Services on the conveyor. How is the information infrastructure of WebCanape?

We often hear the phrase from the client: "You do not rush, make a high quality." Why does everyone think that the longer a project is done, the better it is? Yes, he just does not do it! If it is fast, it means quality, if it is long, there will be no result.

In this article I will talk about the systems on which the site development pipeline is built. Today, only technical details and no water. For those who treat the conveyor as stamping, I’ll immediately say that this has nothing to do with “stamping”. But to save hundreds and hundreds of hours - yes. Bonus more - improving quality and speed. Come under the cut and try on yourself.
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All WebCanape work takes place in several systems that are responsible for management, production and analytics. In this article we will consider only what the managerial staff works with.

Work with applications

The application from the client always goes to CRM. Like most of our systems, we have CRM samopisnaya. We affectionately call it a “calculator”, because It began from the system of automated calculation of project costs. Now, of course, it is already much more than CRM and, especially, a calculator, but the name has been preserved.

After filling in the order form on our website, a link to an online questionnaire (brief) is automatically sent to the client. All the documents we use are online documents. Brief, respectively, too. After the client has filled out the brief, the manager receives a notification, and he calls up the client.



At this point, our most experienced manager joins in the work. His task is to choose the right decision with the client and to give up what we cannot quickly accomplish.

After agreeing on all the nuances of the project application goes into the deal. Before the transaction turns into a project, it must go through 4 stages: cost calculation, proposal formation, contract and payment.

Work with deals

At each stage, a separate electronic document is created (settlement, KP, contract, invoice), the link to which is sent to the client. The time of the project at each stage and status is logged so that you can later see the project life cycle.

At the stage of calculating the cost, we form a team, select the scope of work and modules. The modules have a standard rating (it can be adjusted if the work or module is non-standard) and a description. Everything is done automated with the help of the above mentioned calculator.



At the press of a button, we have at the exit a commercial offer with deadlines and a detailed description of the scope of work. In the introduction, the manager gives comments on the proposal and their contact details.

This is how our standard KP looks like, which we send to the client. By the same principle, an agreement is formed.

When the transaction is brought to the contract and everything is agreed, the manager gives the client a link to the account. If the client is ready to pay with electronic money or a bank card, we have provided integration with Robokassa and Yandex.Casa (for backup).



After paying the bill, the account manager automatically receives a notification. Invoice paid - the transaction turns into a project. The project is assigned an executive manager, who then leads the project until the launch.

In order to quickly decide on which of the managers to put a new project, we are currently developing a module that helps to quickly decide on the choice of the freest manager.


An example of the presentation of information on the manager on the dashboard

For managers, this is an element of gamification, and for a traffic manager, it is an opportunity to quickly understand the situation and choose the most suitable manager for this project.

Important. A lot of time is spent on business processes, which can be freed up for other useful work. This time is difficult to notice in the constant routine of affairs, but with summary statistics, we see delays and can think about how to reduce them. I assure you, they account for the bulk of the loss of time, freeing that, you get the key to efficiency.

Work with projects

On this part of the conveyor there are several stages that a project goes through: collecting materials, developing, testing, launching, and delivering a project. At each of the stages is considered the time in hours and in days. This is required to summarize the statistics (more on this below).



In addition to the stages, the project has statuses: “In Work”, “Approval”, “Finish”, “Suspended”. The transition of a project from status to status is accompanied by an e-mail – notification to the client. This allows you to avoid correspondence and additional customer calls + disciplines the manager (just because the project can not be stopped).

It is worth noting that for all the steps (including those that I have already described) we have a clear schedule of work. It is described in the corporate Canape cooking book. Even if the manager is not sufficiently experienced, he can always look at the phasing of work and do everything without mistakes. Now all the steps are painted in the regulations, but plans to perform most of them at the touch of a button.
While we have simplified the presentation of layouts to customers by sending a link to clients ( see example )

Looking ahead, I’ll say that during the course of the project we measure some important indicators: hours spent at the stage of work (controlling profitability), project time in standard days (controlling terms under the contract), project time in calendar days (monitoring meeting customer’s expectations in terms of ). It is these indicators, or rather their performance + feedback from the client, that underlie the bonus system for managerial staff.



Collecting information and putting the project into operation. Until we collect all the information to complete the project within the terms specified in the contract, it is not allowed to work. And let the customers forgive us for this, but it benefits all. First of all, it guarantees the delivery of the project within the contractual period. All information from the client is collected on a check list.

Putting into operation is the deployment and setup of the site on the test domain, which will later become the site for the client. We will describe this in detail in one of the following articles.

Development, testing and launch. These are the working steps that the project goes through before we upload it to the hosting and transfer it to the client. At all these stages, we measure the time and time spent by specialists. It is very important to understand that you are late or go beyond the budget, not at the end of development, but in advance. This allows you to see the problem in advance, adjust priorities and release projects on time.

At the stage of project delivery, it is published in the portfolio, the client is asked for feedback about the work, information about the involved specialists is collected, etc. Without this work, the manager cannot complete the project.

Summing up and evaluation of results

How much are unsuccessful projects for the studio, I wrote earlier . Therefore, we are so attentive to the "success" of production. At the end of each month we hold a meeting of group leaders at which we analyze and evaluate the results of the work. Above, I described how we collect this data. Below I show how we evaluate them.

First of all, we are interested in meeting deadlines and standards for projects. This is the report that our system builds:



If the average is all good, then the production works fine and you can deal with individual projects where the indicators went beyond the normal range. Talk reason and action.

From the indicators, we are interested in how we managed to do it in the allotted hours (profitability), days (terms under the contract) and how standard-days differ from calendar days. See the total plate.

Further, we consider the same statistics in the context of managers. Statistics tells us which of the managers and in which direction we need to work in order to increase its effectiveness. This is followed by the team leader.



In case of disputable situations when the cause of the delay is not obvious, we can always look in the project log and find out how the project was conducted. For each project you can see the event log.

What happens at this time in production?

At the moment when I am writing this material, there are 54 projects and 426 tasks in work. All this needs to be processed and done on time. For this there is a special production system. She keeps everything under control. It sets the priorities of projects depending on the contractual deadlines and in accordance with this: 1) displays them on TV, tinting according to the proximity of the deadline; 2) prioritizes (sequence of execution) tasks for developers. Accordingly, the system decides for itself what to do for the deadlines to be fulfilled. We will tell about it in the following note. Subscribe to our blog to not miss the sequel.

PS And do not think that automation will save the business. Call customer :)

Vasily Churanov and WebCanape team