Pega golf challenge experience: Capgemini’s “Golf in a Snap” solution

In 2021 we announced a multiyear agreement establishing Pega as a worldwide supplier of the 43rd and 44th Ryder Cup; we also welcomed two professional golfers, Marc Leishman (PGA TOUR) and Mel Reid (LPGA Tour), to our team as Brand Ambassadors.

You may be wondering, what does tech have to do with golf? Well, there are many ways that technology supports, promotes, and celebrates sporting events of all kinds such as enhancing the fan experience or helping reduce the environmental impacts of sporting events. We put these ideas into action by hosting the Pega Golf Challenge, a unique global competition where individuals and teams from around the world collaborated to design, propose, and build applications for how Pega technologies can be used to improve different aspects of golf.

This competition was a huge success that empowered teams to collaborate and think creatively, and we are excited to share the winning stories and experiences with you. First up, Capgemini with their fan-centric application called “Golf in a snap”!

Meet team Capgemini!

This five-person team at Capgemini designed and built a Pega application that focuses on the golf fan experience. The Golf in a snap application enables fans and enthusiasts to view upcoming golf tournament schedules from around the world, book tournament tickets, purchase merchandise, schedule transportation, and research lodging all in one unified mobile experience.

Each team member enjoys a variety of sporting events and understands what it’s like to be a fan and how to improve that experience. With a focus on golf, the team wanted to create a new experience for fans to engage with the sport and their favorite athletes.

Let’s hear more from the team to find out how they built one of the top solutions in the inaugural Pega Golf Challenge!

What approach did you use to build your winning application?

Building this application was very interesting because though we don’t know much about golf, we are sports fans, and we understand the excitement and importance for fans of all sports. We utilized the agile methodology for building their application solution because this approach enables us to prioritize tasks and easily pivot as changes and updates are made. Applications can be complex and the agile methodology lets us be flexible so that we can make changes and improvements as we work and learn.

Which Pega Express best practices did you use and what impact did it have on your project?

App design and development can be a daunting project and we wanted to make sure that we could build a successful and robust solution for this challenge. We really benefited by breaking up app features into microjourneys, which is a practice we learned with Pega. Microjourneys align well with the agile methodology because it means we can focus on smaller parts of a large and complex application, rather than trying to build everything at once. Microjourneys enable us to prioritize features based on real fan needs. We were also able to easily configure interfaces and quickly build out each element of the application. This approach ensured that our application was well-built and truly catered to what golf fans need when they are at a tournament.

What are some takeaways and lessons learned from this experience?

We got to explore the Pega app studio, which improved our development process. We also learned a lot from our brainstorm sessions as a team and with the Pega Express team.

One of the most exciting and impactful parts of project was how we built app features based on our own practical and personal experiences. We understand and love the excitement of live experiences as well as the challenges with booking event tickets and purchasing merchandise. We’ve experienced the disconnect between a fan and their favorite sporting events, so we gathered pinpoints as a team of sport fans and built around seven to eight features within our application that we now call Golf in a snap.

Teamwork makes the dream work

We worked well as a team and took the time to work on this together by using personal interests and passions to motivate us and drive the project forward. We’d like to give a shoutout to Ralph Booth, Nick Lake, and the Pega Express team for their support and encouragement. With them, we learned helpful tips and tricks, engaged in some great brainstorming sessions, and created a winning solution.