Integrating existing systems and revamping their usability
An energy distribution company in Argentina, following an internal audit, recognized the need to enhance the integration of its systems. Since much of their distribution management is outsourced to contractors—responsible for tasks like network maintenance, topology supervision, outage planning, and management—tracking the materials used was essential. During the audit, it was found that supervisors manually monitored and tracked materials, leading to a time-consuming and error-prone process, with a lack of integration between Work Order management and physical Inventory Management. A Software Archaeology Process was conducted to thoroughly examine the current business rules and implementation of their systems, pinpointing the modules that required further integration and assessing any technical debt along with architecture and design aspects that needed review. Based on the findings of this study, we established a connection between both systems, enabling real-time integration between Work Order Workflow Management and Inventory Management, thereby ensuring complete traceability of the process. Furthermore, we improved their systems with user-friendly interfaces, eliminated reliance on paper forms, introduced configurable Approval Chains that accommodate programmed absences, and implemented system-wide push notifications for real-time tracking of workflow statuses by users.