‍"A System's thinker uses a mindset to untangle and work within complexities" - Leyla Acaroglu

Context

Everything brand mission is simple - a platform that pushes everyone to pursue their “Everything”. The brands name speaks to the teams multidimensional background and the verticals the company sits within - Technology, Film, Production, and Fashion. The CEO of the brand reached out looking for a way to streamline their system processes and create workspace environments for each of the verticals. After an in depth discovery and analysis of their current system processes, we were able to build a comprehensive, centralized, Web-based management system that met each verticals needs teams.

Challenges

The team had been using a combination of multiple storage systems, a project management system (trello), and google calendars to stay up to date with meetings etc. - spreadsheets and shared calendars which was proving cumbersome to manage. Majority of their processes were manual and relied on various cloud software systems to store their assets and general specs. In addition, they were using the typical everyday tools for scheduling, communicating and storing other relevant documents with their personal gmail accounts. 

As the business grew, so did their library of content and assets - it became increasingly difficult and inefficient for members to find the documents they needed. Overall their workflow was mostly manual and had a heavy dependency on other members when trying to complete individual tasks.

Needs

The new system had to incorporate the following;

1. Docs needed to be synced across all team workspaces & dashboards - with documentation and process updates clearly displayed.
2. It needed to support recording keeping and processing functions.
3. Same databases can be shared for all functions of the organization
4. easily compile and organize all tasks, assignments, resources and other materials in one view
5. Each team member would need to have their own personalized space with easy syncing capabilities sync with the master database.
6. each member within the verticals of the business should be able to access each other's environment to retrieve/reference documents that live outside their scope.

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Process + Solution

We decided to use Notion as the business management system to manage projects and content material. In addition to being a flexible project management tool, notion provided a solid amount of integration that would make the transition easier for the team (ie synching docs in from google drive, cards from trello, slack for communication, etc)

Notions relational database functionality made it easier for members to retrieve documents across functional dashboards without leaving their own. It also proved to be helpful and identified what was the most up-to-date document within I’ll given workspace.

1. Learn the business + Verticals
2. Find The Pain Points and opportunities for improvement
3. Collect properties and Validate Requirements
4. Design interface UI and test environments
5. Maintain

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Questions + Framework

Elements

• What are the verticals of the business and how would they communicate in the systems - the views, models, behaviour, and structure of the system.
• What are their current tools & process?

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Interconnections + Input/Outputs

• Who Enters the Projects & Tasks?
• Source of input and outputs
• How Users add information to the system and how the system represents information back to the user.
• How are documents stored, created, shared, and updated?
• How the data is modeled and stored within the system.
• How information will move through the system and how will change and updates be communicated and displayed.
• What dependencies do each have on one another?

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Functions & Purpose

• What are their biggest pain points as a team and within each vertical?
• What critical tools/resources need to be prioritized in terms of workspace accessibility for each vertical that needs easy access to from within their workspace?

Impact:

Although the team has only been using the system for a few months, its become evident how efficient their workflow has gotten simply from seeing the quality of the work they continue to produce and at the pace they continue to execute.

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Closing

Check out theEverything. The Brand. Website to Learn more about the brand and their journey thus far.