CareKleen

Through workflow digitization, efficiency from sales inquiry to response increased.

Case Study of Project CareKleen

Nichelabs always provides services of the highest caliber with the experience of more than seven years in the industry, and the products are always supplied in a timely manner while paying close attention to the needs of the customer. The satisfaction of our clients at the conclusion of a project is a significant driver of our efforts. The Dashboard and mobile application were developed for CareKleen Janitorial Services Pvt Ltd in order to digitize and automate a particular Sales Process, and this article outlines the development process.

The Client

Being a 30-year-old company, CareKleen is an Enterprise level janitorial service situated in Sri Lanka which employs over 3,500 employees to provide services to the largest corporations in Sri Lanka, such as banks, insurance firms, retail chains, and other institutions. For the purposes of this project, we focused on their primary industry vertical of cleaning services.

The Problem

According to their business process flow, CareKleen was supposed to provide quotations for their customers after inspecting the client’s requirements. As a first step, an inspector should inspect and gather the client requirement. When an inspection is successfully conducted, inspectors must document the results and submit them to the back office. The back office has to manually prepare the quotation by checking out the costing sheets. Also they had to submit the finalized quotation to the administrators for further proceedings with the request.

It was a time consuming operation to provide a quotation for a client request. In order to carry out the business, managing multiple inspections per day was required. The first is the time required to finish the paperwork of inspections, and second is the checking of costings, and converting them to quotations with the approval from relevant department heads.

Our Solution

After carefully studying the client’s requirements, our team came to the conclusion that there should be a mobile app that is simple for employees who are in the fields at the time to manage their inspections. Alone with that we proposed a web dashboard that would link to this mobile app for their back office, administration, finance, and sales teams. After combining both mobile app & web dashboard, we are able to cover their time consuming & crucial business operations. And also create automated and digitized processes to converts consumer requests into final offers

First the client request comes to the back office, and the back office enters the details of the client including the field visit date, time and location to the system. Also the back office thereby assigns the inspection to a specific inspector via the system. There the inspector will get notification with all the required details. Inspector can select one of the assigned inspections and start inspecting client requirements. During the inspection, the inspector inserts the data into the system via mobile app. After the inspection finishes the inspector can simply click on the submission button of the inspection and complete the inspection process. Inspector is responsible for the details provided and the details are visible to the back office. Thereby the back office can convert the details into the quotation. After that the back office can assign the quotation to a respective administrator using the system and the administrator can thereby view the quotation, and get connected with the client and produce the quotation to the client.

To support the business flow we entered different features to the web dashboard. By clicking a one button, the back office can convert the inspection sheet into a quotation and inside the business process, costing sheets had to be updated regularly and for that we provided an easy way for the users to update the costing sheets. Whenever a quotation is created the user can download the quotation in a pdf format according to their need. Additionally through the system the created quotation can be assigned to an administrator for its approval. Also as another special feature , by using the system, the user can directly send the quotation to the client via email. Also if more senders are needed multiple email addresses can be added by users catering to such requirements. Furthermore, another special feature inside the system is that the users can track the progress of a client request and its current status. Moreover, as there are multiple types of users using the system such as inspectors and sales team, we provided the facility to manage its users inside the system.

Execution

With this in mind, our team, led by our CTO Mr. Asela, launched the project. First, we determined which technologies would be appropriate for the project. We created a workflow with a set timeline and resources. Before beginning this project, we laid some groundwork for the software. The preliminary work included tasks such as conducting a feasibility study, determining the project scope and strategy, and so on. To further grasp the customer’s needs, we spoke with the client multiple times during interviews. As a team, we then meticulously outlined every criterion provided by the client so that we could plan our development accordingly. We started a process called the “discovery phase” which is a special feature of our business.

It was more of a requirement-gathering phase, but with more effort put in by identifying risks, creating wireframes, timelines, and so on it took about two weeks to document and sort out all of the requirements. For that discovery phase, the client had to pay a separate fee for the expertise we provide with the project plan. By the end of this phase, the client had a good idea of what he would receive as the final product. We then presented the client with the project’s premise as well as the resources available. We took the client’s budget and timeline constraints into account and discussed the project budget with them. Following the presentation of the final quotation, we signed an agreement. Following that, the actual software development phase began.

Our intention is to be totally open and honest. The NicheLabs team thinks the consumer should be able to see any mistakes we make throughout development. The agile/project management board was in attendance. The client was also invited to take part in our development process. Although the client could occasionally be too busy or unavailable, we’ve discovered that most clients like being informed of what’s happening and taking part in the process. The client made note of this feature in his testimonial even after the project was finished. And he was quite appreciative of the involvement.

Design

We started by identifying the user type for the software. The majority of users are illiterate, middle-aged, or elderly Sri Lankans. We started designing and ultimately finished a very basic UI for the mobile application and web dashboard after taking all of this into consideration. Some of the mandatory fields in the app are automatically completed as part of our user-friendly design. Additionally, there were autofill values and system suggestions. The data forms can be finished quickly. Utilizing this app is easy and quick. Also validations are included to assist users in avoiding errors. The client was ecstatic about it. Team Nichelabs always uses this procedure to involve our clients as much as feasible in our projects.

Development

The development process then proceeded as it would in any other modern software development company. This included a variety of engineering processes ensuring that the code is running properly. Extra care was taken to ensure quality. We always try to go above and beyond and give our all. This project received a great deal of attention to detail. There were a total of seven sprints inside the development phase and after every sprint our client was able to use new features of the system. The client was extremely confident with the application. We believe in adding value to our end product by adhering to these Agile Principles.

Testing & Deployment

Our primary goal in this project was to deliver the product meeting the industry standards while delivering it on time as well. For that as a Quality team, to ensure the standard of the project we worked as a one team. It included two QA and deployment managers. The key responsibilities of the deployment managers included, ensuring whether the mobile application matches with the guidelines of play store. And the other responsibility included, hosting the web dashboard in the cloud. When it comes to the QA the responsibilities of QA carry out checking functionalities of the entire mobile application and web dashboard , ensuring every feature works well.

Training

The system was specially designed & created according to the client’s requirements, it was mandatory to give training to the employees of CareKleen on how to use the new system. It was an additional requirement to ensure that the users were comfortable with the system. We held two training sessions one was virtual and the other one was physical . The client was overjoyed that our team went beyond the expectations to assist them in learning the system. After the training, the users were familiar with the system and the client integrated the system into their day to day process.

Summary

There may be various ways to achieve success, and success itself may have various definitions. Nevertheless, NicheLabs defines success as the satisfied smiles on our clients’ faces. Agile principles are the ideal strategy to follow for bringing a development project to a successful end, according to our years of experience as a software development company. The trust of our clients has been earned by consistent adherence to our values of a client-first mindset and value addition through extra work and attention to detail.

Through workflow digitization, efficiency from sales inquiry to response increased​.