Planon
Planon’s dominant international presence – more than 1,800 customers across 20 countries – makes us the partner of choice for both large multi-national organizations and for smaller, local businesses that benefit from the extensive best practices of the global Integrated Workplace Management Solution (IWMS) leader.
Our global roster of customers are committed to our vision, which is supported by over 25 years of experience. We have a single mission: To solve customers’ real world business challenges by providing them with robust software applications and expert business services.
Our IWMS solutions help customers, no matter what industry they operate in, save on operational costs, improve sustainability, and drive financial and business value by centralizing and automating real estate and facilities management operations. Planon helps customers manage all aspects of the project lifecycle including software procurement, design, and development through deployment, administration and training.
Founded in the Netherlands in 1984, Planon has offices in eight countries including the United States, the Netherlands, Belgium, France, Canada Germany, the United Kingdom and India.
More information on www.planonsoftware.com
Knowledge Intensive Offshoring
Making software products is a knowledge intensive process. Standard Software is in fact knowledge and expertise that is bundled in a product. Making software products is already complicated enough, but it becomes even more interesting if you want to do this offshore. That this is very well possible is proven by Planon and coMakeIT. In the managed facility of coMakeIT, Planon has software development teams that work seamlessly with the Dutch Planon development teams. The results are excellent, amongst other reasons because the principles that led to success in the Netherlands have been implemented likewise in the offshore situation. An example of how offshoring can be successful.
Software companies generally know very well how to make software. Their problem is often the scalability; how to significantly expand capacity. This is confirmed by Maarten Smeets, Vice President Software Development at Planon: "If we would continue to focus on the Dutch labor market, the growth of our business would come to a hold. We have therefore chosen to broaden our view and we have explored the potential of offshore outsourcing of development activities. We knew immediately that our special way of working, team-based and with the Scrum model, could mean a complicating factor. We wanted, in any event, to adhere to this flexible development method, especially because Planon is very successful with it."
The same is endorsed by Pierre Guelen, Founder and CEO of Planon: "The development of the software is our core business. Many outsourcers can be seen as contractors, but such a construction is not an option for us. We want to remain end responsible. In the selection process we have not opted for a specific country but for the way in which we could integrally work together with a partner. The choice was India with coMakeIT, a party that gave us the confidence of offering enough well qualified people quickly. Software developers who can work with Scrum and can make themselves known with the knowledge-intensive products of Planon." “Furthermore ", continued Guelen," the short lines of communication with coMakeIT and their transparent method of calculation is most satisfactory to us. In the first year of our cooperation in this model we successfully added 26 new developers to our organization. "
Smeets goes even deeper into the partnership: "We are not going to outsource just to save costs, but to keep playing a leading role when it comes to integrated workplace management. coMakeIT understands exactly what kind of people we need. They always make for an impressive number of suitable candidates, from which we may make the final selection. We have chosen to step by step split existing Dutch teams and combine them with coMakeIT people, starting with our best team. The aim was to train them on the job, to create unity and to draw on the already accumulated knowledge. Specifically, we wanted to have “cloned” the old team within 6 months, where it could achieve a combined output of 150 percent. It proved in practice that we reached this goal already after 3 months, and that productivity by now has been increased to 200%. "
By this unique way of working together, the usual problem of high attrition is fully under control. The people feel really connected to their colleagues and the products that are being developed.
Pierre Guelen concludes: "Now that the market for workplace management is becoming mature, it is important to continue to grow. The space is there and we have, partly due to the unique strength of our outsource partner coMakeIT created that capacity. We definitely plan to expand that success."
- Flexibility, move with the customer
- People fit is central
- Team focus and focus on team performance
- Product R & D organization knowledge
- Recognizable
- Offsite integral part of the organization