Build & Modernize
Internal Tools & Workflow Automation
A process that took three people and a shared spreadsheet takes one person and a screen.
What this engagement is
Every company has two or three processes that no vendor will ever build for, because they're specific to how that business works. Those processes usually survive on spreadsheets that one person maintains, with the real rules — the exceptions, the overrides, the customers who are handled differently — living in that person's head. That's a fragile way to run anything that matters.
We start by sitting with the people who do the work and documenting the process as it actually runs, including the informal exception handling that never appears in procedure documents. Then we build the smallest tool that runs it properly: validation at entry, permissions by role, and an audit trail recording who changed what and when.
We deliberately keep these tools small. The flexibility that made the spreadsheet work is a feature, so the admin interface lets your team adjust the things that legitimately change — rates, thresholds, categories — without calling us. What you get is the spreadsheet's adaptability with software's reliability, and data imported from your existing files so nobody re-keys history.
Who this is for
- Operations teams whose core process lives in a spreadsheet nobody else can edit
- Companies that bought a SaaS tool and configured it into something unusable
- Businesses needing an audit trail on a process that currently has none
What you get
- Custom internal application with role-based permissions
- Data import from existing spreadsheets and systems
- Full audit trail and export capability
- Admin interface for your own configuration changes
- Training session and written user documentation
Scope
Exactly what the quoted price covers
The scope document for this engagement lists both columns below in writing. Nothing moves between them without a conversation.
Included in the engagement
- Process mapping sessions with the people who do the work daily
- The application itself: interface, validation, permissions, audit trail
- Migration of existing data from spreadsheets and legacy files
- Admin configuration surface for values your team needs to change
- Training with the actual users and a written guide they'll reference
Not included
- Replacing systems that already work adequately (ERP, payroll, email)
- Company-wide rollout of processes beyond the one in scope
- Ongoing feature additions — follow-on phases, quoted separately
Working together
What we need from you
Fixed dates only hold when both sides show up. These are the commitments we ask for in exchange for ours.
- 01
Two or three sessions with the people who currently run the process
- 02
The real spreadsheets and files, including the messy ones
- 03
A pilot group willing to use the tool while the spreadsheet still exists
Process
How it runs
- 01
Process mapping
We sit with the people doing the work and document the real process, including the exceptions they handle informally.
- 02
Build
Weekly increments reviewed by the actual users, not just the project sponsor.
- 03
Migrate and train
Existing data imported and verified, then training run with the team before the spreadsheet is retired.
Also in Build & Modernize
Scope a internal tools & workflow automation engagement.
Send us the situation in a few sentences. You'll get a scope, a price, and a date back — or an honest no.