Custom CRM & Task Management System

Designed and developed a custom CRM and task-management system to streamline operations across internal and remote employees. Worked closely with department leaders to understand workflow automation patterns, pain points, and reporting needs revealing gaps in communication, inconsistent task handoffs, and limited productivity visibility.

Introduced role-based dashboards, automated task routing, activity timelines, and integrated messaging. Financial modules were added for invoicing, payment tracking, and vendor proposals eliminating external spreadsheets and giving leadership real-time visibility into revenue, expenses, and vendor engagement. A modular architecture allowed new workflow automation patterns and financial features to be added without disrupting operations. Integrations with email, document storage, and HR systems ensured seamless data flow, while strong access controls protected sensitive customer and financial data.

Building from scratch rather than adopting an off-the-shelf CRM was a deliberate trade-off. Commercial CRMs (Salesforce, HubSpot) excel at generic sales workflow automation patterns but their customization ceiling is real. Our agency workflow automation patterns - multi-channel campaigns, custom billing milestones, project-based invoicing - didn't map cleanly to standard objects. A bespoke system cost more upfront but delivered 100% workflow alignment and no per-seat licensing overhead at scale.

The task routing algorithm became surprisingly important to adoption. Early versions required managers to manually assign tasks from an inbox - a bottleneck that caused 2-day delays on client requests. We analyzed 6 months of historical assignments to identify routing patterns: task type predicted assignee more than 85% of the time. Automated routing based on task classification, team availability, and current workload reduced assignment lag from 48 hours to under 30 minutes. This single change transformed how quickly the organization responded to client needs.

Data integrity across the financial module required careful design. Invoicing, payment tracking, and vendor proposals share underlying financial data - inconsistencies between them were catastrophic for client relationships. We implemented a single source of truth (the financial ledger) with all modules reading from it. Every financial event (invoice created, payment received, proposal approved) wrote to the ledger and emitted events that updated the relevant views. Discrepancies between what clients were billed and what finance recorded dropped to zero.