How Red Squirrel replaced a third-party legacy system with a fully-owned custom solution
Greenfield Product Development
A leading healthcare technology software company needed to replace a third-party legacy system with a fully-owned custom web application. Red Squirrel completed the discovery, build, and maintenance phases of the project. Like other software development firms, Squirrels execute complex technical tasks and HIPAA compliance, but also are human-centered and remarkably easy to work with. With the new system in place, the client gained full control over their tools, leading to greater flexibility and tailored functionality.
TL:DR
the client provides software tools, such as incident tracking systems, to health care organizations. For years, they had relied on a third-party legacy system to provide flexible solutions to their customers. However, as their business grew it came to the point where their existing software system would no longer cut it. To gain more control over their systems and reduce their reliance on a third-party system, they hired Red Squirrel to develop a better-suited custom software system.
About the Client
The goal was to replace the existing third-party software with a comprehensive, scalable, and fully-owned custom software solution. As the client grew, they felt the pain points of relying on a legacy system, including lack of scalability and dependency on the third-party vendor for updates and features.
During the discovery phase of the project, we dove deeply into their business problems, their customers, and their internal organization. Red Squirrel thrives in projects with a lot of unknown unknowns as we build trust through transparency, authenticity, and proactive communication.
There are many ways to overcome the inherent complexities involved with software development projects, especially big rewrites. A firm could lean toward more accurate estimates, requiring a deeper and more costly analysis phase in order to be able to start the project with greater clarity about costs. A firm could expand estimates dramatically and then quote the project at a fixed cost to the client. Those approaches don’t fit with Red Squirrel’s values. What fits for us is showing up authentically, being vulnerable in the process, bringing a ton of empathy to each other and our stakeholders, and finally, celebrating the journey along the way.
The Challenge
Our solutions
Once we completed the discovery phase, our Senior Engineer kicked off the software development phase of the project. He got right to work on some of the core data models and user flows. This engineer is good at many things, and one of them is attention to detail. His diligent approach to software development, deeply understanding requirements, and ensuring software is developed robustly, became quickly apparent to everyone involved with the project. In short, he established himself as a trusted team member through his high standards and consistent effort to understand what the client needed.
We built a modern, HIPAA-compliant web application. In choosing our recommended tech stack and approach, we optimized for rapid application development and chose the most productive tooling. We created a Ruby on Rails back end, a HIPAA-compliant version of Heroku for hosting, and a Postgres database. The client also told us that reporting was a priority for their customers, which meant we needed a solid reporting engine. We integrated Metabase for data visualization and reporting.
One of the biggest challenges of the new application was that it needed to be incredibly flexible. One of the client’s goals was to give their customers the ability to create their own custom forms but also custom workflows, and then build reporting on top of it all. We made a form builder that allowed users to create those custom forms and custom workflows in a highly dynamic system, with the needed reporting capabilities. The customization has been well-received by clients.
Red Squirrel engineers supported the implementation of UI/UX design work done by a third-party design firm. While we can provide those services as well, Squirrels can also seamlessly integrate with other firms you know and trust.
Results
Supported the hire of an internal team – After the creation of the MVP, the client decided to hire their own internal engineering team. Instead of seeing this as a threat to our business, we saw it as an opportunity to provide support and value to a client. We provided consulting and advising services throughout their hiring process.
Then our Senior Engineer realized he really wanted to stick with this system full-time and watch it grow and evolve in the coming years. He felt the right move for his career was to do that as a full-fledged client-side team leader rather than as a Senior Engineer at Red Squirrel. There are no “finder fees” for this sort of thing, just a heartfelt “good-bye and see you later” with the Squirrel, and a smooth transition with the client.
Enhanced control and functionality – The successful transition from a third-party software system to a fully-owned custom solution empowered the client to operate with greater flexibility, efficiency, and control. The client gained full ownership and control over their software system, reducing dependency on external vendors. The new solution was aligned with the company's unique processes, enabling a better customer experience.
Ongoing maintenance – Even after building their internal team, the client kept Squirrels on the system for another year to provide support and maintenance. Our clients can choose to bring all maintenance in-house or continue to use Red Squirrel as needed.