#1.
Our client
Our client is part of the Eiffage Construction branch within the Eiffage Group. This branch, which specialises in various areas of expertise such as construction, renovation, joinery, real estate and industrial works, employs around 2,000 people in 14 subsidiaries in Belgium and Luxembourg.
We worked with Eline Princen and Juliette Murcie, HR Project Managers at Eiffage Benelux. They decided to call on our services because, after a great deal of thought, they realised that their project required tailor-made development to meet their expectations perfectly. Eiffage Benelux preferred to choose a Belgian service provider so that they could work with a local company. That's how our partnership began.
#2.
Their needs
Eiffage Benelux wanted a solution to encourage their employees to exercise more and pay more attention to their health. They also wanted to strengthen the sense of community within the company and raise money for good causes.
This project came about during the pandemic: telecommuting meant that people started working less in the office and thus saw much less of each other. So we needed to come up with an idea that would get employees moving more and also allow them to come together, even virtually.
Raising money for charity was a very important part of the project, as Eiffage Benelux has been supporting charities for many years. Before the arrival of the coronavirus, employees personally went to help charities locally, but the situation at that time obviously made this no longer possible. So we had to think of another way to support these associations.
Thanks to this project, they were able to solve several problems at once.
#3.
Our solution
The mobile application developed by our team includes a 2-month sports challenge with 6 stages set by our client.
There are more than 25 sports included in the challenge and each session of one of these sports included in the application earns points and allows an affiliate to win. The number of points varies depending on the intensity of the sport.
Besides the main challenge, employees had the opportunity to participate in bonus challenges (sit-ups, push-ups, etc.) to earn extra points, as well as attend 3 workshops.
In addition, they collected and earned money for 2 charities in Belgium when they reached the final stage of the challenge.
We developed a mobile application with the look and feel of a social network, which allowed each participant to publish his or her sports sessions with a photo in the news feed, like and pin other employees' publications, post messages of encouragement, view branch rankings, etc. There was also a virtual map with 6 stages representing 6 cities and thus 6 buildings built by Eiffage Benelux affiliates.
There was also a virtual map with 6 stages representing 6 cities and thus 6 buildings built by Eiffage Benelux affiliates. To make it even more motivating, a man walked along the course: the more the employees exercised, the further he got on the map.
We also installed GPS tracking to enable participants to record their sports activity automatically (possibly in certain sports such as running) instead of entering their data manually after their session.
Difficulties during the project:
"Integrating GPS tracking was challenging and caused us a few problems," admits Mathieu, our project manager. "It took us longer than initially planned to implement it, but we found the solution. This integration was the biggest problem of the project.
We also discovered a problem at the end of the project: there were a huge number of elements loaded into the application, which slowed down its operation, but our team quickly solved this situation.
#4.
The benefits
"The project has raised €10,000 for a foundation in Wallonia and €10,000 for an association in Flanders."
Eline Princen and Juliette Murcie are delighted: "The mobile application made it possible to achieve Eiffage Benelux's 3 objectives: motivate our employees to participate in sport, bring them together (the project created a team-building session in each branch) and, finally, raise money for an association."
The first edition of the challenge went down very well and participants said they would like to do it again. Just over 400 out of 2,000 employees participated. It should be noted that 60% of all employees are workers, a group that in Eiffage Benelux's experience is more difficult to involve in such a project. It was therefore a great success for this first sports challenge.
Moreover, the project raised €10,000 for a foundation in Wallonia and €10,000 for an association in Flanders. A very nice amount raised by playing sports together with colleagues. All objectives were achieved !
#5.
Our partnership
"They really are experts in the field, they listened carefully to our needs from the beginning and that is why we achieved such a great result!''
The collaboration went really well for both parties, and Eline Princen and Juliette Murcie are more than satisfied with how the project went. Indeed, they recommended us to further develop the application and add a second sporting challenge.
Here's what they had to say:
"We felt that our needs, what we asked for and so on were listened to very well. Mathieu (the project manager) always made sure we got what we needed," Juliette Murcie explains.
Eline Princen adds, "They really are experts in their field, they really listened to our needs from the very beginning and that's why we ended up with a great result! I also think that for every question we asked, they always knew what was technically possible.''
On our side, the collaboration was also a success! They always responded very quickly, knew what they wanted for their application and were understanding when it came to identifying certain problems.
We look forward to working together again on a second sports challenge !
Do you have a question, a project to develop? Don't hesitate any longer and contact us!