Revamping the educational process management software
Challenge
Lack of in-house EdTech domain expertise and tight project development deadlines.
Solution
Modernization of the existing education platform using the most effective tools and frameworks.
Tech stack
ASP .Net Core, EF Core, MySQL, PostgreSQL, AWS, Okta, UI – Blazor Components.
Business vertical
EdTech
Client team size
5 specialists
Cooperation period
Ongoing since February 2021
Modsen resources
6 development engineers
Client
An established advertising firm with exclusive taxi in-car advertising contracts is Modsen’s longstanding client. They are focused on harnessing advanced technologies to enhance ad delivery, collect demographic insights, and create lucrative revenue opportunities for advertisers and taxi companies. As per the terms of the NDA, we are unable to disclose detailed client information.
Project Scope
The essence of the project our client was struggling with consisted in the need to modernize the education software, boost its performance, and add useful functionality to scale the app’s opportunities. To implement the mentioned changes, our partner integrated Modsen EdTech experts into their in-house team. It was essential for our client that the product would be improved according to the company's high tech and security standards.
The scope of tasks Modsen engineers were assigned encompassed:
- Integration of the solution with other company products.
- Reorganization of database structure.
- Integration of the product with Okta and other third-party services.
- Scaling and optimization of the app functionality.
- Research and development of logic for user interaction with various access groups.
- End-to-end product testing and bug fixing.
Cooperation process
Requirements clarification
Clear and detailed requirements set the foundation for successful collaboration and ensure that the augmentation team fully understands the project scope. To achieve that, our company CTO arranged 2 online meetings with the business owner and respective specialists well-informed about the essence of the project. During the calls, the client team communicated their specific needs, goals, and desired outcomes to the head of the remote education software development team. As soon as the key information was received, we immediately got down to the expert selection stage.
Selection of specialists
Hiring Modsen engineers for education platform development, the client mentioned that they were interested in senior-level experts enjoying 3+ years of relevant domain experience to avoid any risks during the project development process. Apart from that, our partner was looking for specialists whose fluency in German would be sufficient as the software platform itself was originally designed for a German online school. Going through the profiles of available developer engineers, the CTO identified the most suitable German-speaking professionals who could contribute their domain knowledge and innovative ideas to the project.
In-house testing
After the pre-selected specialists’ portfolios were approved by the client, we delved into rigorous in-house testing. As a matter of fact, operating a staff greenhouse company, Modsen team focuses on thorough testing, enhancement of code writing abilities, foreign language level boosting, and soft skills upgrading throughout the whole period of an engineer’s career at our company so that every expert that is incorporated into our partners’ projects are 100% ready to take on the challenge.
In-house testing, as a rule, finalizes the specialist selection process, however, our clients are also welcome to arrange extra competence verification checks but due to their time-consuming nature and the high professional standards of our company, such tests are almost always deemed unnecessary.
Onboarding
Once 6 education software development outstaffing specialists successfully passed the testing phase, they were integrated into the client`s team by providing them with access to necessary tools, software, and project documentation. The onboarding process at Modsen focuses on integrating the augmentation team smoothly into the client`s existing workflows, ensuring effective communication, and establishing a collaborative work environment. The total period of time that had passed since the collaboration request was received at Modsen amounted to 10 days.
Project execution
Collaborative approach
At Modsen we understand that a collaborative approach is crucial for the augmentation specialists to seamlessly integrate with the client’s in-house team. It enables effective communication, promotes leveraging of each other`s strengths, and fosters a cohesive work environment. To ensure that, Modsen experts interacted with the rest of the team via our partner’s communication channel Slack to participate in daily, weekly, and retrospective calls, and to constantly keep in touch with the partner while working toward a common goal.
Domain expertise
Delving into education software development, our dedicated team of EdTech engineers was ready to share valuable insights into industry trends, best practices, and user requirements. Their competencies helped streamline the development process and ensured that the software was relevant, functional, and aligned with the latest industry standards.
Flexibility
One of many benefits Modsen IT staff augmentation services can can boast is the agility and adaptability of our crew. Having strengthened dozens of in-house teams, we learned how to quickly adjust to changing priorities, accommodate new features or functionalities, and align our work with the team's workflow. The extensive experience and dedication to helping our partners achieve their business goals allowed us to seamlessly incorporate into the client’s team causing zero disruptions and boosting the project’s dynamics. Modsen augmentation team also managed to copy the style of code and technical documentation writing, accepted by the partner company specialists.
Scalability
During the initial phase of the education platform development, the client decided to welcome 4 Modsen EdTech experts but as the process was unrolling, it became clear that another 2 .NET specialists were urgently needed. The ability to immediately scale up the project team allowed for efficient workload management and timely completion of its milestones. Scalability enabled our joint team to meet increasing demands, handle new challenges, and adapt to evolving project scopes.
Versatility
One of the requirements our partner put forward before hiring Modsen coding aces was their versatility. Universal coders with broader tech stack and domain experience are highly sought-after as hiring such specialists appears to be more effective. At Modsen, we are focusing on raising full-stack developers able to solve a wide range of challenges and significantly contribute to bridging expertise gaps for a variety of business verticals.
Monitoring
Finding skilled high-performing engineers for education platform development was half of the challenge - the other half consisted in ensuring that team augmentation processes within their company are arranged properly. Accurate systematic monitoring is a vital part of Modsen’s in-house augmentation service which is performed through our internal employee management system. Apart from that, company managers closely supervise each engineer engaged in team augmentation trying to indicate any signs of nearing burnout or other potential performance-dropping events.
Reporting
To keep the client informed about the project`s progress, our team generated weekly and monthly reports which included updates on tasks completed, milestones achieved, and any issues or concerns that arise. Regular reporting ensured transparency, facilitated communication between the client and the augmented team and allowed for informed decision-making. It also provided insights into project status, and resource utilization, and helped the client track the return on investment in staff augmentation.
Result
Within a relatively short period of time, our joint extended team managed to finalize the project, reaching 100% KPIs. Summing up the outcomes, the client highlighted the profound tech expertise level of Modsen team of engineers as well as their outstanding communicative skills and effective code-writing practices. Our partner also identified the key facets the augmentation team brought into the project:
- Creation of highly efficient tools for receiving and processing queries from third-party systems – .Net TPL, .Net TAP, AWSSDK.
- Modification of the main entities and connections in databases using core methods of database normalization – EF Core, PostgreSQL.
- Development of a single authorization and data delivery tool for the app – OktaSDK, Amazon Lambda.
- Modification of microservices and scaling of their logic.
- Development of intuitive interfaces for the administration of users of different access groups – Blazor Components, ASP .Net Core.
- Development of module and integrative test scenarios for testing isolated software components and assessment of the apps components at a broader level – NUnit, Moq.
- Elaboration of the database scheme with observance of the appropriate standards.
- Building the user administration interface with the ability to provide each user with a particular set of access rights.
- Development of a single authorization area that allows you to access an app via your own IDP or using third-parties.
Hiring offshore Modsen engineers for education platform development resulted in a streamlined, effective, and issue-free app-building process, augmented with the years-long EdTech experience of our skilled coding enthusiasts.
100%
EdTech expertise gap bridging
53%
More streamlined project development process
+10
Custom deas for the product efficiency boosting