How an IT service provider automated their entire lead-to-invoice process with Odoo

Project Fact Sheet:

The challenge – scattered IT landscape impairs project-related time recording and billing processes

Choosing Odoo as fuel for change, our customer sought to unify previously disconnected systems that hindered the well-functioning of their lead-to-invoice journey. They also seeked to optimize project time management and overall attendance tracking, which was lacking as a result of poor communication between operational and financial systems. Our customer set a goal to automate invoicing and improve project billing via timesheet usage, and consolidate three existing systems into Odoo.

To achieve these goals, our customer was met with pivotal challenges that called for resourceful and timely solutions:

• Disconnected IT Landscape: The customer faced operational inefficiencies due to a complex and fragmented IT setup with multiple disconnected systems 
• Missing Transaction Overview: The absence of customer transaction visibility impacted interaction tracking and management
• Operations-Finance Integration Gap: Operational and financial processes were isolated, leading to coordination issues and workflow inefficiencies particularly regarding time tracking / management and subsequent invoicing 
• Manual Offer Processing: The manual offer processing workflow presented challenges in terms of efficiency, emphasizing the process disjointment within the same project

The solution – Implementing Odoo 15 as single source of truth to replace isolated systems & consolidate data

Eager to optimize their processes, our customer chose Odoo 15 as a catalyst to resolve issues such as system disconnections, enhance time tracking, and ensure the sustainability of their financial journey. 

With Odoo, they designed a new sales workflow that seamlessly connects operational and financial functions through time tracking. Additionally, they integrated Odoo own modules to automate previously cumbersome processes, ultimately replacing multiple systems with a single environment that fulfills all their requirements.

1. Implementation of Odoo Enterprise apps

Odoo’s suite of applications provided a strong foundation for the success of this project.We leveraged features from Odoo 15 apps such as CRM, Sales, Expenses, Timesheets, Sign, Time Off, Accounting & Invoicing, and Employees & Contract. As a result, they achieved:

• Efficient, Fully Automated Sales Process: A tailored sales workflow based on Odoo was created to optimize a previously fragmented lead-to-invoice process with lots of manual overhead
• Integration of Project Management and Accounting: By implementing and integrating Odoo Projects with Odoo Accounting effectively, we facilitated correct project billing.
• Simplified Time Tracking: Our customer’s previous time tracking tool was replaced with Odoo Timesheets, simplifying time management and enhancing accuracy allowing them to analyse time spent on projects.
• Streamlined Time and Attendance Management: Odoo’s Time-Off & Attendance modules were implemented to replace their existing HR tool, resulting in improved HR operations including employee attendance and vacation planning

The result – automated end-to-end processes, accurate project billing & a clear overview of resource utilisation

The integration of Odoo into their daily operations yielded tangible results for our customer:

• Streamlined Project Invoicing: With Odoo, our customer achieved automated project invoicing, leveraging timesheet data to generate invoices efficiently and accurately, thus contributing to  greater cohesion between operations and finance processes.
• Enhanced Project Planning: Odoo’s integrated time tracking and subsequent setup of work plans empowered our customer to improve their project planning analysis and maximize their lead-to-invoice processes as a result of this integration.
• Unified System Consolidation: By adopting Odoo, our customer successfully replaced three disparate systems, achieving a unified and streamlined operational environment that simplified workflows and reduced complexity.