When you’re creating an app in a matter of weeks, you need to build an efficient platform, observe users and challenge the mindset of your customers. The Mobility team have successfully done it all.

They found their team of dedicated users at Equinor's storage facility in Ågotnes, Norway and could start working on the Please Inspect app. There, technical inspectors wanted an application that allowed them to complete maintenance checks and submit forms without having to be in front of a computer.

“By asking these questions the users have to think about their own tasks. This often results in them being more observant to processes in their workflow that can be optimized:"

Additionally, they would get a lot of “bonus finds”.

"Most of the equipment in storage wasn’t labelled optimally, there were no barcodes that would identify the items or bring up the maintenance history," Hermansen says.

"Even though this wasn’t part of what we were tasked to do initially, it was an issue that ended up being resolved by the business,” he adds.

While working on Please Inspect meant they had to figure out a way to have apps communicate with a variety of tech. Previously, the operators had to manually enter info into SAP from their desktop but they wanted to integrate SAP into the app, which meant taking necessary safety precautions.

Solving this issue proved to be a leap forward and upward for the platform, since SAP integration opens up a variety of doors for other business areas. Now, Microsoft Azure is a key component in the platform, as well as React Native and REST.

The simple and interactive prototype is the first step towards creating a “minimum viable product” – or MVP among friends. Where sports fans are no strangers to the term, it’s also a very important part of the Mobility platform method.

While in the world of sports the MVP is the “most valued player” throughout the game, Mobility’s MVP is more like one of the first players on the field: it’s the most basic version of the app.

Where the prototypes display a variety of functionality, that might not even make it to the final version, the MVP is a working application. It might be basic and have limited functionality but it’s still capable of delivering value to the business, and is an invaluable tool in the process.

The MVP lays the groundwork for the the team to get out on the field and work their magic.

The team conducts weekly meetings with the client when working on an app, where they receive updates and can give feedback on the work that’s being done. This ensures that the client stays in the loop on what’s been done – or will be done – and can maintain close contact with the team throughout the process.

Then, the client can bring issues or functionality they might want to the table and the team can get cracking on making it happen. This agile approach makes sure that stuff gets done and while the team has different areas of expertise, they all contribute when and where they might be needed. After all, two heads think better than one.

Contrary to a more traditional approach to the work, the Mobility team will deliver the MVP prototype very early on.

“While it’s easy to talk about this approach it can be challenging when it comes to delivering on it. Getting the client to accept that they’ll have their delivery in stages instead of all at once can be a difficult task," Hermansen says.

But once they see that the train hasn’t left the station - it’s just the first iteration and that more is on the way - clients are more open to it.

"And even more so when they see that the changes or functionality they need is being implemented. But it can be both a quite fun yet a little frustrating journey at times,” Hermansen laughs.

“All the different sites work in slightly different ways and we wanted to get a MVP working for one facility before showing it to others. Then, we could show the app to another facility, show them what we had already done and then ask if it could be a good fit for them.”

Some of the other facilities even changed the way they work in order to have the app work for them.

“They might not have done this if they were included in the project right off the bat. Even though it initially was a lot of work aimed at a small group of users it was worth it in the end. We constantly have a wider scope in mind but we always scale the work down in order to get the best results,” Hermansen says.

With Please Inspect they began to create an app for no more than 7-8 users and they purposefully “ignored” other similar sites during the initial process.