Why Frequent API Hackathons Are Key to Product Market Feedback and Go-to-Market Strategy - Per Lange, Cillers
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The document discusses the challenges of employee scheduling in workplaces, highlighting issues like schedule mismatches leading to employee dissatisfaction and turnover. It emphasizes the importance of considering employee preferences and optimizing scheduling processes using technology to improve productivity and reduce costs. The text also outlines the structure and benefits of hackathons for addressing real market problems and fostering innovation among developers.
Why Frequent API Hackathons Are Key to Product Market Feedback and Go-to-Market Strategy - Per Lange, Cillers
- 4. “Focus on the biggest problem they’ve got!” Focus on a problem that's at the very top of many companies' priority lists. A good indicator of a well-chosen theme for a hackathon is when internal decision-makers and/or potential clients are willing to allocate time to attend and review the solutions. This enthusiasm from key stakeholders often signals that the topic is highly relevant and engaging. This approach prevents wasting developers' valuable time and effort and maximizes the potential for meaningful innovation.
- 7. The Opportunity Despite existing digital tools, many workplaces still struggle with employee scheduling. Managers spend weeks planning schedules without full employee availability details. For example, an employee needs to leave at the latest by 4 PM on certain days during even weeks to pick up their children. However, they end up with “closing shifts” on those exact days. This mismatch between assigned schedules and employee needs causes tears, frustration, and even resignations. In some workplaces, managers are never present on the day the schedule is announced to employees because of the strong negative reactions. 😮 .
- 8. Employee Scheduling Process Forecasting Headcount Demand Events Historic sales / visitors Campaigns Deliveries Schedules must be announced 4 weeks in advance. Different roles Rules, Priorities, Preferences And Abilities Legal rules, e.g. collective agreements Corporate employee satisfaction guidelines Employee exceptions, e.g. medical condition Employee preferences and hard limits. Employee contracts, e.g. hours per week. Employee competencies and certifications. Scheduling Employees Matching headcount decision with scheduling rules, priorities, preferences and abilities. Headcount Decision Balance demand with costs. Within budget Within KPIs, e.g. salary costs / sales Optimize employee productivity Combine local and central knowledge / perspective. Gap analysis. Which skills do we need to hire and when? Adjustments Variations in demand because of unforeseen circumstances. Changes in employees’ availability. Employee turnover. Tracking, Reporting And Insight Generation Are we at risk of not having the necessary competencies and headcount for fully functional operations. Generate reports with KPIs Learn from each scheduling cycle to make improvements.
- 9. Variations Between Companies Time slots Whole hours 3 shifts per day: e.g. 5 - 14, 10 - 19, 14 - 23 Flexible start and stop hours. 15 min Priorities Simplicity vs optimization. Simplicity vs employee satisfaction. Minimize employee turnover vs it’s ok with the current turnover. Periods Flexible schedule vs fixed for 6 months. Challenges High vs low variance in headcount demand One role / competency vs lots of different roles and competencies. High vs low risk of understaffing. Complex process coordination and optimization between different roles. Employee satisfaction with current process. Local differences that affect employee scheduling. Decision Making Centralized vs decentralized Operations managers vs dedicated people planners.
- 10. Most Desired Improvements Better Consideratio n of Employee Preferences Poor consideration of employee preferences leads to dissatisfaction and turnover. Most commonly parents need to leave and pick up their kids. Young people may want to work off- hours to get higher salary, but parents may need to work normal hours. One system to replace them all Multinational companies are stuck with many different systems for different markets and locations. Hard to find a system that works globally and that covers all requirements. Reduce Dependency On Key Person Often a very skilled people planner will be able to do a great job of scheduling employees with good employee satisfaction and good business outcomes. But, if this person leaves it takes a long time to train another. Reduce Time- Consuming Work Lots of time spent for operation managers or even full-time dedicated employees for people planning. Optimize Employee Productivity Reduce unnecessary employee cost that don’t lead to business value. Reduce understaffing that results in lost business potential or bad customer x. Reduce risk of not having a critical competency at work which can result in process stoppage. Improved Automization Of Local Differences Current systems are not good enough at adjusting for local variations. So many companies are forced to let local operation managers do much of the scheduling work. Some of the local managers are not good at scheduling.
- 11. Explore Paradigm Shifts Familiarize with game changing technology that makes the paradigm shift possible Understand which game changing technologies are best for different use cases Timing: when are the disruptive tech good enough for specific use cases
- 14. Summary of What Many Developers Appreciate In A Hackathon ● Challenges with real market demand: “Biggest problem they’ve got!” ● Explore the paradigm shifts and game changing technologies ● An opportunity to build a successful product ● Recognition ● Enterprise Grade MVP In Record Time
- 15. Hackathon Structure ● Online Kickoff With Track Release ● Hackathon Discord Server ● API Lab ● In-Person Main Event ● Jury: Solution Jury + Tech Jury ● Feedback
- 16. Solution Jury Product purchase decision makers (external or internal) with real experience of the targeted problem. Which teams would you like a real follow-up meeting to hear more? Tech Jury Senior software engineering leaders assess the booked teams' solutions in terms of scalability, reliability, security and cost- effectiveness. How near are you to push to production?
- 18. Why Frequent API Hackathons Are Key to Product Market Feedback and Go-to-Market Strategy Build a community around your APIs Reveal which fundamental functionalities need improvement Motivate product teams to address flaws, since the next API hackathon is always just around the corner Developers will switch to your technology once they see it significantly enhances execution of critical business use cases
- 19. Raving Reviews From Developers Developer at Klarna: "Had an exhilarating experience at the hackathon - felt like stumbling into the Y Combinator of the Scandinavia!" CEO, Urban VInd: “Cillers is one of the best, if not the best hackathon organisers in Sweden. Good learning experience and great meeting some of the smartest and innovative developers in the Nordics.” Developer at SmartBear: “I had the privilege of attending what was likely the best AI hackathon in the Nordics yesterday, and I was amazed by it.” Developer at H&M: "Thanks for spearheading such an exceptional event, and fostering an environment conducive to technical exploration and innovation."
Editor's Notes
- #12: We are moving frm Filling in forms, navigate through menys and starring at dashboards to “natural language” in the channel you prefer! Just like you can ask alexa and sira about the weather, we can talk the employe scheduling systems - and it can call you or send a text message ask if you could jump in for Henrik who is sick. LLM and Sinch API (Sinch API have all the channels…) AI) du måste konkret lära dig massa teknologier för att hänga med i paradigm skiftet — AI = LLM = Large Language Model
- #13: Filling in forms, navigate through menys and starring at dashboards to “natural language”. Just like you can ask Alexa and Sira about the weather, we can talk the employe scheduling systems - and it can call you or send a text message ask if you could jump in for Henrik who is sick.