Pilot Guide
One Horizon pilots involve one or two teams and last 1 to 2 weeks. Participating in a pilot is an opportunity for teams to see how One Horizon eliminates status updates and captures progress automatically.
Most teams define "pilot success" as users identifying One Horizon as a tool that saves them hours per week and gives leaders instant visibility without asking.
Below, we share how to select the right teams, gather the evidence you need, and present a data-backed case for One Horizon.
Pick your pilot team
Make a list of engineering teams eager to try something new and that have influence in the larger organization. Review the groups on your list and identify the ones that spend significant time writing status updates, preparing for standups, or gathering progress.
They'll be the most likely to feel the pain of manual reporting and are practically always enthusiastic to pilot a tool that eliminates it.
Once you have at least one ideal team in mind, approach them with a potential pilot timeline. Make modifications based on their input.
Create a "before One Horizon" survey
The purpose of this survey is to gather end user impressions of your current progress reporting and gauge how well (or not) it is working for your teams. Group your questions around several common themes.
Below are three sample topics. Adapt them to your organization's goals, language, and culture.
Reporting overhead
Manual reporting creates friction. Too much friction leads to incomplete data. To get a sense of whether this is a problem for your organization, ask:
Visibility and clarity
Without automatic visibility, leaders spend hours gathering updates. Questions like these show where your current process creates inefficiencies:
Developer experience
Manual reporting interrupts flow. Questions like these show the impact on productivity:
Connect your tools
Teams should connect the tools they use daily:
- GitHub for commits and pull requests
- Linear or Jira for issues and project work
- Google Calendar for meetings and time management
- Slack for sharing recaps and updates
Run your team on One Horizon
Once connected, teams should use One Horizon for 1 to 2 weeks. During this time:
- Developers review their daily recaps
- Team leads checks team progress without asking for updates
- Teams skip or shorten standups
- No one writes manual status updates
We're happy to provide support your organization needs. Reach out if you need help.
Send a post-pilot survey
Reformat the survey questions you created earlier to focus on the One Horizon experience. Leave open text fields next to each question to collect extra commentary. Request feedback by a specific date, at least a week before meeting with leadership, so you have time to compile it.
Sample questions:
Compile your data and present your case
Most individual users tend to love One Horizon. But leaders rarely have time to sift through a long list of anecdotes. To build a clear and concise case, pull out the 4 to 5 most telling quantitative pieces of evidence and put them side-by-side with your baseline. Add an impactful quote to underscore the value of each metric.
Sample metrics to track:
Time savings
Compare hours spent on status updates before and after. Show the reduction in reporting overhead.
Visibility improvement
Compare visibility scores before and after. Show how team leads gained real-time clarity.
Developer satisfaction
Compare developer experience scores before and after. Show how flow time increased.
Adoption rate
Track how many team members actively use One Horizon. High adoption indicates the product works.
Make the switch
A full rollout to One Horizon is the next step. Start by expanding to adjacent teams, then roll out org-wide.