Greenhaven Lawn and Landscape: a weekly route and job board

The problem

A landscaping business plans its week on a whiteboard and a group chat. The crews drive from yard to yard, the office does not know a job was finished until someone phones, and a note about a locked gate or a dead shrub is lost in a stream of messages. Photos end up on four different phones.

What we built

For our sample company, Greenhaven Lawn and Landscape, we would build a weekly board with each crew's jobs for each day, a tap to mark a job done, and a place for the crew to leave a note and a photo from the truck.

Problem and answer

• The whiteboard is wiped, copied or out of date, and a crew turns up at the wrong house.

  Each crew sees its own day on its phone, in driving order, with the customer, the road and the job.

• The office does not know a job is finished until someone phones in.

  The crew taps Mark done and the count for the week moves. The office sees it straight away.

• A locked gate or a broken sprinkler is mentioned in a chat and forgotten.

  The crew adds a note to the job. It stays on that job, where the office will look for it.

• Photos of the work live on four phones and are never found when a customer asks.

  A photo is attached to the job it belongs to, so it is easy to find when a customer has a question.

• Rain moves the week around, and the new plan is explained twelve times.

  The office moves a job to another day and the crew sees the change. There is one plan, and everyone reads the same one.

How it works

1. 01The office lays out the week: which crew, which day and which yards, in driving order.
2. 02Each crew opens its day on a phone in the truck.
3. 03At each stop the crew taps Mark done, and adds a note or a photo if there is something to tell the office.
4. 04The office sees the week fill in as the crews work, and can answer a customer's question from the board.
5. 05At the end of the week the board shows what was finished and every note that needs an answer.

Works with

• Google Calendar, so each crew's days also sit on the owner's calendar
• Google Maps, so a tap on the job opens the route
• QuickBooks, so a finished job can become an invoice
• A text message service, to tell a customer the crew is on the way

The plan we would follow

1. Week 1We ride along with a crew for a day, learn how the week really runs, and agree what the board has to show.
2. Weeks 2 and 3We build the weekly board, the done button, and the notes and photos, using the company's own customers and routes.
3. Week 4The crews try it on real jobs for a week, and we fix what is awkward with wet or muddy hands.
4. Week 5We connect the calendar, maps and invoicing, and test it on the phones the crews already have.
5. Week 6Launch, with a short walk through for the crews and the office.

What the owner keeps

• The board and everything in it
• The calendar and invoicing accounts, all in the company's name
• Every job, note and photo, in the company's hands, never ours
• The customer and route lists, which can be copied out at any time