September 2023
Professional Services Firm (Big Four)
GenuineBee partnered with a renowned accounting firm in the US to transform the way their award-winning video production team manages their workflow. Faced with the challenge of manually creating and updating call sheets, the firm sought a digital solution that could streamline operations and improve efficiency. GenuineBee delivered a custom solution built on Angular, Node, and MongoDB technologies, integrating it with the client's cloud solutions and Envoy security system.
One of the "Big Four", a leading professional services networks in the world, this company has offices in more than 150 countries, more than 270,000 people and annual gross revenues of more than US$40 billion. With an extensive online presence, their main global website alone contains more than 50,000 pages.
The client's video production team had been using the Adobe Workfront platform, but the platform didn't adequately support their needs for efficient call sheet creation and updates. The process was manual, time-consuming, and lacked standardization across different sub-teams. Furthermore, any changes in filming details led to inconvenient updates and redistribution of call sheets, particularly in the generation of authorization lists for security personnel.
GenuineBee proposed a digital solution to meet the client's needs. Leveraging technologies preferred by the client—Angular, Node, and MongoDB—we developed an application to be hosted on the client's cloud platform. A key component of our strategy was the decision to embed the main flows of the call sheet creation project within Workfront, using its native embedded web pages feature to prevent the video team from having to jump from one system to another.
This project demonstrates how GenuineBee doesn't just "buzz around" problems. Instead, we dive in and find innovative solutions to streamline processes and save time. Thanks to our work, this Big Four firm's award-winning video production team can now focus on creating stunning videos, instead of drowning in spreadsheets and emails. A small victory for mankind, a giant leap for production crew efficiency!
We implemented a notification matrix to ensure all relevant parties are alerted to schedule and personnel changes in a timely and appropriate manner. For example, security teams will now be notified about a forthcoming shoot in advance, and will receive an updated personnel list the day before filming begins. Vendors will also be alerted if filming dates change, allowing them to review the crew list. While initial communications are sent via email or through the Envoy system (used by Security), future iterations could include SMS alerts for last-minute updates.
The client was particularly impressed by the fact that our solution gave them the ability to embed external content within their existing project management platform, eliminating the need to maintain separate systems. Custom autocomplete features were developed to "remember" crew data and other participant details for future use, a function not supported by their existing system. The client also expressed appreciation for the visual interface we designed, citing it as a significant improvement over their existing platform's standard interface.
The solution provided by GenuineBee led to improvements in production and communication. The client now has a unified call sheet format that can be customized for different sub-teams. Information is now centralized, and the entire team can be automatically notified of project changes in a timely manner. The use of custom autocomplete features and data "remembering" also saves time and reduces redundancy.
The application was built using Angular, Node.js, and MongoDB. It was designed to be hosted on the client's preferred cloud solutions, and integrated with the Adobe Workfront API and the Envoy security system. The development also made use of a feature to embed external web pages within their existing project management platform, a lesser-known capability that we discovered while working with another client and found to be perfect for this project's requirements.
