Balanced Scorecard

1. Maintain margins

1.1. stronger review of scope and requirements

1.1.1. maybe have estimates done in two parts. initially just do a design review and then give an estimate for the development once we a better idea of what we are building

1.1.2. Break out discovery from ticket writing

1.2. Begin tracking actual impementation times in dev plans

2. Grow revenue

2.1. expand our drupal portfolio

2.2. rob bank downstairs

3. Align delivery processes to customer needs

3.1. Eff those guys

3.2. try adopting a better MVP approach. build just what is need to create a production viable website first

3.3. Setup out internal development environments to match the live setups, if they are using a distributed environment make sure that the internal dev envrionments are also setup that way to avoid issues

3.4. Ensure the entire team interacts with the customer - WHILE MINIMIZING MEETINGS, be targeted

4. Improve consistency of delivery

4.1. Integrate Dev planning into Jira

4.2. Set and use performance budgets on all projects

4.2.1. Identify the things/trends that will destroy our performance budget

4.3. better consistency with gulp tasks on projects, especially with CI

4.4. Internal Sitecore site, an example of our current recommended technology stack. Using re-usable components.

4.5. Use automated tools to ensure all deliveries meet our standards (testing, code guidelines, comments)

4.5.1. Use automated browser testing framework (Selenium / CodedUI)

4.5.1.1. Craft Feature issues from a behavioral driven development mindset to help drive expected and testable outcomes

4.5.2. Use KPI profiling as part of our CI build process. Think nightly performance profiling, with reports on deltas between builds

4.6. Developers should review tickets BEFORE they are submitted to client for approval. This would cut back on risk and over-promising

4.6.1. To piggy back on this, have the devs more involved with the initial definitions of tickets/features to avoid gaps and set reasonable expectations

4.6.2. Have SAs write tickets in a consistent manner and written in such a way any developer new to the project can complete the task

4.7. Invest in code review tools such as Fisheye/Crucible

5. Create reusable assets

5.1. Allow devs to pitch internal projects with possibility of being resourced if deemed valuable.

5.2. Add personalization functionality to the Reuse library

5.3. Invest in our modules, treat them as projects then sell "licenses" to clients as part of projects. Examples: Image Cropper, Velir Search

5.4. Identify gaps in reusable development accelerators, and build

5.5. Give more time to documentation and cleanup of internal libraries and code to make the integration process more consistent and easier

5.6. Create/improve documentation for reusable assets such as the Velir Search library

5.7. Internal Sitecore site, Keeping this up to date with examples of new components that can be re-used for project work. With documentation about how they're used.

5.8. Bring teams together to agree on architecture, because front-end is a moving target

5.9. Reusable libraries should go thru standalone QA. Currently, bugs for reusable libraries are only caught after they're integrated into projects

5.10. capture requirements for reusable libraries, to allow them to be tested later

5.11. hardcore plan around development, versioning and deployment of libraries to projects.

6. Forecast, recruit, and resource effectively

6.1. host meetups, for recruiting

6.2. Keep some % of resources available, or working on internal projects, so they can fill resourcing gaps without affecting other client work

6.3. For forecasting, keep better track of actual hours spent on previous similar projects. (knowledge management)

6.4. Track average time to build components and integration, feed that into future estimates

7. Invest in knowledge management

7.1. Internal Sitecore site, an example of our current recommended technology stack. and employee database. Employee and project pages will have taxonomy of technologies, projects, employees.

7.2. SAs should go thru training for the platform they're working with (attend Sitecore Training, Drupal Training, etc)

7.3. Create a knowledge data platform: Record all meetings, client calls. Use NLP (speech->text) to categorize & index all data

7.4. Establish a wiki with common development pitfalls /weird errors in Sitecore. Something searchable and editable so we can benefit from knowledge gathered on other projects. Emails not effective form of historical issues on the devs email list

7.5. document UI interactions, and client/server model inside JIRA tickets using plain english

7.6. Make it someone's job to organize all the info on the wiki, support.velir.com, project readme, etc into a single resource.

7.7. Treat these tasks like project tasks so that they do not constantly get trumped by project work

7.8. Move Wiki based resources to more secure support site things like resources and password information

7.9. Formalize component specs for front-end, i.e. atomic design component inventories. much easier to task out and estimate vs. pile o' designs

8. Develop and promote industry thought leaders

8.1. Create a blog post publication cycle with demands of each department

8.2. host meetups

8.3. contribute to open source / open source internal tech

8.4. Internal Development Group

8.5. maybe an interactive office map would help to find each other and rooms

8.6. Tie thought leadership goals to senior and principal roles

9. Increase number of services used by new/existing clients

9.1. Leverage AEM integration with other Adobe products, such as Marketing Cloud

9.2. Build tools/enhancements for clients in such a way that we can easily repackage and sell to other clients.

9.3. An Internal Development team can R&D or polish up client work to proof of concept offerings such as Mobile Apps or other offerings that could be added to our 'reusable assets'.

9.4. An Internal Development team can R&D or polish up client work to proof of concept offerings such as Mobile Apps or other offerings that could be added to our 'reusable assets'.

10. Strengthen the Velir Brand

10.1. Create new tech blog for quick dev posts.

10.2. Maybe a greater focus on Non-profit companies or industries that are of that nature (helping people)

10.3. Allow time for internal data visualization intiatives to showcase new technologies and increase awareness of Velir in the Data viz community

11. Expand service offerings

11.1. Automate website audits to the greatest extent possible. Use these tools on our own website builds

12. Retain existing accounts

12.1. Offer a discount on licenses if they sign up for support contract

12.2. Consider providing modules or upgrades of modules for free based on size or duration of account

13. Deliver a superior customer experience

13.1. Create a private area in Jira for Velir only comments

13.2. Polish the deliverables so things we present to clients always look good.

13.3. Develop websites with real content from the start of the project

13.4. Solve Design QA once and for all

13.5. Hit a 90% acceptance rate in UAT. Do not treat clients as a QA resource

14. Create a skill development and onboarding strategy

14.1. Create an in-house training class for new Sitecore developers that encompasses, Sitecore, Glass, and TDS to alleviate shadowing burden (Internal sitecore site I've added to other focus areas could be a training path of implementing our technology stack across all departments)

14.2. Design a protocol so developers are responding to email communications

14.3. Host some training for non-violent communication

15. Establish career progression pathways

15.1. Clear and centralized list of roles within the company, including expectations and prereqs

15.2. Allow more flexibility in roles with cross-discipline opportunities

16. Establish individual performance expectations

16.1. Establish "retros" even for Waterfall projects and evaluate estimates vs. actuals