Software reaches all realms of business, including the oil and gas industry, so it is important to find a strong oil and gas software development partner. However, searching for a software development partner can take months. Even then, you may not be satisfied with your candidates after weeks of searching. Considering how important reliable software can be for business, we have put together a short guide to help you efficiently identify the best oil and gas software development partners, so you can spend less time recruiting and be happy with the results.
Step 1: Identify Your Business Needs
The first thing to do when choosing a software development group to partner with is to determine exactly what your business needs are. Identify what your expectations are for a partner before you even start looking for one; what needs to be done, the breakdown of responsibilities, how you expect to collaborate, and your project goals should be clear. Then, you have something to compare candidates against. This will allow you to weed out groups that won’t be able to meet your needs much earlier in the process, saving you time and energy.
Step 2: Look For Experience
When identifying potential oil and gas software development partners, start your search with those with lots of experience. Typically, companies will list when they were founded on their websites, but it is not only about how long they have been in business. It’s important to consider the type of work they do and to see testimonials about the quality of their work.
Experience in Oil and Gas Software Development
Any provider you consider as a potential development partner should have considerable experience in the oil and gas industry. There are a lot of intricacies in this industry that are not always easy for outsiders to pick up or understand. People with experience in this field will not need to be taught or guided through these nuances, they should already know them.
Customer Testimonials
It’s important to look past how the company speaks about themselves and learn about what their customer think. Testimonials and case studies can provide insight into the type of work that was done, how it was done, and how satisfactory the product was. Quotes from past clients can reveal how well the companies collaborated and the type of relationship that you might have with a potential development partner. If you struggle to find customer testimonials from a candidate, it may be a bad sign that they don’t have many happy customers.
Step 3: Ask About Their Development Process
Once you have identified experienced candidates, you should learn more about how they go about developing software for the oil and gas industry. Think beyond the end-product and ask them how they would create it. The best candidates will take advantage of continuous testing and monitoring to ensure the best-quality product throughout the entire development process.
Continuous Testing
Testing applications is, of course, an important step in the software development process, but top developers recognize that it is not just one step to be taken at the end but incorporated throughout the whole development process. If your candidate company makes extensive use of continuous testing, taking advantage of automation and artificial intelligence, you can expect that by the time you get the product it is already high caliber.
Data-Driven Reporting
In order for you to make the best business decisions, you need to have data to back them up. Make sure any provider you consider takes advantage of continuous monitoring and can deliver useful and timely reporting on the project. Using DevOps metrics to monitor their development process ensures that you have full transparency to the development process and data to make concrete and useful projections.
Making a Decision
Finding the right oil and gas software development partner can be difficult, but if you take some of these suggestions into account, you should be able to find a partner you will trust. At Calavista, we take pride in our experience in many different industries, including oil and gas software development, and would be happy to start a conversation about your company’s needs and if we could be a good partner. Check out some of our case studies about previous work or contact us at info@calavista.com if you would like to simplify the process even further.
