Flowfinity enabled us to build a solution tailored for our unique business needs, and helped keep our overall software costs down by eliminating the need for us to purchase multiple expensive out-of-the-box solutions.
Level-It Installations Improves Efficiency by 50% with Flowfinity Workflow Automation Software
Company: Level-It Installations Ltd.
Region: Americas
Company Size: Medium Enterprise
Industry: Construction, Architecture
Function: Field Service, Dispatch Operations, Scheduling, Timesheets, Job Costing
Overview
Level-It Installations Ltd. is an architecturally specialized construction company that offers planning, procurement and installation solutions for clients across North America. Headquartered in Vancouver, Canada, Level-It has a diverse network of customers including high end tech companies.
With business doubling every year, the organization needed a better way to track all of its ongoing projects, including the activities of construction contractors across the continent. They were looking for a way to build a powerful information system, and efficiently scale it to keep up with company growth.
Level-It selected Flowfinity software to create mobile applications for automating its unique business processes. Now, Level-It has custom, end-to-end business applications that help management ensure their growing number of complex projects are completed on time, and on budget.
"Change orders occur frequently and job statuses can be requested multiple times per day, so real-time reporting is fantastic."
With Flowfinity, Level-It achieved:
- 50% time saved by Operations Management
- Replaced lengthy phone calls, spreadsheets and emails with mobile apps for higher efficiency
- Faster deployment of business applications to keep up with new business processes
- Ability to update business applications, faster and more easily
- Improved staff accountability
- Faster reporting with a cloud-based, centralized database
The Challenge
Level-It had seen consistent company growth, year after year, and manual processes involving phone calls, emails, and spreadsheets could no longer keep up. The company needed to collect data from the field faster to handle more and more construction projects. The data also needed to be accurate and reliable, as it is used for budgeting, scheduling, payroll, and other business process.
Level-It was looking for a flexible and scalable mobile business process management solution that could meet stringent data collection requirements, and grow with the company.
"We needed a software tool that could cater to our business workflow needs," said Angie Marston,
Assistant Operations Manager, Level-It Installations. "It also needed to enable detailed reporting, so we could show transparency into our operations at any given moment."
The Solution
Level-It selected Flowfinity, a flexible software solution for building robust business applications, without any code. The software's powerful features, easy to use app building interface, and overall flexibility allow Level-It to implement mobile apps for collecting field data faster and streamlining mission-critical business processes.
"Flowfinity is a sophisticated, user-friendly tool that enables us to create end-to-end mobile workflow solutions for a diverse range of business processes," said Marston. "It enabled us to build a solution tailored for our unique business needs, and helped keep our overall software costs down by eliminating the need for us to purchase multiple expensive out-of-the-box solutions."
"Flowfinity is a sophisticated, user-friendly tool... it enabled us to build a solution tailored for our unique business needs."
Results
Faster deployment of mobile applications, easier updates
With teams expanding each year, it was challenging to ensure all staff were following the proper workflows. Flowfinity allows mobile applications to be designed and deployed faster, shortening the development lifecycle and keeping up with business demand. With one click, all mobile forms and applications updates are made instantly and applied across all platforms, so users have access to the most up-to-date versions. This ensures each user is working with the right applications for guiding them through proper procedures and workflow steps.
Faster reporting with cloud-based, centralized database
Previously, with numerous emails and manual processes, it was easy to lose track of valuable business data. This equated to lost money and wasted company time of expensive, highly-skilled field staff. Now, all critical business data is uploaded instantly into a centralized, searchable database that's automatically managed. Reports for management are completed faster, and updates are provided in real-time.
"We're achieving greater insight into our business with the level of detailed reporting Flowfinity provides us," said Marston. "We identify issues faster to remain proactive and eliminate inefficiencies in any of our processes. Real-time updates help improve operational intelligence, and enable our company to make better decisions."
Increased efficiency of managing operations by 50%
By enabling field staff to collect data and track jobs on smartphones and tablets, Level-It has improved its efficiency in managing operations at head office by 50%.
"Since implementing Flowfinity, we have reduced the time spent on reviewing data and generating reports by 50%," said Eva Larson, Accounts and Payroll Director, Level-It Installations. "From head office, we manage construction contractors and projects across the country, and Flowfinity applications help us ensure the information captured on-site is more accurate and reliable."
Level-It is planning to eliminate the use of an expensive version of payroll software that's mandatory for union reporting. With Flowfinity's enhanced data reporting capabilities, the organization will only require the basic version of ADP which will decrease payroll costs by 50%.
"We have reduced the time spent on reviewing data and generating reports by 50%."
Improved staff accountability
Since teams in the office can obtain updates from the field at any time, there's no more waiting for end of day numbers. Projects statuses can be viewed mid-progress for a better idea of whether deadlines are being met, employees are remaining productive, and expenses are within budget.
"With Flowfinity, we're able to effectively track what our field staff are working on, and learn how to optimize their time," said Marston. "The transparency gives us better accountability to make better choices about how we use our labor force. We're seeing a major shift in field efficiency."
Level-It's Service Division has also improved work order management. The division can now easily manage work order tracking requirements by customers, and facilitate job costing which platforms previously used could not handle.
"We closely monitor various stages of work orders for better time management," said Brooke Ridley, Service Division PM, Level-It Installations. "Change orders occur frequently and job statuses can be requested multiple times per day, so real-time reporting is fantastic."
Scalable and effective business systems
As the organization continues to grow, it's often difficult to anticipate what new business processes will be required. With Flowfinity's powerful customization features, including deep links and web services API, Level-It has full confidence that new business apps will be created and integrated seamlessly. For example, the organization recently added call-outs to link Flowfinity with third-party calendar applications to facilitate job scheduling.
"We're not limited to what we can do with Flowfinity, as it has the flexibility and functionality to evolve with us," said Larson. "As soon as we need a new business application or feature built into our system, we know it can be done immediately and smoothly."
Future
Level-It plans to explore Flowfinity's real-time dashboards soon, helping to improve operational intelligence further. The organization could effectively visualize and measure key performance indicators in an easy to consume format.
"Flowfinity apps are consistently helping us identify areas that can save us money, and the addition of real-time dashboards will take it one step further," said Marston.
