CASE STUDY
IT Staffing – Application Development
Client Details
Industry: Multiple/Diversified
Revenue: $20B+
# of Employees: +/- 15,000
Gravity Practice Area: IT Staffing – Custom Software Development
Project: Custom Trading Application Development Acceleration
Client Overview
Our client is a $20B+ F150 company with >10,000 employees delivering services across multiple industries within the United States.
Project Overview
Trading and Risk Management is a very important and profitable segment of our client’s business operations. The Enterprise Trading and Risk Management (ETRM) application handles all trading, compliance, reporting, and billing to run and support the trading business. Our client’s application development organization was executing a major update/modernization to their platform and needed to expand their Agile development team to execute. Gravity worked closely with the VP of IT and the Director of Trading & Risk System to review required development and enhancements to the ETRM application.
Business Problem & Objective
The ETRM IT application is used to support the trading business. Our client sells securities to other parties. Pricing these securities is a complex endeavor, as global economic forces are very fluid and supply and demand are constantly changing, affecting pricing on a minute by minute basis. The business is highly regulated, making compliance and reporting critical requirements. As a result, the ETRM application is a very complex application designed to account for and support the organizations critical trading business.
The ETRM application needed to be modernized to better support the trading operations, including enhanced integrations with back office accounting, tax, and compliance. Our client’s development teams were also in transition to the Scaled Agile Framework® (SAFe®), which would allow them to achieve the benefits of Lean-Agile software and systems development at scale. The Director, Trading & Risk Systems needed a variety of highly skilled resources (software engineers, business analysts, Agile coaches and Scrum Masters) fluent in Agile and SAFe methodologies to successfully complete the ETRM enhancement project.
Gravity IT Staffing – Custom Software Development
Gravity employed its IT Staffing Software Development Acceleration services capability to build the project team to execute the ETRM modernization program. Successful delivery of the trading platform modernization program required the following SME resources:
- Principal IT Programmer Analyst – Scala technology expertise
- Principal IT Programmer Analyst - Java technology expertise
- Senior IT Programmer Analyst – Java technology expertise
- Associate IT Programmer Analyst – Java technology expertise
- Principal Agile Coach
- Senior Scrum Master
- Associate Business Systems Analyst
Gravity used its “referral-driven” sourcing model and its recruiters aligned with (a) Software Development (b) Agile/PMO (c) Business Analysis skill sets to identify multiple, local resources to staff the project. Gravity then executed its 5-step vetting process to present the best consultants for the open positions.
Results
Under the direction of Director, Risk & Trading Applications, Gravity IT Staffing Application Acceleration resources successfully built out the team to execute the modernization project. Gravity was instrumental in filling a very strategic hybrid Scrum Master / Agile Coach on a project where there had been 3 different Scrum Masters in less than a year. Over 36 months, Gravity placed 15 resources on the ETRM development teams, including multiple Scala/C++/Maximo specialty resources. The Enterprise Trading Risk Management systems were successfully modernized and continue to support our client’s “best in class” trading operations.