by open review sessions. No matter how thick and detailed the coding and design guidelines are, a combined review of code and design by both your team and our team is better. It is also by these reviews that your organization knows exactly how the code and logic of the application works. A major benefit of these reviews is that the application design and implementation is known within your organization. These reviews are frequent in the first sprints as the mutual trust has to be built and knowledge has to be transferred.

Request more information about how TEO ensures Quality, Performance and Communication.