PROJECT / SAMPLE
The spreadsheet had become the application.
A narrow internal tool replaced a brittle workflow spread across spreadsheets, email, portals, and tribal knowledge.
- Date
- 2026-02
- Type
- software / automation / integration
- Status
- fictional fixture
- Published
- prototype only
Problem
An important operational process depended on copy/paste across spreadsheets, email threads, and browser portals. The process worked only because a few people remembered every exception.
Constraints
- The external portals offered incomplete automation interfaces.
- Operators needed a gradual transition from the spreadsheet.
- The workflow changed often enough to punish a rigid packaged system.
Observed
- Fourteen handoffs obscured ownership and current state.
- Most errors occurred while transcribing data between systems.
- Exceptions lived in inboxes rather than the operational record.
Work
- Mapped the real workflow with the people performing it.
- Built a narrow stateful operations application.
- Automated available API and browser steps.
- Made exception ownership and recovery explicit.
- Imported history without forcing an all-at-once cutover.
Decisions
- Model the actual workflow, not the spreadsheet layout.
- Automate routine steps while keeping exceptions inspectable.
- Prefer one focused tool over a broad platform customization.
Result / SAMPLE
Operators moved through a four-step workflow with clear state, while exceptional cases remained visible instead of disappearing into email.
- 14-step workflow → 4
- ~26 staff-hours/week eliminated
- error rate −93%
What we did not do
We did not purchase and heavily customize a general operations suite. The problem was narrow enough to deserve a narrow tool.
Technical index
internal tools / browser automation / workflow modeling / data migration