Technical Mentoring - an example
Below is an example of a typical technical mentoring solution where the value of what is delivered is a lot more than just another piece of software.
The problem
A bank had a team who were responsible for maintaining property information about their branches. The data held on each branch included physical details, services offered, opening times, number of ATMs , rents payable etc. Top level monthly financial data associated with each branch, such as amount of money taken from each ATM, money received over the counter, money distributed over the counter were also recorded. Each branch belonged in a three deep hierarchy: branches belonged to regions and regions belonged to areas.
The team in question had an existing application (based on MS Access) which had been built for them a few years ago. The application had been written in an unmaintainable fashion, with an extremely poor database design and coupled with the Access programming know-how required, the team was at a loss when it wanted to make changes. In addition, due to the bad database structure, the process of importing new monthly financial data (even when done directly in the database) was complex, error prone and time consuming.
The solution
Was it time for a new application? It was easy to suggest that indeed this was the solution to all their problems and hence another bespoke application development project could be started. However, on careful inspection of their needs, it was obvious that the flexibility they required for future changes, additions and reporting would have made quite a complex piece of software and certainly would have cost a lot more than their available budget.
The alternative was to help them build their own software solution, technically guided and with some initial kick-start coding such that they not only had a software solution that did what they wanted, but they understood enough about it to make the typical changes needed in the future. Should they have come across problems, their Technical Mentor was (and still is) just a phone call away. The cost was much less than even getting a simple finished application developed. (Although there was some cost element coming from the time the team needed to dedicate to project, this was outweighed by the benefits of knowledge transfer, staff development and motivation.)
In this example, the Technical Mentors examined all the requirements, including the requirement that it must be written around MS Access as they simply did not have the time, resource or budget to put the database on a more ‘corporate’ platform such as SQL Server. Having done this they designed and implemented the database, which was then quickly followed by a couple of days training the staff in the basics of database design and using their new database as the basis for a lot of worked examples. The team then continued to explore and practice whilst the Mentors got on with the next bit, although they were always on hand to offer support, guidance and pass on experience.
The user interface required was not very complex, but needed a lot of flexibility so they could make changes, design new reports, display new fields and perform various aggregations. It was decided that as they were all very familiar with Excel, it could be best to make use of it for their front-end. The Technical Mentors developed a basic workbook that included some simple controls to pick areas, regions, branches and dates, which could be placed on each new screen (tab) in their application. They developed a worksheet (hidden to end users) that took the parameters from these controls and combined them with additional information in the workbook (e.g. query name, location where data should be written, transposition rules). This served as a basis for all data retrieval from the database in to the application screens. Now any new screen in the software application was simply a matter of adding a few bits of data in the data retrieval worksheet, and then formatting the output in the appropriate worksheet - something the team was very familiar with. The Technical Mentors did some additional training on how to use the basic application, some extra SQL training and documentation of the template worksheet code.
The Technical Mentors built one of the required screens for the team as an example on which they could then base their work, and helped the team build the next couple of screens. After that, the team built the remaining screens themselves. An additional day of on-site training was given to help them with some more complex SQL queries, and after that the Mentors were available for advice, support and guidance as the team continued to develop the application to respond to their ever changing business needs.
Long term…
Having recently caught up with the team, it was good to hear that the application is in regular daily use, and the concepts learnt are being put in to play in other tools and applications. So pleased are they with the solution that other teams in the business are now using the same concepts and principles. These are the real long term business benefits to this type of solution - a consultancy solution which Colrosa can help you deliver successfully. The key is to spot and use the talent already available and make best use of it now and in the future.
Back to Technical Mentoring overview.
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