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Telenet
Every day, hundreds of thousands of Flemish people make calls, send emails, or watch thanks to the products of Telenet. But did you know that behind the scenes, many Axxes experts are involved? Some of our consultants are working there to develop an innovative customer portal. Alex Le Roy from Telenet collaborates with them.
What is your role and how long have you been working at Telenet?
Alex Le Roy: "Currently, I am the Product Owner for a team called B2B Digital Transformation & Acceleration. We mainly develop digital tools for medium to large companies. I have been with Telenet for almost 5 years now, with the first 4 years spent as an Application Expert. In that role, I primarily worked with Adobe products, such as Adobe Experience Cloud and Adobe Lounge. Although my previous and current roles have a strong technical aspect, I am not trained as an IT professional."
How would you describe the IT department within Telenet?
Alex: "Everyone knows Telenet as a major telecom player. In the entire company, we have around three thousand colleagues, the majority of whom, like my team, are based in Mechelen. Within Telenet, there are various departments (circles) and teams, and the IT department, with hundreds of colleagues, is divided into several large teams. When we look at customer segments, we have several groups. The first group focuses on residential customers, the second on small businesses, and the third on large enterprises. Each type of customer has different needs in terms of products and digital portals. For medium and large enterprises, Telenet had around twenty portals that coexisted. Now, we are consolidating them so that we can standardize the front door for all portals. Additionally, we want to focus more on self-service. This allows us to work more as a managed service provider, giving customers more autonomy to manage their products themselves."
How large is your team?
Alex: "We have around twenty talents in the team. The team comprises a scrum master, four business analysts, two functional analysts, an application expert, two testers, two tech leads, and six full-stack Java developers, including 2 Axxes employees - Lotte and Cel."
Can you tell us more about the portal you are developing?
Alex: "We've been working on the project, called 'Mijn Telenet voor Bedrijven,' for several quarters now. We started from a blueprint, then moved to a demo, and now we're building a full-fledged portal that includes various integrations with our backend systems. This summer, the Flemish government signed a framework agreement with us for two different sets of services, for which municipalities as well as other Flemish public services can contract with us under favorable terms. Through our digital portal, they can log tickets, view quotes, ask questions, etc. Additionally, they can easily navigate to other portals and services associated with specific products via single sign-on applications. This way, they don't need to keep separate sets of logins to access different portals."
Within Telenet, they closely follow what we do. Doing pioneering work is enjoyable, but at the same time, you're also the first to solve new problems.
What services are you referring to?
Alex: "A classic example is the billing systems where people can view their invoices, or platforms like Cisco Meraki. Many products already had their own portals, but it's not easy or even intended to rebuild them. Our main goal is to ensure that the data from these portals can be easily accessed and consolidated into one cohesive platform. In the long term, we will take further steps to integrate them more seamlessly, but that's for the future. Part of 'Mijn Telenet voor Bedrijven' was delivered in 2023, and the other parts will follow later."
What is the technology stack of this project?
Alex: "AWS is a very important pillar. Part of it is built in Angular, and we also focus on new automation tooling, such as Cypress. Developers and Tech Leads choose what benefits the organization the most. Speed is a significant factor there. We're also leading in terms of micro-frontends, allowing us to release things and immediately roll them back if necessary. Within Telenet, they closely follow what we do in this regard because we're occasionally the first within the company to go in a new direction. Doing pioneering work is enjoyable, but at the same time, you're also the first to solve new problems. It presents challenges, but that makes the job interesting. Especially young individuals with a lot of energy and interest find fulfillment in it."
In less than a year, Cel has become one of the most reliable pillars and driving forces of our squad, and if all school leavers reached Lotte's level, the world would be fantastic.
Cel and Lotte, two consultants from Axxes, have been with your team for over a year now. What are their strengths?
Alex: "Lotte is always enthusiastic and technically very competent. She is a team player with expertise and is highly appreciated by the other developers. Our tech lead once said: if all school leavers reached her level, the world would be fantastic. She has a great sense of humor, which is also important."
"Cel is someone who is very passionate about his job, not afraid of new things, and isn't hesitant to speak up. In less than a year, Cel has become one of the most reliable pillars and driving forces of our squad. He's like a striker, always looking to create momentum. I hope he always maintains his critical attitude."
"We learn from them, and I'm confident that it's mutual in an environment where many new things are being built."
In new projects, speed is crucial, and when we work with partners like Axxes, we know that we can quickly find quality people.
Why did you engage Axxes?
Alex: "Usually, we look internally for developers, but that's not always straightforward. In new projects, speed is crucial, and when we work with partners like Axxes, we know that we can quickly find quality people. In the job interviews, our Talent Lead, David, takes the lead, but the Tech Lead and developers also participate. It's not always easy to assess people, but I can only be positive about the two consultants in my team. If Axxes can always guarantee this level of quality, then we would be foolish not to engage them consistently."
Photo credits: Telenet
