Mabey Hire - App Rebuild
Client
Mabey Hire
Services
Software DevelopmentLaravel DevelopmentAPIs & Integrations
Discipline
Construction
Equipment Hire
Location
UK & Europe
Look how we rebuilt a construction company’s internal systems’ front end to improve functionality, security, cost effectiveness and speed to change for their CRM and engineering management platform.
Look how we rebuilt a construction company’s internal systems’ front end to improve functionality, security, cost effectiveness and speed to change for their CRM and engineering management platform.
Project Overview
Mabey Hire’s internal system, which served as their CRM as well as a tool for managing engineering design requests, had been built on a framework that was not widely used by modern developers.
A major goal was to move the platform to the Laravel / Vue framework. There were also multiple opportunities to identify, flesh out and implement updates to the system that would allow for alignment with the evolving requirements that, as a business, their progressive processes followed. In other words, make future work simpler, quicker and cheaper to carry out.
As well as moving the front end of the system onto a framework that was more widely used in the development world (and therefore reduce risk to the business), we would also wanted to identify the solutions we could implement that wouldn’t cost more in development time but would result in updated processes that matched the progress the business had made since the initial launch of the system. This would involve some workshops and research to uncover the opportunities.
Our Approach
Project Discovery
Our approach to this fits into two distinct categories. The first was to identify and create a site map so that we knew the scope of the project we were rebuilding. Secondly, we wanted to identify any pain points in the system so that we could rebuild in a way that kept all the best parts of the functionality and improved where achievable.
What we identified
| The Problem | The Solution |
|---|---|
| The enquiry flow - whereby a customer’s enquiry for services from Mabey Hire was not fully fit for purpose, and was a key user flow that got a lot of traffic. | We mapped out the business logic for the existing enquiry flow. We then conducted a workshop with key members of the Mabey Hire team to map out the requirements of the process, and comparing that to the existing flow, we designed a new enquiry flow that was fit for purpose. |
| The entire system requiring rebuilding. | We liaised with the client and segmented the project into individual pages and functionalities that we could target as chunks to develop in a manageable way. We drew up the requirements for each section and created a comprehensive roadmap for our developers to follow. |
| The system was data heavy and needed to display large amounts of data in a user friendly way. | We built things in a component-led way. The system for example, had lots of tables of data, so we built one component that could be tweaked to serve all the tables’ purposes. The initial work beforehand led to reduced work overall, and a very manageable future. This approach was also used when tackling tables, forms and page containers so that the structure of the code was simple to develop and effective in implementation. |
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The Project Goals
Establishing clear goals is essential in any project, as it guides decision-making and keeps the team focused on desired outcomes. The primary goals we established for building a solution for the front-end rebuild for Mabey Hire were:
| Protect existing functionality | Mapping out the entire site map and business logic to form part of the specification. |
| Reduce future build and maintenance costs | Using our expertise to recommend best practise in terms of frameworks used and coding practises implemented |
| Improve functionality for key areas | Workshoppping and discovery phases to understand the need before building |
| Improve the mobile experience | Introduce solutions that work to display large amounts of data on mobile screens without being overwhelming |
Solving for Mobile
The existing system was being used on mobile by the sales team who would be out in the field meeting clients; however, mobile had never been considered when the existing system was originally put together.
A major challenge was needing to display lots of data on such a small piece of real estate - the phone screen.
Our UX designers, front-end developers and solutions architects brought together their expertise to find ways of ensuring the large amounts of data were still accessible on a mobile screen, whilst not overwhelming the user's experience.
The end result was made up of, but not limited to, accordions, a selective table viewer system, side drawers, and a complete restructuring of tables
The Results
60%
reduction in all future development costs
100%
uptake from users
Futureproof
a more accessible codebase for future developers
Project Summary
Rebuilding an entire CRM’s front end and engineering task management system is a massive undertaking. We have currently achieved the CRM rebuild, which includes an overhaul of key processes whilst not losing any initial functionality outside of that which was identified as obsolete. Mobile-friendly functionality has also been introduced, a key requirement for the sales team operating whilst meeting with clients.
The system has been developed in a way that allows for components to be reused across the site and for future projects, meaning that coding for existing and new projects is significantly reduced.
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