Ashwell Mercer Interiors / BG-Demo – Onboarding
Callcompleted
Ashwell Mercer Interiors · 3 Oct 2024 11:45
Craig Ashwell said that since signing on Friday 23 August 2024 only two or three people had logged in. No connector had started without written access. The job code was agreed as the client key.
What was said
What this says
As at Fri 9 Oct 2026Craig Ashwell said that since signing on Friday 23 August 2024 only two or three people had logged in. No connector had started without written access. The job code was agreed as the client key.
What happened: Craig said they signed on Friday 23 August 2024 and by October only two or three people had logged in. Callie Brennan confirmed neither the project nor the commercial connector had started, as written access was missing.
Customer view: Craig had told the board the brain would give one view of every client. He said he was unhappy with the delay, not with Callie.
Commercial: Sunil Kapoor's read-only account needs a change request, and the client lists do not tie, so the job code was agreed as the spine. Callie would not promise mailbox or call recorder connectors until she checks the order form.
Watch: Craig needs something to show the board and wants dates. Callie passed on a couple of outstanding invoices for the customer's finance team.
Themes
As at Fri 9 Oct 2026Theme
Delayed onboarding, access
Importance
complaint
Sentiment
negative
Voice
decision-maker
Who was there
BG-Demo
CRMmade from
Them
CRMmade from
Follow-up
Next steps
As at Fri 9 Oct 2026- Sunil Kapoor to raise a change request that day for read-only accounts on the project, commercial and accounting systems.
- Callie Brennan to send the setup note with scope and dates the next day and check connectors against the order form.
- Craig Ashwell to name the first users by Monday.
Risks
As at Fri 9 Oct 2026- Connectors had not started because written read-only access was not supplied, and Craig Ashwell has told his board the brain gives one client view.
- Client lists in the project and commercial systems do not tie, so the first refresh could index duplicates.
- A couple of invoices flagged as outstanding remain with the customer's finance team.
Opportunities
As at Fri 9 Oct 2026- Variations visibility, covering instructed, signed and done on site, is Craig's main use case, and mailbox and call recorder connectors could serve it.
- Credit control is the first user group, and Craig wants to retire its spreadsheet.
Transcript
Callie BrennanHello, hello. Can you both hear me all right?
Craig AshwellYep, loud and clear.
Sunil KapoorYes, fine here. Morning, Callie.- Callie BrennanMorning, both. Craig, is that a meeting room behind you or have you moved house?
- Craig AshwellMeeting room. The office is chaos. We've got a handover on the floor below and half the building's in hi-vis.
- Callie BrennanHa, busy is good. Right, let me give you the plan for the next forty minutes or so. First, where we are with the connectors. Second, what I need from your side before we switch on the refresh. Third, who's actually going to be logging in, and when. Then we agree owners and dates, and I'll send a setup note straight after. Does that work?
- Craig AshwellFine. Can I say one thing first?
- Callie BrennanOf course.
- Craig AshwellWe signed on Friday 23 August 2024. It's now October. I've got two people on our side who've logged in, maybe three, and one of them is Sunil. I told the board this would give us one view of every client. Right now it gives us a login page.
- Callie BrennanThat's fair, and I'd rather you said it. So here's the honest position. I haven't started the project system or the commercial system connectors, because I don't have written access for either. I don't start a connector without it. That's my rule, not yours, but it does mean the clock's been sitting still.
- Sunil KapoorThat's partly on me. I had the request. The account I'd normally use for the project system has write permissions, and I wasn't willing to hand that over for a read-only job.
- Callie BrennanNo, that's exactly right, and I'd far rather have a read-only account. Can you create one?
- Sunil KapoorI can. It needs a change request on our side, which is why it slipped. I'll raise it today.
- Craig AshwellToday. Not next week.
- Sunil KapoorToday. I'll copy you on it so you can see it move.
- Craig AshwellGood.
- Callie BrennanBrilliant. So what I need from your side is, one, a read-only account for the project system. Two, the same for the commercial system. Three, whichever account the credit-control team uses for the accounting system, again read-only. All in writing, by email is fine, to me and copied to Craig so there's a record.
- Sunil KapoorBefore I send anything, can I raise the thing I found on Tuesday? It's why I'm slightly nervous about switching anything on.
- Callie BrennanPlease. Go on.
- Sunil KapoorThe client list doesn't tie. The project system and the commercial system both have clients, and I counted a fair few that appear in both under different spellings. Some are the same landlord with a trading name and a group name. Some have a different legal entity per site. So when someone says one client list, I don't know which one.
- Callie BrennanMm. That's really useful to know now rather than after the first refresh. Okay. So the brain doesn't fix that by magic, it needs a key. What's the thing that's the same in both places? Is there a client code, a company number, anything like that?
- Sunil KapoorThere's a project code that's consistent in the project and finance side. On the commercial side it's looser. Sales people type what they like.
- Craig AshwellThey do. I'm one of them.
- Callie BrennanHa, right. So which project code, Sunil? Is it the one that's on the invoice?
- Sunil KapoorWhich project code is the right question, yes. There's the tender code and the job code. The job code is what finance uses. The tender code only exists until we win. I'd say the job code is the one that ties to the ledger.
- Callie BrennanThen job code is the spine. That maps cleanly. What I'd suggest is we pull a sample of maybe a dozen clients across both systems, you tell me which are the same, and I'll show you how the brain would match them. Then we agree the rule before we run it across everything.
- Sunil KapoorThat's sensible. I'll reconcile the sample myself and mark the ones I'm sure of.
- Craig AshwellHang on. Can I ask the thing I actually care about?
- Callie BrennanGo ahead.
- Craig AshwellVariations. Where's the variation? I want to ask the brain about a client and see, what's the job, what's been instructed, what's been signed, and what we've actually done on site. Because the one that worries me is the one where the client says go ahead on a call and we build it and nothing's on paper.
- Callie BrennanYes. And that's one of the reasons you bought Growth, so project, commercial and credit-control can all see the same client. Where do variations live today? In the project system, or in emails?
- Craig AshwellBoth. Which is the problem.
- Sunil KapoorFormal variations are in the project system, with a number against the job code. The informal ones are in people's mailboxes and in notes from calls.
- Callie BrennanOkay, so the formal ones come through the project connector and I can map them to the job code. The informal ones are a different source, so that's a question of whether you want the mailboxes and the call recorder connected. I'd want to be careful not to promise that today, because I haven't looked at your plan against the connectors on your order form.
- Craig AshwellThen look at it. Tell me what's in and what's not.
- Callie BrennanI will. I'll put it in the setup note, a list of what's in scope, what's connected, what's waiting and who owns each. A date against every step.
- Craig AshwellGood. That's what I need. Something I can show the board that says here's what's live and here's what isn't.
- Callie BrennanUnderstood. Can I move to the users, because that's the other half of what you said. You've got forty licensed users. How many do you actually want in over the first month?
- Craig AshwellForty's the plan. Project managers, the commercial team, quantity surveyors, credit control. I don't want forty logins on day one though. I want the people who'll use it properly.
- Callie BrennanSensible. Who gets value first? If I had to pick a group I'd say whoever chases the money, because the question they ask every morning is which clients are late and why.
- Craig AshwellCredit control. Yes. They'd use it. They've got a spreadsheet that's a work of art and I'd like to retire it.
- Sunil KapoorThat spreadsheet doesn't tie to the ledger either, for what it's worth. Not by much.
- Craig AshwellI'm not hearing that.
- Sunil KapoorNoted.
- Callie BrennanHa. Well, that's rather the point of the brain. Okay. So first group in is credit control, then the project managers on the biggest live jobs, then commercial. Sunil, you're the admin, so you're in already and you'll want to see how users are added so you can run it alone eventually.
- Sunil KapoorYes. I'd like that. I don't want to be asking you every time someone joins.
- Callie BrennanNo, you shouldn't have to. I'll walk you through it once the first refresh has landed.
- Callie BrennanSorry, give me a second, I'm just pulling up the checklist so I get the order right. Right. Here we are. Before we switch on the refresh, the order is: access in writing, a test connection to each source, a sample mapping that you've signed off, then the first full load. After that I check the record counts against what you expect, and only then do I tell you it's ready.
- Sunil KapoorI'd like to see the record counts. Not just that it ran. If the project system has a number and the brain has a different number, I want to know why before anybody asks it a question.
- Callie BrennanAbsolutely. I'll give you the count from the source and the count in the brain side by side, and any difference gets a reason next to it. I won't say it's fine unless I've checked it.
- Craig AshwellHow long, from access to usable?
- Callie BrennanIf the access arrives in the next few days and the sample mapping comes back quickly, I'd expect the first refresh to land the week after next. I don't want to put a hard date on it until I've tested the connections, because that's when surprises appear.
- Craig AshwellSurprises I can't have. I need to tell people something.
- Callie BrennanThen tell them this: access this week, connections tested early next week, sample mapping agreed, first refresh the week after. And I'll tell you straight away if any of those moves.
- Craig AshwellFine. I'll take that.
- Callie BrennanOne practical thing and then I'll leave it alone. Our finance team has flagged a couple of invoices on the account as outstanding. I'm only passing it on, it isn't my area and I don't want it to hang over the project.
- Craig AshwellThat's not one for this call. Send it to our finance team and I'll make sure it's picked up.
- Sunil KapoorIf you can tell me which ones, I'll reconcile them against our ledger and say what we've got. Sometimes it's just a purchase order number that's missing.
- Callie BrennanThat would help. I'll ask our finance team to send you the detail directly so I'm not the go-between.
- Craig AshwellGood. Moving on.
- Callie BrennanOkay. Let me read back what I've got, and stop me if I've got it wrong. Sunil raises a change request today for read-only accounts on the project system, the commercial system and the accounting system, and emails the details to me with Craig copied. Sunil also marks up the sample of clients that appear in both lists, using job code as the key. Craig, you confirm who's in the first group of users, credit control first.
- Craig AshwellI'll give you names by Monday. Credit control first, then the project managers on the three biggest jobs.
- Callie BrennanLovely. And I'll send the setup note tomorrow, with the in-scope list, the order of work and a date against each step. Then a short check-in next Thursday, same time, so you're not waiting on me to find out where we are.
- Sunil KapoorSame time works for me. I'll have the sample done by then.
- Craig AshwellWorks for me. Callie, one more thing.
- Callie BrennanYes?
- Craig AshwellI'm not unhappy with you. I'm unhappy with how long it's taken. Let's get paid for what we've built, and let's get this thing earning its keep.
- Callie BrennanUnderstood, Craig, and thank you for saying it plainly. Let's get it landing cleanly. Thanks, both.
- Sunil KapoorThanks, Callie. Speak next week.
- Craig AshwellCheers.
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