eCommerce Project Experience

June 10th, 2009

Following is detailed information regarding one of the eCommerce projects I have worked.

B2B Shopping Carts

I was involved in design, development, testing and deployment activities for several eCommerce websites for an industrial footwear business. Direct customers for the the footwear company were industrial and hospitality businesses, but the actual selection and purchasing of footwear through the sites was done by the employees of the businesses. The employees were able to “purchase” shoes from the website using a variety of payment methods including subsidy, payroll deduction, procurement card and personal credit card.

I was responsible for full SDLC activities for these websites, including, but not limited to the following:

  • Collecting and documenting Company and customer business rules
  • Identifying server-side system requirements, shopping cart functionality and integration requirements
  • Creating UI diagrams, ERD’s, data flow diagrams and data maps
  • Consulting with developers as needed to identify best approaches for implementation and integration
  • Creating and maintaining project task lists
  • Assigning tasks to developers.
  • Performing system functionality and data integrity testing throughout the project
  • Performing final testing prior to opening the site to the customer for pre-launch testing

Each website was unique in terms of approved styles and pricing. Other considerations included:

  • Security: Employee Level and Manager Level Sign-in
  • Payment Methods: Subsidy, Payroll Deduction, Procurement Card, Personal Credit Card (individually or in combination)

The requirements included a need for bi-directional transfer of data between shopping carts and Lehigh systems and between shopping carts and customer systems. Following are some examples of those feeds:

  • From Server: Updates to product data from main database
  • To Server: Product sales information
  • From Customer: Employee Information, including Subsidy eligibility and open balances
  • To Customer: Daily/Weekly/Monthly Employee Purchase Information

Each customer had different system requirements and technical capabilities. To accommodate those needs we created utilities to facilitate import and export of data in a variety of formats including .csv, tab-delimited and XML. We typically used FTP as our transfer method.

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Anatomy of a Failed Interview Process

June 9th, 2009

The interview process can be very frustrating for a job seeker for several reasons. One major reason is communication. Whether you’re working with a recruiter or directly with a potential employer there are so many things that can go wrong in a process that should be pretty straightforward and simple. Here’s a story related to me by a colleague on the job-hunt:

  • I applied for a position with a large company through a referral from a former colleague. I passed my resume to my colleague and she passed it on to the HR department. She received immediate feedback that my resume has been passed around the entire HR group. (This was good news, as she had heard nothing in response to several other resumes she had passed along.) We’ll call the job I was applying for “Position A.”

While the initial response was good, here’s how the rest of the processed panned out:

  • The company HR rep calls me about a week later and leaves me a voicemail indicating she would like to talk to me about Position A. I return her call within ten minutes, leaving her a voicemail indicating that I am, indeed, interested in speaking with her. It is a Friday afternoon. On Monday I send the HR rep an email expressing my regrets for missing her call the previous Friday and my hope that we can speak soon. A week later she still has not returned my call. I assume they have filled the position and move on.A few weeks later I get another voicemail from the same HR rep. I return her call, leaving her a voicemail. She returns my call, starting the conversation with, “Thank you for returning my call. I really appreciate it.” Hmmm.

    Position A is no longer open. Now we’re talking about Position B. A phone interview is requested. I accept. I will receive a call from the hiring manager at 2:30 p.m. on Tuesday. This is Friday. I ask the HR rep to forward me a copy of the job description prior to the phone interview so I can prepare.

    By Tuesday morning I have not received the job description. I email the HR rep. I also leave a voicemail for the HR rep. At 2:00 p.m. I receive a call from the hiring manager (not the scheduled time). I still have no job description.

    The hiring manager talks to me for about ten minutes. In answer to one of his questions I indicate that while I have not yet seen the job description for this position, it appears I am a good fit for it. He cuts the interview off telling me I will be contacted by the HR rep in another week or so. When I get off the call with the hiring manager I have a voicemail from the HR rep and an email. I now have the job description. Nice.

    I have a bad feeling about this. I’m pretty sure I won’t be hearing from anyone any time soon.

    Surprise! About three weeks later I get another call from the HR rep requesting to set up an on-site interview. I accept. We verbally agree that the interview will be Wednesday morning at 9:00 a.m. Within the hour I receive an email confirming our interview for Wednesday at 8:00 a.m.

    I respond to the email asking for a reconfirmation of the time, as I had understood the time to be 9:00 a.m. There are five business days until the interview.

    I’m sure you know what happened…no response.

    Tuesday morning I phone the HR rep, leaving her a voicemail. No response. Wednesday morning I show up at 8:00 a.m. The hiring manager is not in. The receptionist pulls up his calendar and confirms that the interview is in fact scheduled for 9:00 a.m. I return home and come back for the interview at 9:00.

    I interview with the hiring manager and his manager. The interview goes very well – thank goodness! I ask about the timing for their decision. They indicate they’ll continuing interviewing through the end of the week and make a decision the following week.

    The following Monday (decision week) I send an email to both of the managers which whom I had interviewed thanking them for taking the time to speak with me and letting them know I am very interested in the position. I state several positives for the company and how I feel I can contribute to the continued success of the company.

    Two weeks later…no response.

There clearly are some weaknesses in the process here, but is this an isolated incident or is this typical of most companies out there?

Post feedback or share a story of your own!

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The Value of Process Design

June 1st, 2009

In today’s economy, more than ever, customer retention is critical to the success and longevity of your business. A key component to customer retention is consistent, efficient service.

With vacations, downsizing, job sharing and any number of other factors affecting workforces these days, a well-documented, repeatable process is critical to your staff’s ability to stay on top of the details of each project.

Most organizations don’t want to waste their valuable time (and therefore money) creating processes. They feel the best plan of attack for any project is to use the “dig in and get it done” approach, or as Nike says, “Just do it!”

Unfortunately, this approach seldom works, and even if it does there’s a pretty good chance it won’t be repeated. Why?

  1. There is no organization to the process.

    2. When you “plan” as you go, you have a much greater chance of leaving out or neglecting some very important components of the project.

  2. There is no documentation of the process.

    3. Because the process has not been documented, consistency of process – and therefore outcome – on the next project cannot be guaranteed.

  3. There is no organization to the process. (Yes, I repeated myself)

    4. While it is important to document the steps required to complete a project successfully, it is also important to have supplies and templates available at the ready so that each step can be completed as efficiently as possible.

  4. No Resource Plan

    5. Unless you’re planning on running a one-man show, you’ll need to be able to identify the additional “players” in your plan and estimate time frames for their involvement.

A good process plan will provide a roadmap to success on every project.

You may be thinking…

  • We’re so short-handed as it is, how can we allocate resources for a project like this?
  • We’re so overwhelmed, how do we even start?
  • How do we measure the effectiveness of the processes we implement?
  • What tools are available to help define them?
  • How can we minimize resistance to the changes we’ll implement through this exercise?

The good news is, you don’t need to hire additional staff or a team of consultants to define your internal business processes. You can do much of the work yourself using some very simple tools. Yes, you will need to assign a resource or resources to work on the project, but it needn’t be a 100% time commitment for them, and, once the implementation is underway you’ll be amazed at how quickly you begin to see improvements in your overall productivity.

Stay tuned as we explore the (yes) process of creating a good, solid, repeatable process. In the meantime, I have some questions for you:

  1. Do you have effective internal processes?
  2. If so, what do you feel is the key to maintaining effectiveness of those processes?

Blessings!

Melody

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