MegaSack DRAW - This year's winner is user - rgwb
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Hello,
I need some advice on how to go about getting a website/database/app built to assist with the running of a company. I know very little on this kind of thing and am not sure who or what sort of company I would need to approach to discuss making such a thing? (website creators, software developers, app developer, etc? I’m not sure who I should be asking!)
I am looking to setup a website/app which allows staff members to create an account from which they can login and store their employer information such as training certificates and emergency contact information, etc. Crucially though, it needs to have the ability for the staff members to record their attendance when out visiting sites. By this, I mean there needs to be a function whereby the staff member can provide evidence of their attendance to site (basically the ability for staff members to sign-in/out from sites that they are visiting), ie, by clicking a button which logs the time, date and location of the staff member and then records it into a database accessible by their manager so the amount time each staff member spends onsite can be proved. (Staff members are required to record the time they arrive, and time they leave site - they currently do this on standard timesheets but these are very open to fraud).
Can anyone advise me how I could go about getting such a website built? Any website/software developer recommendations or advise would be hugely appreciated.
This is exactly what my mate has developed. Give me 5 mins and I'll drop his contacts details in a pm.
I would be looking at finding something off the shelf that meets your needs (or as much as possible for what you're willing to spend), as to design and develop it from scratch will cost you, at a guess, tens of thousands of pounds. Then you also have to think about who will support it when it goes wrong, maintain it, add new users to it, remove old users etc etc etc.
First rule of IT - buy, don't build.
Don't do it. Not only is app/website development for something like this a significant undertaking, but if you're storing potentially private and/or sensitive information, you will need to know all the various regulations, too.
As @IHN said - this has been solved, several times, by experts. Buy it in!
^ What they've said. Pay for software / a service that's established and reliable. It'll be ready sooner, well tested, regularly backed up and will work better.
By all means have a small website for the basic landing pages (Homepage, About us, staff login, contact us etc) but use a 3rd party for the complicated stuff.
Write down exactly what you need, then go look at what's available.
Prepare to sacrifice some 'wants'.
Can anyone advise me how I could go about getting such a website built? Any website/software developer recommendations or advise would be hugely appreciated.
BreatheHR does this all already - why develop something new with all the GDPR/Data Loss concerns/
Sack your staff and hire ones you trust?
I've worked in this sort of environment, it's toxic and it's soul-destroying. Nothing inspires a great work ethic like being treated like a dishonest workshy teenager.
Why do you need to know where your employees are down to the minute? If you've got a job that's estimated to take six hours, Alice does it in four and Bob does it in eight, then what are you doing with that information? You either send Alice to a second job or pay her for four hours' work? If you're penalising someone for being efficient, everyone's going to want to swing the lead.
Random customer satisfaction surveys will keep people honest. "Hi, it's Dave from Flange Co. Just a quick follow-up on today's site visit, can you confirm the times Alice was on site for? And on a scale of 1 to 5 how satisfied were you with etc etc etc..."
Apologies if I've completely got hold of the wrong end of the stick, but absolute time is usually a poor metric of performance.
Write down exactly what you need, .....
Prepare to sacrifice some ‘wants’.
This is where paying for a day or so of a good (and I stress good) Business Analyst's time can help; they can work with you help you work out exactly what you're looking to achieve, what bits you really need, what bits you probably don't, how you expect it to be used, who will be using it, what different types of user you might have etc etc. With a good, clear picture of all that kind of stuff, you're in a much better position to a) look for products that do what you want and b) decide between different products.
Thank you for all the comments so far, all very valuable.
@IHN @twrch - ‘Off the shelf’ has many options however none of them reallly fit and I cant find anything that has the function as I described or need. A lot of what is out there IMO is over thought/engineered and as a result a lot of the features end up being redundant therefore the costs are difficult to justify (not that cost is an issue – its just seems pointless paying for an abundance of features that won’t be used or utilised to their full extent).
@IHN – I haven’t considered business analysts but can see the merit in this - seems like a gamble as it wouldn't be worth it if the outcome ended up fruitless - I guess your emphasis on 'good' business analyst carries a lot of weight!
@ChuckMorris – very very interesting, thank you. I will look further into this.
@joeydeacon – any third party suggestions?
Still very keen to hear people views and suggestions – especially I’m after any good contacts?
Something like this is going to be many hours of development. Are you sure you are up for the costs? If on day rate a fully independent developer (not subcontracting) should be charging best over £500 per day. A full on software house significantly more. A week busy you nothing. A month a little more than than nothing.
There will be something out there for you. Many of the CRM and ERP packages are highly customisable.
Well this is a first.
Firstly I cannot genuinely believe you’re asking for this kind of advice on STW. How large is the company, how may timekeepers are we talking about?
I’ve written bespoke time recording software for the largest law firms on the map, I understand time recording far too much for comfort.
There will be an off the shelf solution that will fit the bill, possibly need some configuration and/or minor customisation re the site visits - but most likely not. Most are cloud based, suitable for mobile and have an easy to use UI.
A days requirements analysis will help you go in the right direction and avoid wasting time and money. Please don’t go down the route of bespoke development- it costs far more than you could possibly believe, you will get exactly what you need today, but at a cost that always exceeds the original budget, but crucially without the shared benefit of feature input from multiple clients all using the same software platform etc.
A lot of what is out there IMO is over thought/engineered and as a result a lot of the features end up being redundant therefore the costs are difficult to justify (not that cost is an issue – its just seems pointless paying for an abundance of features that won’t be used or utilised to their full extent).
The reason off the shelf has so many features is that is has to fit a wide range of customers. Even if it has to be customised to you and you don't use a lot of the features it is still worth it as the customisation is usually just selecting certain features and hiding others.
If you do go down the custom route (and I hope you don't) make sure that you get a copy of all source code so that you can go to another developer later if your current one goes out of business or if they start charging too much because you are locked in 🙁
The alternative if you want a custom thing is to get it built using Microsoft PowerApps so you can go to anyone else to tweak it if you need