edict egaming GmbH

Starting point: Time recording via Jira

As a controlling employee at edict, Roman Krust acts as the commercial interface to the parent company Merkur Interactive GmbH. In this function, he is responsible, among other things, for the transfer of project times incurred in the various software projects into the ERP system of the "mother". At edict there are currently about 75 employees, two thirds of whom work in development and one third in customer support. He remembers: "In the past, all project times - whether technically or commercially intended - were recorded with Jira"..

"ZEP is a very stable tool, the staff appreciate the intuitive interface and so we are very happy that we were able to meet all our requirements with ZEP."

Jira is a web-based planning tool for agile software development that is widely used in the software industry and is also used by edict. Roman Krust explains: "In order to separate the more project-driven time planning and recording from the commercially intended effort recording, we went in search of an appropriate additional online tool."

"The CSV export is sufficient for us to transfer the data entered in ZEP into the SAP system of our parent company. Invoicing and further processing in controlling then takes place there."

A slim tool instead of the "egg-laying pillow": The decision goes to ZEP compact

During the research, the focus was exclusively on time recording. "The aim was to find a streamlined tool solely for effort recording rather than the 'egg-laying pillow' that is often on offer."Roman Krust explains the initial situation for his search for an appropriate solution. In the end, the decision was made in favour of the ZEP - Time Recording for Projects solution from provantis IT Solutions, namely in the product version ZEP compact. True to the motto "pure time recording", the web-based solution offers pure working time recording for projects. These can be internal company projects or external customer projects. The regular working time and the employment periods for each employee are taken into account. A time project plan with a statement of the work performed in hourly or daily rates as well as time statements in different levels of detail are available as evaluations. In addition, a project time matrix can be called up for a quick overview of the times recorded for a specific project and an employee time matrix for an equally quick overview of the times booked per employee. As an interface to third-party applications, the solution offers an export of data and evaluations in CSV format. Roman Krust confirms: "The CSV export is sufficient for us to transfer the data entered in ZEP into the SAP system of our parent company. Invoicing and further processing in controlling then takes place there."

In addition to pure time recording with ZEP compact, edict uses the module "Departments", which can be added optionally as an additional module to the standard functionality of ZEP. The module enables the mapping of the existing department structure of a company. ZEP is thereby extended by an additional, hierarchical structuring level. All evaluations can then be carried out for the entire company as well as for individual departments.

Roman Krust explains: "Thanks to the ZEP add-on module, it is possible for those responsible in the different departments of our company (development, test, IT, etc.) to independently call up the evaluations relevant to their department and control the project work. In addition, the solution thus also enables a cross-departmental allocation and coordination of the individual project work and times."

Time recording from the cloud: no problem with ZEP

When deciding on the operating model - cloud computing or on-premise - edict went for the cloud right from the start. Roman Krust explains: "We ourselves are a provider of cloud computing solutions, so it was obvious to use a cloud service for internal company use as well. Although our employees do not usually work on site at the customer, they should still be able to access the time recording system via a web-based interface and enter their project times there, regardless of time and location - for example, in the home office."

The topic of data protection and data security was important as a selection criterion, but was not the top priority: "We only record the name and email address of the project staff and a freely chosen project name as part of our effort recording. This is not very sensitive data. In addition, we are convinced that provantis, as a cloud service provider, does everything to ensure maximum data protection and data security."

Lean tool for time recording: goal achieved!

With the use of ZEP compact - supplemented by the "Departments" module - edict has achieved its goal of using a lean tool for recording project times. Roman Krust sums up: "ZEP is a very stable tool, the staff appreciate the intuitive interface and so we are very happy that we were able to meet all our requirements with ZEP."