Fourth brings innovation to its customers faster with CA Agile Central
An appetite for new features
From local bars to global hotel chains, Fourth has been helping the hospitality industry control costs and optimise profits with its cloud-based business management solutions since 2001.
To help its customers deliver winning hospitality experiences as the industry evolves, Fourth needs to provide cutting-edge features and capabilities ahead of the curve. And that means continuous innovation.
“We had to double the size of our development teams to keep up with demand,” says Christian Berthelsen, Chief Technology Officer at Fourth. “With CA Agile Central and SAFe (Scaled Agile Framework), we can ensure that we’re all working consistently and efficiently towards the same strategic goals.”
A smarter way of working
Fourth is a growing, multi-national business with offices across Europe, the US and the Middle East. Its software-as-a service solutions range from customer experience and demand management to payroll and workforce planning.
Keeping these solutions up to date with new functionality is key to the company’s competitive advantage. “As our customers pay for our solutions on a rolling basis, we’re continuously updating them to reflect changes in the industry and new trends,” explains Berthelsen.
As well as growing its development teams, Fourth needed to ensure developers and their stakeholders were able to work together effectively, even when based in diverse locations. “Our teams were working very much in siloes, which made information sharing difficult,” comments Carly Hodges, Head of Agile Portfolio Office at Fourth. “We were struggling to get a holistic picture of demand, and what we were delivering to our business stakeholders and when.”
To bring developers and their stakeholders together, Fourth adopted CA Agile Central and introduced SAFe as part of an agile transformation. “CA Agile Central is the foundation underpinning our agile processes,” explains Sue Bramhall, Organisational Agile Coach at Fourth. “It’s the central repository for all development data, and everyone can access it – from architects and developers to product owners and business stakeholders. Now everyone knows what everyone else is doing: there’s no hidden agenda, and we can adapt very quickly to keep going in the right direction.”
Improving predictability and control
This transparency materially improves predictability, enabling product owners to provide stakeholders and customers with accurate updates and set expectations.
Increased visibility also means that everyone can now be involved in the decision-making process. “With a strategic view of activities and how they align to business needs, development teams can prioritise more effectively and managers can make data-driven decisions,” explains Hodges.
With CA Agile Central, Fourth and its development teams are bringing customers exciting new features and capabilities faster than ever before. “Adopting agile has given us the predictability and control we need to keep our business stakeholders and customers happy, and to keep us innovating faster as we grow,” concluded Berthelsen.
Adopting agile has given us the predictability and control we need to keep our business stakeholders and customers happy.
Carly Hodges | Head of Agile Portfolio Office, Fourth
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