Starting point: time recording via Jira
As a controlling employee at edict, Roman Krust acts as a commercial interface to the parent company Merkur Interactive GmbH. In this function, he is responsible, among other things, for transmitting the project times required for the various software projects to the “parent” ERP system. edict currently has around 75 employees, two thirds of whom work in development and one third in customer service. He remembers: “In the past, all project times — regardless of whether technically or commercially intended — were recorded with Jira”.
“ZEP is a very stable tool, the employees appreciate the intuitive interface and so we are very satisfied that we were able to meet all our requirements with ZEP. ”
Roman Krust
controlling
Jira is a web-based planning tool for agile software development that is widely used in the software industry and also used by edict. Roman Krust explains: “In order to separate the more project-driven time planning and recording from the commercially intended recording of expenses, we set out to find an appropriate additional online tool. ”
“The CSV export is sufficient for us to transfer the data recorded in ZEP to the SAP system of our parent company. Invoicing and further processing are then carried out there in Controlling. ”
Roman Krust
controlling
Lean tool instead of “egg-laying woolly milk sow”: The decision is made in favour of ZEP compact
The research focused exclusively on time recording. “The aim was to find a lean tool exclusively for recording expenditure instead of the frequently offered 'egg-laying woolly milk sow. '”, explains to Roman Krust the starting point for his search for an appropriate solution. The decision was then ultimately made on the ZEP — time recording for projects from provantis IT Solutions, in the ZEP compact product version. True to the motto “pure time recording”, the web-based solution offers pure recording of working time on projects. These can be internal or external customer projects. Standard working hours and employment periods per employee are taken into account. Evaluations include a time project plan with an overview of the work done in hourly or daily rates as well as time sheets in various levels of detail. In addition, a project time matrix can be retrieved for a quick overview of the times recorded for a specific project and an employee time matrix for an equally quick overview of the times booked per employee. As an interface to third-party applications, the solution offers an export of data and evaluations in CSV format. Roman Krust confirms: “The CSV export is sufficient for us to transfer the data recorded in ZEP to the SAP system of our parent company. Invoicing and further processing are then carried out there in Controlling. ”
In addition to pure time recording with ZEP compact, edict uses the “Departments” module, which can be optionally added as an additional module to the standard ZEP functionality. The module makes it possible to map the existing departmental structure of a company. ZEP is being expanded to include an additional, hierarchical structuring level. All evaluations can then be carried out both for the entire company and individual departments.
Roman Krust explains: “Thanks to the ZEP additional module, it is possible for those responsible in the various departments of our company (development, testing, IT, etc.) to independently retrieve the evaluations relevant to their department and control project work. In addition, the solution also makes it possible to allocate and coordinate individual project work and times across departments. ”
Time recording from the cloud: No problem with ZEP
When deciding on the operating model — cloud computing or on-premise — edict relied on the cloud right from the start. Roman Krust explains: “We are providers of cloud computing solutions ourselves, so it was obvious to use a cloud service for internal use within the company as well. Although our employees do not usually work on site at the customer's site, they should be able to access time recording via a web-based interface and enter their project times regardless of time and location — for example in the home office. ”
As a selection criterion, the issue of data protection and data security was important, but it was not the first priority: “As part of our expenditure recording, we only record the name and email address of the project staff and a freely chosen project name. This is less sensitive data. We are also convinced that, as a cloud service provider, provantis is doing everything it can to ensure maximum data protection and data security. ”
