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Children’s Miracle Network Hospitals Expedites Project Management Success with Isos Technology Managed Services
170
children's hospitals
$9B
dollars raised
38M
patient visits
Project Snapshot
- CMN Hospitals participated in Isos Technology’s Fast Track program: after a discovery process, Isos developed plans to maximize tool use and align it to long-term goals.
- The initial engagement was extended to include ongoing managed services support and implementation of the recommendations made during the Fast Track evaluation.
- Isos Technology streamlined software development processes; implemented new workflows, templates, and permission schemes; and standardized how scrum boards are used.
- Newly implemented processes have reduced friction, enhanced collaboration, improved transparency and visibility, and improved efficiency, scalability, and extensibility
Case Study
Children’s Miracle Network Hospitals® raises funds for 170 children’s hospitals that support the health of 10 million kids each year across the U.S. and Canada. Donations go to local hospitals to fund critical life-saving treatments and healthcare services, along with innovative research, vital pediatric medical equipment, child life services that put kids’ and families’ minds at ease during difficult hospital stays and financial assistance for families who could not otherwise afford these health services. When we improve the health of all children and allow them the opportunity to reach their full potential, we also improve our communities for years to come. Together, we can change kids’ health. Together, we can change the future. Visit cmnhospitals.org.
Challenge
CMN Hospitals had been using Atlassian’s Jira Software and Confluence tools to support their software development projects for several years. While they have skilled technical team members on staff, they do not necessarily have specific expertise in Atlassian tools. In order to change or scale their use of the tools, team members had to learn on the job. And while they were adept at figuring things out, it wasn’t an efficient use of their time.
Over time, the software development team incurred technical debt—decisions they made to meet shortterm objectives didn’t always meet their long-term goals. This resulted in time-consuming rebuilds and prevented them from scaling efficiently. The organization also had a vision for how Jira could be used to manage all their non-technical programs and projects, including fundraising campaigns. However, before pursuing this route, they first needed to get their tools working more efficiently for their technical projects.
On a day-to-day basis, the lack of centralized administration and governance meant teams were working in different ways. Scrum team leaders each had their own boards, structured to meet their individual needs. It was hard to get a clear view of their backlog or make changes to it without impacting another team’s backlog, and even harder to report on the status of work being done across the organization.
Solution
CMN Hospitals found Isos Technology through Atlassian’s online partner directory, where Isos is featured as a Platinum and Enterprise Solution Partner. They were drawn to Isos’ Fast Track offering, which consists of a thorough discovery process to understand organizational goals, a plan for maximizing the tool in a short period of time, and a roadmap for aligning tool use to long-term goals. This part of the engagement went so smoothly—attributed in part to excellent communication by both vendor and client—that CMN Hospitals chose to extend the engagement by contracting with Isos for Atlassian managed services.
The first order of business was to address one of CMN Hospitals most pressing challenges: to streamline software development processes, making them more efficient, scalable, and repeatable. They also needed to implement new project workflows, permission schemes, and issue templates that worked for all technical teams across the company. And they wanted to implement a consistent methodology for how scrum boards were used.
As a result of the process changes that Isos helped implement, each scrum team leader now has greater visibility into their backlog and can therefore be more accountable for it. They can also more easily work in it and make changes without impacting other teams’ backlogs. The new structure supports collaboration among teams, reduces friction, and increases visibility—it’s now much easier to report on the status of individual projects, as well as the status of work being done across the organization.
The two teams continue to engage using a highly collaborative process. The CMN Hospitals team often brings ideas to the table, and the Isos team provides ongoing training, recommendations, and tactical support for accomplishing their goals. There is additional training along the way—with Isos coaching on how to take advantage of tool functionality to further standardize processes. Currently, the internal and external teams share admin responsibilities, with Isos spending about 30% of their time on admin tasks and dedicating the balance to aligning the tools to support the organization’s roadmap—including developing a proof of concept for using them for non-technical projects.
Results
Streamlined processes: By streamlining and standardizing processes, there is reduced friction: work gets done faster, more efficiently, and with greater accuracy. Scrum team leaders can more effectively manage their backlog, which saves them time and results in greater accountability.
Increased transparency and visibility: With the backlog working as it should, teams have better visibility into their work and how it fits into the bigger picture. Reporting is easier, and management has improved insight into the status of work being done across the organization.
Enhanced governance: With standardization of processes, workflows, templates, and permission schemes, all teams are now working in a consistent manner across the company. This makes it easier for teams to engage with one another and work together more collaboratively to further organizational goals.
Improved scalability and extensibility: Now that the tools have been optimized, it is easier and faster to scale processes—without painful, time-consuming re-work. The organization now has a strong foundation on which to build as they extend their processes and tool use to include the management of non-technical programs and projects.
The Isos Technology team listened to our concerns and saw our situation through our eyes: they functioned as true team members. I’ve worked with quite a few external vendors and Isos’ ability to put themselves in our shoes is really something unique to them.
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