Posted on by Tim HasseLast modified: December 15, 2022
Trim was responsible for designing and building this Native iOS app from scratch.
Worx360 is an online job platform that connects Health Facilities to Medical Professionals. The fundamental goal of this app is to create an online job marketplace that Health Facilities can trust to easily and quickly find the most qualified and suitable talents across different professions in the medical field, giving them a platform to vet candidates based on the required qualifications thoroughly.
This app works to satisfy two types of stakeholders; the Employer (Health Facilities) and the Employee (Medical Professionals). The app comes with key features including;
Job listings,
Facility-Candidate match based on culture survey,
In-app hiring and employee management,
In-app work log and communication,
A calendar feature for managing paydays, and job start and end days.
UX Research is an absolute necessity in our workflow. At every stage of our process we are (at the very, very least) guerrilla testing what we’ve designed and built frequently. As the fidelity of our products increases, our research becomes more fastidious. We are not in the business of attempting to set goals and design solutions without data to drive those decisions. Our UX Research services are not only available to during the course of green field projects at T R I M, we also offer them à la carte.
If you need a fresh set of eyes for your website you’ve already built, web development SLC is here to help too.
Why is it important?
By conducting tests and studies, UX research will uncover the users’ needs and identify how a product can meet those needs. This information is then used to inform product development and design.
Even creating an MVP (Minimum Viable Product) can be costly. It becomes even more so if you invest in a product only to learn that your intended audience has no interest, no need, or no use for your product.
When UX research is done the first time correctly, it takes all the guesswork out of product design and development, can save you time and money, and ensures that you are building a product that will succeed.
Our Research Capabilities
Usability-Lab Studies
Ethnographic Field Studies
Focus Groups
Interviews
Moderated Remote Usability Studies
Unmoderated Remote Panel Studies
Concept Testing
Diary/Camera Studies
Customer Feedback
Card Sorting
Clickstream Analysis
A/B Testing
Intercept Surveys
Email Surverys
Product Design
At T R I M, our Product Designers use the design thinking process to identify usability problems and design solutions for them. They are expected to empathize with the user and consider their needs. Product Design is holistic, the business requirements of the product offering must be kept in mind during the design process. We don’t work in a vacuum, we know our design decisions today can impact the product roadmap 6 months from now. We strive to solve problems for users that they didn’t even know they had. It’s not just about making things that look pretty, it’s about adding value for the end-user. Whether you’re building a product from scratch or just want us to take a look at what you’ve already designed and built, hire us to advocate for your users today.
Our Product Design Capabilities
Design Sprints
Wireframes
High-fidelity UI
Clickable Prototypes
UX Auditing
UX Copywriting
If you’re looking for a shop to conduct UX Research and Design, whether for a new project or an existing one, reach out to us here and we’ll get back to you ASAP. Let’s build something great together.
A Design Sprint is a process for validating ideas and solving problems by creating quick prototypes and testing them. Created by Google Ventures, it’s a 5 day exercise that will help you to better understand the problem your business is attempting to solve. Your focus will be honed as you sketch out different ideas, run tests, and make informed decisions.
Why use a Design Sprint?
Design Sprints are a quick way to validate an idea and make sure you are building the right product. Rather than investing months of time on a problem, Design Sprints can narrow your focus and send you off in the right direction in just one week.
Who’s involved?
In order to ensure the success of the exercise, we dub someone on the client side the Product Owner. There may be several people involved in decision making at your organization but the PO is the mouthpiece during this engagement. Maybe they’re an executive, or even the CEO, whoever they are, they call the shots. The process is collaborative of course but when push comes to shove, the PO has the final say.
Then there’s the facilitator, they make sure velocity is maintained throughout the sprint. At T R I M we provide an unbiased, trained facilitator who is well versed in the Design Sprint methodology for all of our engagements.
Some additional roles that may or may not be relevant on the client side are Marketing Expert, Customer Service Expert, and Finance Expert. These aren’t mandatory roles, sometimes the PO handles some or all of these, but if they’re available they should definitely be included. The Marketer adds value by being well versed in the company’s messaging, while the Customer Service Expert will know your customers more intimately. And, of course, the Financial Expert will keep the project grounded by weighing the potential ROI throughout the process.
It’s also important to give the folks who will be “doing the do” a seat at the table. We always include a Product Designer and Product Engineer in our Design Sprints. Not only will the ultimately be the ones to bring the result of the Design Sprint to life, their skill sets allow for higher velocity during the exercise itself. Our designers and engineers alike are very capable of prototyping rapidly since they’ve been doing it for so many years.
How to Prepare
Like we said above, this is a 5 day exercise, and we mean 5 full days. We highly recommend you have virtually nothing else going on that week. Phones are also strongly discouraged during the exercise, there will be breaks periodically of course but it’s important that the entire team is focused when we’re actually sprinting.
Whether we’re coming to you or you’re visiting us at T R I M headquarters, there are going to be a lot of sticky notes in the conference room. We’ll be jotting down ideas constantly and sticking them everywhere. A whiteboard will also be necessary so let us know if we should provide one.
What does a Design Sprint look like?
Day 1 On the first day we define our long term goals. The fewer the better. Purists would tell you to pick one and only one. The question is, where do you want to be five years from now? What about one year? Six months? That goal will be the true north of the project, everyone involved should always keep it in mind.
Now we turn the goal into action items and hone in on customers’ pain points. This is done by mapping out the user journey based on prior research about the customer. A tool can an Empathy Map can be helpful here and when combined with the user journey, a Swim Lane diagram can be made. This will help illustrate how the user is interfacing with the product and heat map their pain points.
From there we decide which problems can be turned into opportunities, and how. These ideas are voted on by the whole group to determine which problem becomes the focus. The PO gets to decide ultimately but it is still important to vote.
Day 2 Ok, so the problem has been identified, time to throw a bunch of potential solutions at the wall. There are all sorts of different exercises we run to accomplish this. Lightning Demos, Four-Step Sketches, Crazy 8s, and so on. We won’t go into too much detail here, you could probably write a whole article of each of these but the point is that they all encourage and foster rapid ideation. These different exercises provide different levels of fidelity, throughout the day the solution will start to crystalize. By the end of Day 2 the goal is to have a handful of end to end solutions drawn out.
Day 3 Time to prototype. Pick one, and only one of the solutions from Day 2 and prototype it. Like Day 1, this can be done by voting but the PO gets to call it. The goal for the prototype should be good enough quality that it could pass as a real product. We’re faking it at this stage. These are mid to high fidelity mockups that we want to look and feel as real as possible.
The team gets divided into a group of people who make the individual pieces of the prototype, and people who assemble it all into one thing. Usually designers are the ones making the pieces. It is also helpful to have someone dedicated to writing copy. It’s important that all of the text in the prototype is written well enough that it makes sense to the customer. You can also have someone dedicated to pulling assets. Often times, the people making the pieces of the prototype will need an image or an icon in a timely fashion, that’s where the asset sourcer comes in.
Day 4 More prototyping. In our experience, sometimes up to half of Day 3 can be spent deciding which solution to go with. In this case, use Day 4 to continue prototyping. If necessary, Day 4 can be eliminated in some cases. We have done this occasionally if the client is pressed for time or if a solution is decided on and fully prototyped by the end of Day 3. Another task that can be accomplished on Day 4, if not Day 3, is writing the script for the user interviews on Day 5.
Day 5 Testing, testing! Time to get that prototype in front of users. We find that 80% of potential problems with prototypes can be uncovered with as few as 5 users. There are actually diminishing returns beyond that point. The interview script that we wrote early in the week gets put to use on this day. It is crucial that questions are open-ended and do not lead the user in a particular direction, otherwise the data collected will be virtually useless. No more than two team members will test the prototype with users and interview them as to avoid observation bias. The testing is recorded though so that the whole team can review it later in the day.
As the testing results come in, the entire team will help to process them. When reviewing the tests and interviews, the goal is to keep an eye out for recurring patterns in users’ behavior and responses. We then use these themes to roadmap new epics, features, and fixes. Tickets are made in Asana for all of the above, they’re prioritized, and added to the backlog.
What happens next?
With the design sprint concluded and action items identified, now the real fun begins. Time to roll up our sleeves and start designing and building. Design Sprints can be done at any stage of a product’s life cycle. It’s always good to do them early when it’s a greenfield project but don’t let that deter you from doing one well into your company’s maturity.
Why T R I M?
We believe that short iterations, and close collaboration with real humans is a better way to build products. We’ve launched apps with multi-billion dollar companies, and have helped raise millions of dollars alongside first-time founders.
If you’ve got an idea you’d like to validate with a design sprint, give us a shout and hire us to run one for you today.
You’ve probably heard of Google Ventures Design Sprints. We’re big fans of them here at T R I M, and we run them often, but most of the time when we say “sprint” at T R I M, we’re referring to our timeboxed work week. Every week our team of consultants is on sprint from Monday through Thursday. We have a brief stand up meeting every morning where we take turns sharing what we worked on yesterday, what we’re working on today, and whether or not we have any blockers. A blocker can be classified as anything that is preventing us from getting our work done. Maybe a designer needs buy in from Product Owner on a UX decision, maybe a developer needs an asset from design, these are just a couple examples of blockers. After stand ups on Monday and Tuesday, we roll up our sleeves and get to work but on Wednesday and Thursday we have extracurriculars after stand ups.
On Wednesdays we have Inspo Day and on Thursdays we have Training. Inspo Day is pretty much exactly what it sounds like. It’s a time for team members to share inspiring things they’ve discovered in the tech space throughout the week. On Training days, a team member puts together a short training presentation to educate the rest of the team. These presentations are brief and high-level but they are a great way for our different departments to get acquainted with the others’ skillsets. Developers sit in on product design trainings and vice versa. The rest of the week, the team is devoted to production.
We wrap up our sprints by end of day Thursday. Fridays are dedicated to demoing our work for Product Owners, sprint planning for the following week, investment time, and retrospective. Investment time is when we sharpen our skillset to ensure that we’re always at the top of our game. We build this time into the work week for our consultants to learn new things and tinker. Retrospective happens at the end of the day on Friday and it’s a time for us to celebrate what we did well that week and talk about what could have gone better. We create action items for the weeks ahead based on what we learned from what could have gone better.
With all that said, we expect each of our consultants’ output to be no less than 20 billable hours of high quality work each week. We do not bill for extracurriculars, daily meeting time, our Friday demo and planning time, nor do we bill for our weekly retrospective. Our sprint schedule has been instrumental for us in shipping many successful products over the years.
So there’s a bit about what “sprints” are at T R I M and what they look like each week. If you’d like to work together and experience our sprint process first hand, we’d love to hear from you. Drop us a line here and we’ll get the ball rolling. Let’s build something great together!
The latest and greatest version of PBS KidVision is now available for download in the Apple App Store! We’ve added a whole bunch of new features that we think our users will love. Here’s a look at what you can expect to find.
First off, PBS has made all educational content free for the time being since so many kids are stuck at home due to coronavirus. Also, KidVision can now be played on iPads as well!
The game has also been expanded dramatically. Version one had 3 locations: the art museum, the baseball stadium, and the zoo. Well the number of locations has been doubled in version 2! There are 3 more brand new locations now: the police station, the venetian pools, and the sea turtle rescue. Just like the original locations, these new ones have immersive 360 video experiences with 3 levels of play per location.
Another exciting new feature set is the ability to further customize and decorate your Pudgy avatar! In the first version, users could pick a custom Pudgy color, which was lots of fun. Now, users can use tickets to purchase cool accessories for pudgy like hats, sunglasses, lunchboxes, and more!
The customization doesn’t stop there, for the 3 original locations, users can now purchase location upgrades with tickets. Get more animals for the zoo, decorate the museum with a colorful mural, or add baseball players to stadium! You’ll also notice a few fun new animations throughout the app as well.
Download KidVision in the App Store today and let us know what you think! Be sure to stay tuned, we’ve got big plans for the next version too!
Native apps are staples for most smart phone users these days and will continue to be for the foreseeable future. They serve as utilities, communication, and entertainment in our daily lives. Performance, fidelity, and ingenuity in the native app arena have increased tremendously as smart phones become more and more capable. Generally speaking, they’re great, but there is still room for improvement.
The catch with native apps is that they are high-friction. Before you can even begin to use one, you usually have to download and install it, create an account, learn how to use it, etc. Also, depending on the app, they can be quite large and we’re not all using the latest and greatest smart phone with a gazillion gigs of storage. Most of us have had to delete apps just to be able to download new ones. Last, sharing data between different native apps can be difficult. This is starting to be addressed, certain apps that play nice with one another will allow sharing between them but even then it takes several steps just to copy and paste text, send a photo, share a post, etc.
All of these problems are typically avoided on the web, PWAs attempt to solve them and can do so pretty well. But, again, they’re far from perfect and can definitely be improved.
Enter MiniApps. They’re a fairly new type of mobile app. They integrate with native apps but also rely on web tech like Javascript and CSS. They’re small in size, perform well, and you don’t have to install them. They can also be distributed across many different platforms: the web, within native apps, SMS, QR codes, etc. MiniApps will never replace native apps, or the web, or PWAs, but rather bridge the gap between native and web.
Google unveiled their “Instant Apps” in 2017 and they’re becoming widely adopted. Apple followed suit this year with their “App Clips” and Snapchat just unveiled their in-app “Minis” this year as well. This is a trend all business owners should be paying attention to at the very least, if not considering building their own MiniApp.
So, what would you even use a MiniApp for? Scooter sharing is a great example. Let’s say you’re visiting an area that has Lime Scooters, even though in your home town Bird Scooters are more prevalent. These days you’d have to download the Lime App, sign up, add your payment info, etc. And after that you’d return home and probably forget you even had the Lime App on your phone. It’s a cumbersome process just to ride a scooter and the app is a waste of space once you’re done.
With a MiniApp, like Apple’s App Clips for example, you could just scan the QR on the scooter and the App Clip would load almost instantaneously. You could pay for the scooter ride with Apple Pay and be on your way. No more waiting for the full app to download, no more sign up, no more wasted space on your phone.
Rewards programs are another good use case. Do you really need a coffee shop’s whole app on your phone just to keep track of your next free cup of coffee? No way, it’s a glorified punch card. Scanning a QR at the register and firing up a MiniApp is a much better solution.
QR codes aren’t the only way to access MiniApps though. They can be launched via search engines, smart assistants (like Siri), SMS, web browsers, calendar items, and more.
MiniApps aren’t going anywhere, this is a trend you’ll want to get out ahead of. As more and more companies unveil their versions of MiniApps, users will only become more accustomed to using them. It’s only a matter of time before they’re the standard and users expect your business to have them.
Check out some of our other resources in the meantime, you can learn a bit more about Apple’s App Clips here and Snap’s Minis for Snapchat here. If you’re interested in designing and building a MiniApp for your business, we can help. Drop us a line here.
Chatbots are becoming more widely adopted and entering the mainstream. Even if they’re just now making your radar, you’ve probably already interacted with several of them. Either way, you might have several questions about them. What are they? What can they do? Are they right for your business.
We’ll unpack all of those but what’s most important to know out of the gate is that Chatbots aren’t going anywhere. There are limits to what they can offer but as your customers interact with them more and more, their expectations will be raised. Furthermore, a well designed Chatbot can make your life easier and possibly save you money along the way.
So, what’s a Chatbot?
Chatbots use conditions, triggers, and/or events to interact with users automatically. When done right, they’re consistent, prompt, and versatile. They can be deployed via several avenues like Slack, SMS, live chat, etc. You can design them to either be proactive or reactive in order to collect important information from the user interacting with them. When it comes to communicating with your business, employing a Chatbot gives your customers more options and can help grow your business.
The Future of Chatbots
A recent Facebook survey uncovered that over 50% of users are more likely to shop online somewhere if they can engage with the business via chat. Almost 60% of Generation X and Millennials report having knowingly interacted with chatbots. Some estimates indicate that 85% of customers’ interactions with businesses will be via chatbots and other self-service solutions. Sure, email and telephone are the most common channels at the moment but the The writing is on the wall, Chatbots will only continue to become more popular.
These days, if your customers cannot find what they’re looking for quickly, there’s a good chance you’ll lose the sale or maybe even lose the customer forever. The second most common online frustration users’ report is not being able to get answers to simple questions. Third is that basic business details are hard to find. Chatbots can easily prevent churn as a result of these issues when they’re designed and built well.
Unfortunately, they are not a one-size-fits-all solution. The type of bot you build and the features it has will need to be tailored to your users. When we build Chatbots at T R I M, we do a deep dive on our Product Owners’ industry as a whole, their business in particular, and their target demographic.
Chatbots for Customer Service
Chatbots work great for customer service for several reasons. First, they’re affordable. Sure, there’s some up-front cost associated, we need to do some conversation mapping and write the code. But compared to a solution with a visual interface, like a web application, the cost of a Chatbot is a drop in the bucket.
Second, Chatbots can easily leverage conversation APIs and AI so that they’re easy to communicate with and incredibly helpful. APIs and AI are both constantly advancing and those updates are reflected in your Chatbot very quickly. With AI, your Chatbot could predict your users’ needs or even up-sell them by leveraging data like their order history for example. Meanwhile, thanks to conversation APIs, the Chatbot will communicate so well it might even be mistaken for a human.
Last, text-based communication applications might be the most popular on the internet. Virtually every popular social media app has a robust chat feature set built into their platform. Businesses are already leveraging this and meeting their users where they are by handling customer service via apps like Facebook Messenger.
But Wait, There’s More!
Chatbots can handle way more than just customer service! They can handle standardized conversational marketing that would typically be done by a human, lowering your operating cost as a result. Leads can be generated with Chatbots by implementing them on your website to handle initial engagement. Your converted customers can be onboarded with the help of Chatbots. The list goes on but the point is that customer service is just the tip of the iceberg. Think about how many standardized procedures there are in your business right now, many of them could probably be done with Chatbots.
Your Very Own Chatbot
Think your business would benefit from a Chatbot? You’re probably right but it’s important that they’re designed and built well. There are DIY, off the shelf solutions out there that will let you build your own chatbot without writing any code but you should be wary of them. There are many best-practices to be considered with Chatbots and they’re not exactly a silver bullet.
If you’re going to incorporate Chatbots, it’s important that your customers can still engage with real humans somehow. You’ll need to do proper conversation mapping that accounts for a variety of outcomes. Any deviation from the happy path needs to be carefully considered as to not inconvenience your users, otherwise the Chatbot might do more harm than good.
The avenue you choose is also important to consider. Slack, SMS, Websites, Facebook, Twitter, etc. Chatbots can operate in all of these arenas, which one is right for your business? What metrics is that based on?
All of these questions and considerations are where we come in. If you’re in the market for a Chatbot, let’s build it together the right way the first time. Here’s some examples of bots that we’ve built at T R I M:
KidVision is a game we designed and built for South Florida PBS. The product owners identified an unsolved problem in current landscape of mobile games for children: educational mobile games for kids are few and far between. Of the limited options available, almost none let parents track their children’s progress, and even fewer have an intentional, age-specific curriculum built into the game. The outcome is lots of screen time with little tangible results. If you are planning to use kratom, is important that you check kratom Masters to find all the info about kratom.
We designed and built an immersive, educational game with a variety of levels, clear objectives, and performance analytics for parents, aimed at kids age 3 to 7. Before each level, players take a pretest to determine what they already know. While playing, kids are taught new colors and words. By quizzing them again after each level, we’re able to demonstrate to parents exactly how much their child has learned throughout the course of their game play.
The first version of this project was shipped in less than six months, we provided design, development, and strategy services to the product owners throughout the duration of the engagement. We recently began design and development for versions 1.6 – 2.0 and will be launching those versions shortly. This endeavor was sponsored by Major League Baseball, Miami Zoo, and Young at Art Museum. It was an amazing experience working alongside the PBS team to bring their vision to life. KidVision is in the app store, go check it out and feel free to let us know your thoughts
Posted on by Amber FrankLast modified: August 29, 2020
Sketch has long been used for prototyping, but how does it stack up against it’s newest competition, Figma? We’ll take a look at which is the better tool for teams working remotely.
Desktop vs. Web
Sketch is a powerful desktop app, while Figma lives on the web. Figma also offers a desktop app, but being primarily web-based allows for features that just aren’t possible with Sketch, such as real-time collaboration and ease of sharing with other team members that don’t have the program installed on their desktop.
Collaboration
Because Sketch is desktop based, only one person can edit a file at a time. If you have a design team that consists of more than one person, this creates lots of issues when there are multiple team members on the same project. Figma lets you share design files and collaborate in real-time, similar to Google Docs, which means there’s no need to later compare files and find the source of truth for the latest version; there’s only one.
Version history
Sketch allows users to manually revert to a previously saved version, but if you forgot to save, you’re out of luck. In Figma,every change to a product is saved automatically to the cloud, and version control lets users rewind a project to previous states.
Plugins
Sketch has tons of third-party plugins on the web that can be installed to add new features and efficiency to your workflow. Figma allows users to search for and install plugins all within the app, and updates are automatic because everything is in the cloud.
Prototyping
Sketch’s tools for prototyping are relatively basic, with some simple animations. Sharing prototypes requires them to be uploaded to the cloud first, and any major changes require a new link. Figma’s prototyping is much more powerful with advanced animations. Plus, sharing a prototype is easy; just get a link from right within Figma.
Developer Handoff
In order to hand your Sketch designs over to your dev team, you must use a third party application like Zeplin. Figma has developer handoff built in, so no need to export your files for handoff.
Design Systems
Sketch allows users to create a library of symbols, text styles, and layer styles that can be shared with other team member with Sketch Cloud. However, it must be manually saved and updated by anyone who is using it (even when it’s linked to the cloud, you still must click the notification to implement the latest version). Figma creates a living design system made of components that is automatically updated and applied.
Here at T R I M, we’ve personally experienced the pain points of being a remote team using Sketch. Having even just two designers work on the same project still proved difficult when we were both working at the same time and later when it came time to combine our files and figure out who has the latest/most up-to-date version. Also, one slip up of forgetting to upload a file can throw off an entire week’s work when someone goes on vacation. Having everything based on the web and automatically upload to the cloud is a saving grace for a remote team to be able to work together efficiently, while still being able to work from home in the times of stress, viruses and social collapse.
BOTTOM LINE: Figma picks up the slack where Sketch falls short for collaboration for remote teams.
No need to constantly upload files and no more wondering who has the latest version. While Sketch has Sketch Cloud, it still requires you to manually upload it the first time and only updates when you manually save. It doesn’t allow users to work on the same document and you must still download it to be able to edit it.
T R I M Agency is seeking a Backend Engineer to join our startup studio. The ideal candidate will not only love to code, but love to see companies grow from zero to launch.
T R I M Agency is a startup studio and practitioners of agile development. We have solved enterprise problems through technology for billion-dollar corporations, but our passion is building products for startups through an accelerated co-founder-as-a-service offering. For every project, we form micro teams of one designer, one developer, and one strategist. Our portfolio companies have raised over $3.6 million in funding over the last 18 months, and we are preparing for the next cohort of companies to build, launch, and grow within our portfolio.
We expect our Backend Engineer candidate to own a consultancy mindset, self-start on product features, and maintain sprint responsibility week-to-week by working closely with product owners and teammates. Our culture is fostered through instituting the importance of the 8 TLC’s (Exercise, Diet, Nature, Service, Relationships, Recreation, Relaxation / Stress Management, and Spiritual Health), and we structure our weekly sprints to include both “inspo days”, as well as paid investment time on Fridays. We are also the “Coolest Office in South Florida” (as named by South Florida Business Journal, 2015), creators of General Provision coworking, and home to Broward’s first coding Bootcamp. You can find our HQ in Fort Lauderdale, but our clients are all over the country.
You will be responsible for:
Designing and prototyping new services and applications
Building and maintaining GraphQL APIs and Microservices
Improving and optimizing existing backend systems
Here is what you must have:
Experience working with and understanding CI/CD and support patterns
Expertise in Node.js
Experience building GraphQL APIs and Microservices
Experience with Yoga, Prisma
Expertise in security best practices and authentication protocols such as SAML, OAuth, Token-based authentication.
Expertise in best practices, design patterns, architecture, and data modeling.
Experience working in Typescript
Comfortable using GitLab, Asana, and Slack.
Excellent communication skills, strong writing and presentation skills
Nice to haves:
Hands-on experience with Kubernetes: Cluster maintenance, logging monitoring, security, troubleshooting.
Hands-on experience with Ingress of Nginx DevOps tools: Jenkins, Ansible, Git, Gitlabs CI/CD, Docker Network and security management for hybrid environment Cloud Architect Certification on Multi-Cloud Platforms.
BS degree in Computer Science, Engineering or another related field
Experience in front-end web technologies such as Angular, React, Vue
The T R I M Apprentice Program is a paid, three month immersive experience in software and mobile development. Apprentices receive hands-on training, work side-by-side with T R I M engineers and product designers, and gain experience in all aspects of agile software creation.
The Apprentice Program
At T R I M, we don’t just build great apps and websites. Teaching, learning and self-improvement are important aspects of what we do and our Apprentice Program is an example of our culture in action. Our success hinges on our team of specialists and we believe in investing in the future of South Florida tech. So we thought, why not actively develop our next generation of T R I M Specialists? What if we could welcome a few of the smart, motivated new developers and continue to nurture their skills – what would that look like?
Our Apprentice Program is a 3-month immersive training experience in software development, as well as building tech companies and products the “T R I M Way.” Apprentices receive hands-on training while building and shipping code for our current clients. As they work side-by-side with T R I M engineers and product designers, they will not only strengthen their coding skills, they will learn to become consultants. This means the apprentices will gain experience in all aspects of creating software including defining sprints, team collaboration, pairing, testing, interfacing with clients, and reflecting on progress during our weekly retrospectives.
A Live Experiment
At T R I M, we like to say that we live in Beta and the Apprentice Program is another example of this positioning. 2020 is our fourth iteration of the apprenticeship program, and we’re excited to see what will happen. We’ll be collecting feedback along the way from everyone involved, and documenting the journey.
Skills Required:
Full Stack Development Understanding (Bootcamp Grad or Higher)
Entry Level Experience in HTML/CSS
Entry Level Experience in a front-end framework like Angular or React (Preference for Angular)
Entry Level Experience in API Development (Rails, Node, or Python)
The ideal candidate is entering the job market as a software developer, but want to accelerate their skill set, through exposure to the full build cycle, opposed to a small cog in a large wheel. This program is NOT intended for people without a working knowledge of software development.
The T R I M Apprentice Program is a three-month immersive experience in software and mobile UI and UX design. Apprentices receive hands-on training, work side-by-side with T R I M product designers and developers, and gain experience in all aspects of agile software creation.
The Apprentice Program
At T R I M, we don’t just build great apps and websites. Teaching, learning, and self-improvement are important aspects of what we do and our Apprentice Program is an example of our culture in action. Our success hinges on our team of specialists and we believe in investing in the future of South Florida tech. So we thought, why not actively develop our next generation of T R I M Specialists? What if we could welcome a few of the smart, motivated new UX designers and continue to nurture their skills – what would that look like?
Our Apprentice Program is a 3-month immersive training experience in software and mobile design, as well as building tech companies the “T R I M Way.” Apprentices receive hands-on training while building and shipping products for our current clients. As they work side-by-side with T R I M engineers and product designers, they will not only strengthen their design skills, they will learn to become consultants. This means the apprentices will gain experience in all aspects of creating software including defining sprints, team collaboration, user testing, interfacing with clients, and reflecting on progress during our weekly retrospectives.
A Live Experiment
At T R I M, we like to say that we live in Beta and the Apprentice Program is another example of this positioning. We’ve passed 10 apprenticeship programs, and 90% of those apprentices were offered full-time jobs. We’ll be collecting feedback along the way from everyone involved, and documenting our findings along the way.
Here is what we are looking for in a Design Apprentice:
A portfolio with examples of UI/UX work
A grasp of the basic principles of graphic design (Proximity, alignment, hierarchy, typography, color, etc.)
Experience using design software of some kind (Adobe Creative Suite, Sketch, Figma, etc.)
Communication skills and autonomy
These are nice to haves:
Formal design education (College degree or Bootcamp)
The T R I M Project Manager is responsible for the entirety of the Product team’s weekly sprint schedule and the primary point of communication with our clients. This critical role in our operation is the conduit between our product teams and our customers. Our ideal candidate is a tech enthusiast that loves to build apps. Experience working in a dev team or tech environment is preferred, but project management experience in other industries will be considered.
The role is primarily tasked with being a liaison for our clients, and a steward for our product teams so that they can focus on productivity and producing their best work. The PM is also the Point of Contact for the majority of our internal services including (but not limited to) Slack, Asana, Harvest, 1Password, Uber Conference. Our team and clients will come to you to manage these services.
Your day to day duties will primarily live between Asana and Slack, coordinating Product Team meetings and Client Communication, reviewing software features, and road-mapping upcoming sprints.
The Project Manager is a selfless role, understanding that the success of the Project Manager relies heavily on the success of your teammate’s execution. The PM is also critical for velocity and deadline goals. They will be required to run quarterly reports on our teams’ velocity and sprint planning accuracy.
Skills that you must have:
Excellent written and verbal communication skills – you are the voice of our team
Excellent Time Management Skills – enforce our time boxes
Excellent group leadership skills – you keep meetings structured
Reliable and Consistent track record of attendance
Proficiency in Modern PM and Communication Tools:
Slack
Asana (or comparable experience)
Google Suite (Gmail, Docs, Sheets, Slides)
Others: 1Password (Credential Management), Uberconference (Phone Lines), Harvest (Time Management), Loom (Screen Recording), Apple Connect and Google Play Store (App Management),
Ability to learn new software – we’re a tech company, and we will use new tools as it makes sense
A fearless approach to problem-solving
Comfort creating tickets for Software Projects
Comfort confirming acceptance criteria of tickets for Software Projects
Kanban Comprehension
Skills that are nice to have:
Experience managing Software or Product teams
Agile Development Team Experience
Quality Assurance Experience
Experience writing user stories
Understanding of Modern Development team workflows
Experience preparing and publishing apps in the App Store or Google Play Store
T R I M is a startup studio and practitioners of agile development. We have solved enterprise problems through technology for billion-dollar corporations, but our passion is building products for startups through an accelerated co-founder-as-a-service offering. For every project, we form micro teams of one designer, one developer, and one strategist. Our portfolio companies have raised over $2.6 million in funding over the last 18 months, and we are preparing for the next cohort of companies to build, launch, and grow within our portfolio.
T R I M is seeking a developer to join their product studio. The ideal candidate will not only love to code, but love to see companies grow from zero to launch.
The T R I M development stack is Angular / Rails API / Postgress in the Heroku Environment for web apps, and Swift or Java / Rails API / Postgress on Heroku for native mobile. Our ideal candidate is comfortable with API development and Angular front ends for zero-to-version-one products, and will fearlessly dissect 3rd party API documentation and implement RESTful, XML, and JSON based web services.
T R I M is a product studio and practitioners of agile development. We have solved enterprise problems through technology for billion-dollar corporations, but our passion is building products for startups through an accelerated co-founder-as-a-service offering. For every project, we form micro teams of one designer, one developer, and one strategist. Our portfolio companies have raised over $3.7 million in funding over the last 2 years, and we are preparing for the next cohort of companies to build, launch, and grow within our portfolio.
We expect our developer candidate to own a consultancy mindset, self-start on product features, and maintain sprint responsibility week-to-week by working closely with product owners and teammates. Our culture is fostered through instituting the importance of the 8 TLC’s (Exercise, Diet, Nature, Service, Relationships, Recreation, Relaxation / Stress Management, and Spiritual Health), and we structure our weekly sprints to include both “inspo days”, as well as paid investment time on Fridays. We are also the “Coolest Office in South Florida” (as named by South Florida Business Journal, 2015), creators of General Provision coworking, and home to Broward’s first coding Bootcamp. You can find us headquartered in Fort Lauderdale, but our clients are all over the country.
Here is what you must have:
Front End experience with Angular
1-2 years Experience with Ruby on Rails (Node.js experience is a plus)
Agile Development experience
Familiar with GIT for version control
Standards-Based, W3C Compliant Approach
A fearless approach to innovation
The passion and awareness for what is next
You must love the web, engage socially, and breath mobile.
T R I M is seeking a Dev-Ops Cloud Engineer to join our startup studio. The ideal candidate will not only love to code, but love to see companies grow from zero to launch.
T R I M is a startup studio and practitioners of agile development. We have solved enterprise problems through technology for billion-dollar corporations, but our passion is building products for startups through an accelerated co-founder-as-a-service offering. For every project, we form micro teams of one designer, one developer, and one strategist. Our portfolio companies have raised over $2.6 million in funding over the last 18 months, and we are preparing for the next cohort of companies to build, launch, and grow within our portfolio.
We expect our Dev-Ops Cloud candidate to own a consultancy mindset, self-start on product features, and maintain sprint responsibility week-to-week by working closely with product owners and teammates. Our culture is fostered through instituting the importance of the 8 TLC’s (Exercise, Diet, Nature, Service, Relationships, Recreation, Relaxation / Stress Management, and Spiritual Health), and we structure our weekly sprints to include both “inspo days”, as well as paid investment time on Fridays. We are also the “Coolest Office in South Florida” (as named by South Florida Business Journal, 2015), creators of General Provision coworking, and home to Broward’s first coding Bootcamp, Wyncode Academy. You can find us in FATvillage, Fort Lauderdale, but our clients are all over the country.
Here is what you must have:
Ability to deliver container-based solutions utilizing the Kubernetes on the Google Cloud Platform
A detailed understanding of core concepts for Kubernetes APIs and cluster architecture, as well as services and networking.
Hands-on experience with Kubernetes: Cluster maintenance, logging monitoring, security, troubleshooting.
Hands-on experience with Ingress of Nginx DevOps tools: Jenkins, Ansible, Git, Gitlabs CI/CD, Docker Network and security management for hybrid environments
Expertise with one or more of the following languages: Javascript, Python, Go
Experience in defining enterprise cloud strategy, roadmap, standards and leading practices associated with all aspects of cloud capabilities (compute, data, storage, security, identity and access, self-service, performance)
Excellent communication skills, strong writing and presentation skills
