Exceeding expectations and meeting quick legislative deadlines
How Cornflower Modules helped a State of Colorado division comply with fast-moving legislative changes
A State division with a four-month legislative deadline for a suite of new laws engaged Cornflower Labs and the Cornflower Modules product to deploy a custom form-based data collection, review, approval, and archiving pipeline.
Cornflower delivered a fully-functioning production system within 2 months, including nice-to-have features in the initial launch.
The result: Cornflower delivered the fastest and most complete client-facing data input, review, and processing system that the Division had experienced, and ensured agency compliance before a fast-approaching deadline.
The problem: Solving a massive data influx on a short legislative timeline
Leadership at a State of Colorado Division needed a platform for hundreds of external stakeholders to send semi-structured data to the State for a variety of new laws within mere months. This division was in a high-pressure environment, searching for a proven system that could offer customizability and could be deployed quickly while also adapting to their unique needs, including structured review capabilities, file management, and GIS analysis.
In addition, the Division sought a partner for long-term technology transformation and identified the Cornflower Modules platform as an opportunity to build a base that could enable transformative projects and experiments over the long term.
The approach: Leveraging legislative requirements as an opportunity for Division-wide innovation
Cornflower created a customized deployment of their Modules product – an integrated form, data processing, data analysis, and workflow management system – which adapted to the Division’s unique needs while leveraging Modules’ wide feature set. On day one, Modules contained the mission-critical functionality for the Division, including user accounts and user management, task assignment, and a review pipeline for the Division to internally and externally respond to external submissions. It also came pre-configured with other desired features, including integration with the State’s technology stack, data visualization capabilities, and previous approval of the State’s security requirements for system hosting and deployment.
By tightly integrating with the client team using Google chat rooms and engaging in daily communication, Cornflower rapidly gained info on the context of the project and immediate requirements in a matter of weeks, which enabled shortened delivery times within an Agile approach. By one week after contract execution, the Division and external local government users were providing initial feedback on a test system, and within three weeks were testing and reviewing the implemented system.
Services provided
- Cornflower Modules implementation
- Process improvement
- Open database access and data infrastructure
- SQL query design and recommendations for data analysis
- Custom user-centered design for new features
Value created: Helping analysts maximize their impact by automating and structuring data from external stakeholders
By using Cornflower Modules, the Division kicked off a ground-up open platform for data across their division and department, solving not only their immediate legislative mandates but also long-term digitalization and modernization goals.
By using industry standard cloud deployment, code, and database tools, the agency enabled a high degree of interoperability with other existing and future parts of their business processes. This flexibility allowed the agency to rapidly respond to future mandates and changes, including, for example:
- New legislative requirements for data collection
- Updates or augmentations to the data currently being collected
- Process modifications, including changes to internal approval processes
- Archival or other documentation requirements
- Additional integrations with other software systems such as Tableau and GIS software through APIs, database connections, and file transfer/downloads
The Cornflower Modules approach enabled first-class integrations with Tableau, Looker Studio, and other business tools to leverage Cornflower Modules as a central dashboard for the Division’s work. As such, the Modules Platform automates myriad formerly manual processes such as free-form, email-based questionnaires and the manual archiving of final reports.
The entire Cornflower Modules system uses a transparent SQL-based data schema and follows data design best practices. This enables Division data analysts and decision-makers to easily access their data and make business decisions via SQL queries, Tableau, and other visualization tools.
“Cornflower Labs is an outstanding partner for any government agency or organization looking for a full-service digital solution. I had the pleasure of working with Rob and Andrew Schwartz from Cornflower Labs on a critical project for the Colorado Department of Local Affairs.
They were selected from a competitive bid process to deliver a ground-up solution for data collection and reporting for new state legislation. With a tight three-month deadline before our first critical milestone, Cornflower Labs not only delivered, but they exceeded our expectations.
Their team diligently worked to understand our unique needs, outlined a clear and detailed scope of work, and established a task management process that kept everyone organized and on track. By working directly with our internal and external stakeholders, they delivered a customized solution that was on schedule and ahead of the statutorily dictated reporting milestone.
I continue to be impressed by their strong work ethic, collaborative spirit, and positive attitudes. I highly recommend Cornflower Labs and look forward to our next big project with them!”