productOps Blog

How productOps Built a Modern Expert System

The lessons of expert systems were used in the development of a sales and order management system.

Guide to Digital Transformation: Discovery Part 3 - Deliverables

Collaborative strategic and design sessions are at the core of every project. To solidify the vision we typically need to write some exploratory code, create proofs of concept, and create visual artifacts that provide a detailed definition of what the project will deliver.

Technology

A Brief History of Artificial Intelligence - Part 2: AI Winters and Expert Systems

There was a lot of hype and inflated expectations as to what expert systems could achieve which led to a lot of investments and new companies formed. Eventually, the promise was underwhelming compared to the hype.

Business Strategy

Guide To Digital Transformation: Off-The-Shelf Or Custom - Part 1

Ill defined business requirements and changing market conditions often lead to rushed software buying decisions that negatively impact the ability to do business successfully.

Business Strategy

Guide to Digital Transformation: Discovery Part 2 - Methods and Process

We look at the process and methodology involved in charting a digital transformation during a Discovery engagement with our clients.

Technology

A Brief History of Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning - Part 1: Beginnings

Why is there such interest in AI and how is it really impacting our life? In this series, I want to present a more optimistic view of AI that could benefit us rather than destroy us.

Business Strategy

Guide to Digital Transformation: Discovery Part 1 - Purpose and Success

At the start of the digital transformation process it’s important to clearly define the end goal. In other words, what success will look like.

Leadership

The Emotional Journey Of Digital Transformation

Digital Transformation is the creation of value through technological advances to organizational, cultural, and operational business components.

Case Study

Building A Smart City Platform

Simply, the LOUD solution improves the quality of life of its citizens. It helps local companies reduce the number of noise violations, city management the ability to make data driven plans for the future, and consumers the power to make more informed choices based on a city’s noise profile.

Data Science

What Are Data Services?

More than just crunching numbers, productOps uses data to anticipate the future so your business can thrive.

Technology

Growing Up With Alexa. Are We There Yet?

Alexa needs to gain our trust, in the accuracy of her responses and her use of our private information. She needs to know us. And in order for her to mature, she will need to know herself.

Community

Choice Reviews Make Academic Resources Accessible To Librarians During Crisis

Choice is the publishing branch of the Association of College & Research Libraries, a division of the American Library Association, and has become the go-to source for librarians seeking worthwhile new titles for

Data Science

Pandemic Response Hackathon - Shelter In Place Simulation

The Pandemic Spread Simulator - PaSS was built over this last weekend as part of the Pandemic Response Hackathon Challenge to help visualize what it means to shelter in place and why it is important.

Case Study

Data and Experience Design for Education

The productOps NOVA software platform is designed to increase student success rates through more efficient and relevant program creation, better fund management, and enhanced data management across the entire CCC system.

productOps develops trail use tracking technology

One criteria for obtaining funding and resources for park trails is being able to determine the traffic coming through a particular area during any given period of time. In general, park usage has

Technology

The next AI winter is coming, and that’s great

AI is hitting a wall because it has to. The boom was never going to deliver all the goods that were promised. And this is because AI is about the most difficult technical problem there is.

Technology

AR You Ready for the Future? Part 1: Getting Started with ARKit on iOS

We at productOps are using augmented reality as a means of elevating mobile apps from the informative to the experiential. This blog provides a quick glance at ARKit, its engaging features, impressive visuals, and widely applicable toolkit.

Methodology

Designing for Human Emotions

Designing for emotional humans can be a daunting task. Most of the time as designers we approach this by simplifying the problem and finding ways to group users together into easily identifiable traits. If only it were that easy.

Case Study

New Tech Network Brings Project-Based Remote Learning To Public Schools

ProductOps was called in to help at a critical juncture when NTN needed to switch Learning Management System (LMS) platforms from an outdated, unsupported application to their next-generation LMS for project-based learning and multi-outcome scoring.

Community

CruzHacks 2019 a Success

CruzHacks brought together teams from all over the Bay Area and beyond on the weekend of January 18-20. Talented young engineers packed the Stevenson Event Center on the University of California Santa Cruz campus to compete in various categories.

Methodology

Pivotal Tracker: Keeping Ourselves and Our Customers On Track

To be effective we are required to integrate quickly into a company's internal workings and culture to execute projects that will move their business forward. Fundamental to this is project management software that is intuitive to use, fast to on-board users, and easy to share.

Careers

Specific Perils of the Generalist

As the moniker suggests, we generalists often don't fit into one tidy role. This can feel like a career liability. It gets lonely if you consistently feel like an outsider, never 100% matched to any particular role.

Careers

Generalists. I love you, specifically.

I'm happy to have found a workplace that explicitly values generalists. As a consulting firm, productOps' employees have to be versatile. Individual employees often participate in multiple diverse projects in the span of a year. We have to hire based on more than our needs for the project du jour.

Community

Fluro Friday Comes To Santa Cruz To "Free The Funk"

"Fluro Friday", where everyone is encouraged to show up to the beach in fluorescent colors to raise awareness for mental health, comes to Santa Cruz.

Business Strategy

How Netflix and Twitter Bucked The Usual Rise and Decline of Organizations

What business leaders can do to snatch victory from the jaws of defeat and turn their firms into ones that buck the trend of the seemingly inexorable forces that shape how companies evolve. There is evidence that great helmsmanship can make a real difference to outcomes.