Large-scale IT Projects

Know-how of large-scale projects

More than 40 years in the market for software and IT has provided us with extensive experience and know-how in more than one way: plenty of in-house solutions and products covering the entire tourism life cycle.

But it's not just these solutions that make the company successful: by applying its experience, ISO can contribute to the software development process of large-scale projects with the customer. The company currently handles several large IT projects across various industries – some of them with teams of up to 25 employees and project durations of several years. Our customer include Thomas Cook, Thomas Cook Airlines, Hotelplan and DER Touristik.

One a major project in the tourism industry for example has been running for three years.

When we examined the tender, we could already see that this project was going to be very large – we are looking at several years and multiple teams. In the end, we were awarded the contract because we were best suited to meet the requirements of such large project.

Klaus Masson

ISO project manager

There are several decisive factors for completing large-scale IT projects successfully: an agile mindset, industry-specific domain knowledge, and up-to-date technology and process competence.
 

Agile Mindset

In such long and accordingly complex projects, an agile mindset is essential to cope with changing situations. “Tenders for major IT projects usually state only the goals – not how to achieve them,” says Masson. One must therefore be prepared to develop in distributed teams or change the project teams in the current process if, for example, the required technical skills in the project change.

If the skills required ad hoc cannot be found in the company's own ranks, the ISO-Gruppe has a proven expert among its enterprises – ISO Recruiting Consultants – who can quickly submit suitable profiles.

An agile mindset is based on extensive experience. One thing is quite clear, particularly in long-term projects: Change is the law!

Klaus Masson

ISO project manager

Even with experience, many unknowns still need to be mastered. Another process that needs to be learned is how to deploy large, distributed working teams sensibly. It is important that a number of things are ensures: that quality standards are met in various locations, that task packages meet the team makeup and that the communication is always good.
 

Domain knowledge

For more than 40 years, ISO Travel Solutions has been developing software solutions covering the entire tourism life cycle. This know-how and domain knowledge result from numerous implementations and the development of various systems (such as travel agency and reservation systems, a CRM, mobile solutions, interfaces, online portals) that support the sales of travel and tourism services.
 

Technology and process expertise

A further pillar of major IT projects is the technical level one must achieve in order to handle such projects as the sole service provider for software development.

We always develop the system so that we can also operate them.

Klaus Masson

ISO project manager

This requires corresponding experience and know-how in all roles and methods of modern software development.

“This includes drawing up the project's vision and objectives, staffing the team, managing the requirements, selecting the architecture and technology stack, implementing and testing, and finally operating the application with a high level of automation. In addition, topics such as product ownership, staff coaching and possibly short-term staffing to meet peak resource demands must be defined and handles”, says Masson.

About 610 employees, the ISO also has the staffing level to respond to such situations and cover every aspect of the entire software development process – from the initial idea to the actual development and subsequent productive operation.

Currently the longest time an employee of ISO has been involved in the same project for the customer is more than 6 years. And in another project, ISO has been operating and further developing a customer’s systems already for 15 years – from several sites.

ISO has similar experience with large-scale projects not only in the field of tourism but also in the industry and in public administration.