MESSA iOS and Android Mobile App
Michigan Education Special Services Association
The MESSA mobile app makes complex health benefits information quick to access and easy to understand.
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web
mobile
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desktop
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![](https://cdn.prod.website-files.com/628fcc1631ad0b25b32f223e/62bda9c8422cd467a703a7cd_MESSA-Supporting_fe25e19ecd3ccb2d1839c16b8e269f2a.jpg)
MESSA offers health and disability insurance to over 189,000 Michigan public education professionals and their families.
The health plan administrator knew their next generation of members expected a native mobile experience to complement their highly rated responsive web app.
MESSA already had an experienced web development team. They needed a firm that would build a best-in-class native app while training their web team in mobile development.
MESSA chose Atomic to do both.
Teresa Bendall, Development Manager and Web & Mobile Product Manager at MESSA
![](https://cdn.prod.website-files.com/628fcc1631ad0b25b32f223e/6329d2be98dd31f852febeba_MESSA-Side-by-Sides-2.png)
Coordinating Stakeholders
![](https://cdn.prod.website-files.com/628d552469d2a1b0c6b730a9/63625c0796c6527710c14ea9_Recycle.png)
![](https://cdn.prod.website-files.com/628d552469d2a1b0c6b730a9/63625c054b004d70d1c2c567_Groups.png)
![](https://cdn.prod.website-files.com/628d552469d2a1b0c6b730a9/63625c028a367e8a4bebfcc0_Computer.png)
Technical Specs
Atomic designed the system architecture and wrote software and firmware for:
![](https://cdn.prod.website-files.com/628d552469d2a1b0c6b730a9/6362571bbe17203b58c6ab7b_network.png)
![](https://cdn.prod.website-files.com/628d552469d2a1b0c6b730a9/63625882a89d6c4d89f0e07f_gateway.png)
![](https://cdn.prod.website-files.com/628d552469d2a1b0c6b730a9/636258867bb31f12ea922948_web-app.png)
Phase 2: Developing a Full-feature Workshop Experience
With the Learning Map developed into a digital product, Root wanted to further help users dive into their organization’s strategy, financials, or processes with a second release. Among other features, they sought to create a kind of a virtual whiteboard, where everyone’s voice could be heard in a fun, engaging, and meaningful way.
Atomic’s Software Design Practice Lead in Ann Arbor, Bryan Elkus, led design work on the project. He saw the user experience of going through the Learning Map activities as a type of collaborative online challenge.
Under the guidance of Atomic's Software Consultant & Designer Bryan Elkus, the project emphasized collaborative user experiences, akin to an online group challenge, focusing on:
- Consultants facilitating onboarding, ice-breakers, and exercises.
- Client company employees engaging in organizational change.
Atomic Object Software Consultant & Developer Matt Soto his development work focused on delivering Root’s vision of polish, complex features, and emphasizing a business model around the digital product.
Root's VP, Nate Butki says Atomic’s consultative approach helped the project team uncover and address underlying needs rather than merely executing requests.
“Atomic didn’t want to just figure out what we wanted and give it to us—but rather figured out the need and helped us with it,” he said. “If they had listened to us and spit out exactly what we asked for, they would have only gotten 80 percent of it. Atomic’s team asked the questions and pushed us further.”
Technical Specs
Atomic designed the system architecture and wrote software and firmware for:
![](https://cdn.prod.website-files.com/628d552469d2a1b0c6b730a9/6362571bbe17203b58c6ab7b_network.png)
![](https://cdn.prod.website-files.com/628d552469d2a1b0c6b730a9/63625882a89d6c4d89f0e07f_gateway.png)
![](https://cdn.prod.website-files.com/628d552469d2a1b0c6b730a9/636258867bb31f12ea922948_web-app.png)
Building for the Future
Atomic designers did real-world research to discover which features MESSA members valued most. Features such as deductible progress, member card information, and customer service are at the touch of a screen.
To complement the MESSA team's experience in web frameworks, Atomic built the app in React Native. MESSA developers could maintain and build out the app even after Atomic handed off the project.
Using Extreme Programming techniques such as full stack development, peer-reviewed code, and pair programming, Atomic set the MESSA team up for success by sharing mobile development best practices.
“Your crew is exceedingly talented and helped lead us through the questions we needed to talk about. I’ve never worked with a vendor with such exceptional collaboration.”
![](https://cdn.prod.website-files.com/628fcc1631ad0b25b32f223e/6329d5316c50277fff1e886a_iPad-Feature-Circle-2.png)
Phase 2: Developing a Full-feature Workshop Experience
With the Learning Map developed into a digital product, Root wanted to further help users dive into their organization’s strategy, financials, or processes with a second release. Among other features, they sought to create a kind of a virtual whiteboard, where everyone’s voice could be heard in a fun, engaging, and meaningful way.
Atomic’s Software Design Practice Lead in Ann Arbor, Bryan Elkus, led design work on the project. He saw the user experience of going through the Learning Map activities as a type of collaborative online challenge.
Under the guidance of Atomic's Software Consultant & Designer Bryan Elkus, the project emphasized collaborative user experiences, akin to an online group challenge, focusing on:
• Consultants facilitating onboarding, ice-breakers, and exercises.
• Client company employees engaging in organizational change.
Atomic Object Software Consultant & Developer Matt Soto his development work focused on delivering Root’s vision of polish, complex features, and emphasizing a business model around the digital product. Root's VP, Nate Butki says Atomic’s consultative approach helped the project team uncover and address underlying needs rather than merely executing requests.
“Atomic didn’t want to just figure out what we wanted and give it to us—but rather figured out the need and helped us with it,” he said. “If they had listened to us and spit out exactly what we asked for, they would have only gotten 80 percent of it. Atomic’s team asked the questions and pushed us further.”
Nate Butki, Root VP
Taste-testing the Product in the Field
Delivering A Great Product and An Empowered Team
By getting to share their decades’ experience with agile practices, Atomic’s team got to watch the counterparts at Root develop new skills over the course of the second engagement.
Soto says he loved watching Root’s inherently collaborative culture adopt the agible practices they were learning.
“After a few months, they loved how easy and smooth it was to make last-minute changes, to pivot in another direction, and use feedback to spend their time where it was most impactful,” he said.
Root’s Jared Page says the agile approach to product design, development, and management he saw during the engagement had a profound impact.
“One of my favorite things about this project is that everyone got better—better at our jobs and better with communication; it just feels cool,” he said. “Sometimes you work for a year and don’t know if you’ve improved but everyone could look back on this project and say they’ve improved. This project changed the way I will work forever.”
Nathan Papes, Software Consultant and Developer at Atomic Object
Coordinating Stakeholders
![](https://cdn.prod.website-files.com/628d552469d2a1b0c6b730a9/63625c0796c6527710c14ea9_Recycle.png)
![](https://cdn.prod.website-files.com/628d552469d2a1b0c6b730a9/63625c054b004d70d1c2c567_Groups.png)
![](https://cdn.prod.website-files.com/628d552469d2a1b0c6b730a9/63625c028a367e8a4bebfcc0_Computer.png)
A Partnership with a Storybook Ending
The team’s careful project management, client communication, cutting-edge architecture, and cohesive design strategy helped the team ship the product on time and on budget.
Reflecting back on the multi-year, high-profile project, Robinson said Atomic helped his company arrive at a special moment in time.
“We'd never done anything this big. Ever,” he said. “We’re live across all the major pillars Atomic said they would deliver on. It was delivered on time, on budget, to expectation, live. Not three or four milestones late with people leaving and the platform half-baked and full of bugs.”
StoryLoom began open-beta in December 2022. A global launch is scheduled for the spring of 2023.
“We’ve been given a rare opportunity," said Robinson, "to find success by chasing opportunities Starship Enterprise-style: going where people aren’t—pushing boundaries.”
Atomic provided research, design, and development services while partnering with MESSA's web development team to deliver an app they could maintain well into the future.