Counterpart

THE CHALLENGE

As the state’s governing body for high school athletics, the Indiana High School Athletic Association (IHSAA) serves more than 400 member schools and 160,000 student-athletes. And with tournaments for its 21 sanctioned sports—plus, athlete eligibility and official licensing & management among many other responsibilities—to oversee, the organization’s internal team had become bogged down by a very manual and tedious workflow.

IHSAA’s legacy software system had been in place for more than a decade and was comprised of a mix of spreadsheets and other lo-fi tech tools. This disconnect in systems and patchy UX (user experience), meant that virtually anything that needed to be processed had to be run through the IT team. IHSAA needed a solution that would unclog the IT bottleneck and continue to scale along with its athletic programs and user base.

THE SOLUTION

Introducing: myIHSAA! This custom portal is more than just an association management system (AMS)—it’s truly a full business solution that serves IHSAA’s entire workflow for every single sport. The comprehensive web app allows admins to register athletes; officials to manage their credentials and tournament applications; coaches and athletic directors to rate their officials, in addition to the ability to run and pull reports, send SMS reminders for various deadlines, and so much more.

Even better, this centralized hub is completely responsive, so busy athletic directors, coaches, officials, and staff can access what they need on the road, wherever they are.

SOLUTIONS

• Association Management System (AMS)
• Full Business Solution

TECHNOLOGIES

• .NET Core
• ASP.NET Core 
• Angular Web Framework
• C#
• Microsoft Azure App Service
• Microsoft Azure SQL Database
• TypeScript

THE RESULTS

Simply, there is no other tool like myIHSAA in the country that serves high school athletics. The efficiency gained by the IT department has enabled the team to grow beyond being a help center for antiquated technology, instead focusing on other strategic technology initiatives—for example, a data center migration project with a target of 90 percent savings.

The upgraded portal UX has already resulted in greater participation and engagement from members, including a 10% increase in applications for boys basketball tournament officials. Implementing the Google Distance API and an SQL database to calculate officials’ travel distances to tournament events has dramatically reduced calculation times, something only fellow geeks might appreciate. As more features continue to roll out, the IHSAA internal workflow and audience experience will only continue to evolve and improve.

And while business impact for IHSAA and improved UX for audiences is always a priority, this project has also helped earn an exciting accolade for our project partner and IHSAA Technology Director, Luke Morehead. In 2018, he was named a 2018 CTO of the Year by the Indianapolis Business Journal!

"I LOVE the build! This is quite a change from past process, but so much more inclusive of valuable information during the assigning process, which [before] was captured and referenced via a spreadsheet."

- Sandra M. Walter, IHSAA Assistant Commissioner

Read more here: https://www.counterpart.biz/case-studies/ihsaa/​

THE CHALLENGE

For three years in a row, Big Brothers Big Sisters of Central Indiana (BBBSCI) has been recognized by the agency’s national headquarters for the strength of its mentoring programs and network. A significant contributor to this success is BBBSCI’s dedication to removing barriers to meaningful and impactful relationship-building among its mentor matches (“Bigs” and “Littles”).  

BBBSCI conducted a Six Sigma Match Intentionality Project aimed to improve match satisfactions and youth outcomes. The study identified 12 critical life skills and attributes (“Thriving Indicators” now known as “Little Impacts”) necessary to reach one’s full potential. As a result, BBBSCI wanted to combine this data with an actionable and adaptable tool that would help Bigs foster these attributes within their Littles.

THE SOLUTION

We partnered with BBBSCI and Crafted to build The Big App. On the front end, The Big App is a mobile platform that helps mentors approach their mentoring time with greater intentionality, thanks to a framework of activities and events tied to each Little Impact. The app also serves as an information hub, storing basic profiles for each match as well as metrics around time spent towards each category.

On the back end, The Big App is a custom, data-driven dashboard that gives BBBSCI staff the ability to enter and manage activities and events, identify and analyze key performance indicators, and continually assess and interpret the collected data as Bigs and Littles build their relationship. BBBSCI leverages these key metrics to make data-driven decisions around helping match relationships thrive.

SOLUTIONS

• Mobile App

• Custom Product

TECHNOLOGIES

• C#

• JQuery

• MS SQL

• Web API

THE RESULTS

The Big App launched internally for BBBSCI in March 2016, and circulated quickly among Bigs. That summer, we were proud to join BBBSCI in showcasing The Big App at the Big Brothers Big Sisters of America National Conference. Since then, The Big App has helped support more than 10,000 mentors across nine Big Brothers Big Sisters agencies nationwide. Additionally, it has provided more than $100K in new sponsorship opportunities to BBBSCI. In 2018, The Big App was named a 2018 Indiana Innovation Award winner. In 2019, the platform was nominated for a TechPoint Mira Award.

"We are proud of the work that went into The Big App. This work would not have been possible without the generosity of our partners at [Counterpart]!"

- Amy Pomeranz Essley, Chief Program Officer

Read more here: https://www.counterpart.biz/case-studies/bbbsci-big-app/​

THE CHALLENGE

After 60 years of providing handmade products on a daily basis, Long’s Bakery understands the importance of quality, timeliness, and efficiency. During those years, Long’s ran solely on cash registers and handwritten orders. Their administrative needs, internal communication, and quality control were all limited by outdated technology. The Long’s administrative team needed more time devoted to business development and less time decoding handwritten orders, managing payroll using a traditional time clock, and working with a not-so-user-friendly Windows 95 POS (Point of Sale) system. To handle their business growth, Long’s decided they wanted to incorporate new technology. With two locations, 80 employees and their unique business model, “off the shelf” POS systems fell short. A tech-savvy market calls for a tech-savvy business, and Long’s Bakery knew that if they wanted to achieve their goals, they needed to adapt.

THE SOLUTION

When Long’s Bakery reached out to Counterpart for a solution, we started working on a user-friendly and comprehensive POS software system that would smoothly integrate with their broad list of products and administrative needs. Our team made it a priority to simplify the POS interface, effectively streamlining the order-taking process with a minimal learning curve. Additional components were soon added to their production system, providing phone ordering, order fulfillment, time clock, and supply ordering capabilities. It was imperative that Long’s employees could immediately embrace the new system since first impressions are crucial and to maintain the level of service Long’s customers have come to expect. To accomplish that goal, Long’s employees provided input during the design process to ensure that the system would meet their needs, and it has exceeded their expectations. In their own words, they would never go back.

SOLUTIONS

• Full business solution

• Custom POS with hardware integration

• Custom iPad supply ordering

• Third-party integrations

TECHNOLOGIES

• C#

• JQuery

• Kendo UI

• MS SQL

• Web API

THE RESULTS

The software created for Long’s Bakery exemplifies how a small family business can expand without losing hold of their original vision. Long’s Bakery now operates with state-of-the-art capabilities while maintaining the personal feel. The entire system provides efficiencies that continue to save time and money, both for administrative functions like invoicing and payroll, as well as with ordering supplies and filling customers’ orders. Long’s Bakery has a technology solution that is smart, secure, and scalable.

“Counterpart has made it possible for our business to have modern technology that creates efficiencies and solutions for our business needs. They work hard to understand our business, and we feel confident that we have software that will grow with us for years to come.”

- Dennis Rinehart, President

Read more here: https://www.counterpart.biz/case-studies/longs/​