Dominique Grinnell - Sr. Product Team Manager at Delta Dental of Washington
PLEASE DESCRIBE WHERE YOU WORK AND YOUR POSITION THERE
I work at a dental benefits company, and I lead one of the product groups.
FOR WHAT PROJECTS/SERVICES DID YOUR COMPANY HIRE XYONIX?
We’ve hired Xyonix for a couple of projects. The current one is to create a machine learning tool that will help customers make a better decision about the product that they have purchased, which in our case is dental benefits.
HOW DID YOU SELECT THIS VENDOR AND WHAT WERE THE DECIDING FACTORS?
I selected Xyonix because I’d worked with them before. Another team hired Xyonix to do some work that was pretty complex involving secure information including claims. They were so great to work with, I had interactions with them for some portion of that work. I also talked to the people by whom they were hired, and they had nothing but great things to say about Xyonix.
DESCRIBE THE PROJECT IN DETAIL AND WALK THROUGH THEIR SERVICE PACKAGE.
We’re calling it the “interactive plan finder”. We have six plans for individuals at our company, and insurance benefits are complex. It can be difficult to distinguish between plans. Quite often, they’ll make a decision based on price rather than specific dental conditions or need. So we brought Xyonix onboard to help people make that better decision by serving them a series of questions that would feed into the best plan for them. Not only that, but the tool would also feed us back valuable information about what people value more. If they say they have a periodontal issue, do they value that more or less than this other issue that they have? Or do they value that more than the money they’d need to spend?
This tool would also help us with plan design in the future. If we see that there are many people who say that they have a specific oral care need and none of our plans clearly address that, then we’ll be prompted to evaluate whether we need a plan specific to implants, dentures, or something along those lines. That’s the other learning point for us.
HOW MANY RESOURCES FROM THE VENDOR'S TEAM WORKED WITH YOU, AND WHAT WERE THEIR POSITIONS?
We’ve always worked with two, Andy Skalet and Deep Dhillon. Deep is one of the owners, they both did data science work.
HOW EFFECTIVE WAS THE WORKFLOW BETWEEN YOUR TEAM AND XYONIX?
I think it's very effective. We have a data analyst on our team as well as another marketing manager who has experience doing data analysis. Altogether, there’s a lot of back-and-forth. The flow of information is great, and it’s very fluid. We meet bi-weekly, but a lot of communication happens in the interim.
WHAT DID YOU FIND MOST IMPRESSIVE OR UNIQUE ABOUT XYONIX?
One of the things would be their attention to detail. Another is their creativity. Those are two things that, when you’re doing a data machine learning or AI project, you really need. For us, when we’re thinking about ways that we can improve our business and improve the member experience, it’s great to have somebody who listens to what the business needs are and understands the business well enough. I’m not saying they’re going to go out and write a treatise on dental benefits, but they are definitely able to give us suggestions on improvements in this project that will most certainly push our business forward.
ARE THERE ANY AREAS FOR IMPROVEMENT OR SOMETHING THEY COULD HAVE DONE DIFFERENTLY?
I really can’t think of anything. Deep definitely has given his all in terms of being available for me. For example, when I’ve told him that I’m running out of money and need to talk to senior management to get some funding. I started this project on my own, and this project is getting far bigger than just my department. It’s something the whole company will want. So when I’ve talked to him about my vision for phase 2, phase 3, phase 4, Deep has definitely been a champion for what we’re doing, and extremely willing to provide his expertise and any sort of guidance that I need in making the business case for expanding the project.
HOW WAS THE QUALITY OF XYONIX’S WORK?
5/5
HOW WAS SCHEDULING WITH XYONIX?
4/5 - Only because I don’t like working in the Google system. But it is nice to be able to see the availability of somebody.
HOW WAS THE COST OF XYONIX’S WORK?
-/5 - I don’t have a good way to evaluate that. I think it’s worth it, but I’m working with a very small budget. I think they’re worth every penny. And like seriously, every penny for me counts in my budget.
HOW LIKELY ARE YOU TO REFER XYONIX TO A FRIEND?
5/5
GIVE XYONIX AN OVERALL RATING.
8/5 - I guess a five if we’re being realistic and if we have to make sense. If we don’t have to make sense, I don’t think a five really encapsulates the work that they do. The work is top-notch. It’s what we ask for and more. They go the extra mile in terms of letting us know that whatever we need, they’re there for us to lend their expertise, to be in a meeting if they need to, to explain the project in more detail. So it’s really going above and beyond.