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  • Project Context

The project of customization a French solution for Brazilian and Chilean Financial Market in Asset Management customers was done in 2013/2014, and the main challenges were the team in different continents, the local financial market with many particularities and time pressure for the ROI.

The team was distributed in 3 continents including the cities of New York, Paris, Cape Town, Sao Paulo and Santiago with the activities of Functional analysis, Product management, Systems development, Project management and Account management.

In the project were considered the local laws with diverse requests and some different rules and process of each company, as well as instruments with different characteristics, example for Certificate of Deposits of 64 days.

The high pressure for results generated by top management of both companies (customer and vendor), on way to guarantee the ROI – Return of Investments for both sides in period not too long.

  • Real challenges

The main project issues were the time of project and scope for many different adjustments in the tool solution, as well as the resources based in different time zones, generating a big challenge about the communication process to guarantee the alignment of all participants.

The project time was initially based in the analysis of other similar Europe projects not considering the reality of South-America projects, so it was generated a high expectation that the project will be done in few months.

Based on the different rules and processes and local laws defined as scope for this project, it was requested some adjustments with many differences about size and complexity, also demanding some alternative approaches in the French solution.

The different time zones of each participant were an important reality in this project, so it was necessary to organize the communication plan to support differences of more than 6 hours, as well as, that the result of some activities was done only in the next day.

  • Approach applied

An experienced Project Manager was defined to align the project plan including regularly meetings, as well as identification of main deliveries and clear milestones for the project.

The previous experience of project manager with initiatives like this was essential, as well as, his fluency in all languages involved in the project (English, Portuguese and Spanish), in order to facilitate communication and alignment of all participants and other stakeholders of the project.

For this project, it was aligned a control process using Weekly Status Meetings and Monthly Steering / Management Committee. Furthermore, it was defined the tools for control of development activities (JIRA and Bamboo), as well as the MS Project solution for timeline control.

The scope definition was aligned in the first phase of the project, creating clear milestones: 1) Project plan; 2) Environment preparation; 3) Tool “tropicalization” (changes to adapt for local environment); 4) Development of special enhancements and 5) Production Go live.

  • Achievements / Results

Almost 45 types of financial instruments was aligned, including the specification of the main important items, it was defined over 25 interfaces for all communication between the French solution and legacy systems of the customers, generating a project of almost 2 million euros.

The financial instruments considered in the project including all types of FI – Fixed Income (Money Market and Bonds offered by Public and Private sectors), Equities (including Options), FoF – Fund of Funds, Derivatives and Swaps.

It was necessary to be created more than 25 interfaces, including basic items as Issuers, Sectors and Brokers as well as complex datasets as Instruments, Corporate Actions, Positions and Transactions.

The budget of the project was of almost 2 million euros, considering the Hardware, Software Licenses costs, IT development and Consulting Services.

  • Lessons learned

Detailed below some of them:

  • Importance of communication plan and frequently alignment with all stakeholders.
    • The vital approach of maintain the good flow of communication with all project participants and stakeholders, using the status report and meetings to share the project evolution as well as analyze and take the action based in issues and risks.
  • Respect for cultural differences including the solving process for identified issues and conflicts.
    • Important to understand the cultural of the critical participants and stakeholders, on way to manage the expectations and attitudes, as well as the behavior of each of them to make a smart and efficient use of resources.
  • Critical Compromise / Accountability of all team managers to maintain the priorities and focus on the project.
    • Efficiently use of the meetings to involve the top management when necessary to guarantee the project support, solving the issues that appear in the project, as well as to align the project rhythm in comparison with the expectations.