Operations and technology partner for construction and trades
You shouldn't have to bend your business to fit software.
Software should bend to fit your business. We work with construction and trades businesses across Australia on how the whole thing fits together: the systems, the process and the people. And we make sure it works.
Sound familiar?
Most of the businesses we work with started here.
- 01
“Someone in the office spends a day a week re-keying between systems.”
- 02
“We've looked at Simpro, AroFlo and a Dynamics partner and still can't tell which one fits.”
- 03
“The monthly numbers come from four places and they don't agree.”
- 04
“The thing that makes us different is the thing no package has a box for.”
Why it keeps happening
The real work is the rest of it: how the systems, the process and the people fit together across the whole business.
Everyone selling to construction and trades is selling a product. Another app, a bigger all-in-one, AI this and AI that. Each one covers its piece of your business, and the people selling it stay in their lane.
So you pick the best core system you can, and it feels like the answer. Then the business bends round it. The gaps fill up with spreadsheets and re-keying, and things quietly settle for second-best.
And it takes judgement. Sometimes the way the system does it is the better way, and the business should take it. Knowing which is which is the job.
What we do
How your whole business fits together is our business.
We bring deep industry experience. We know how businesses like yours run, so we don't start from scratch. We get straight into the specifics of yours and work out the answers with you: what to keep, what to connect, what to build or buy, and when the way a system does it is the better way.
And we make sure it works. We're not here to transform your business and leave. We go on the journey with you, one problem at a time, at a pace your people can take.
What it looks like when it fits
Three things change. Here they are, in real businesses.
01
It fits the way you work
AAA ran its week off a whiteboard, and the whiteboard was good: the whole week in one view, a card moved in two seconds. We built that board into their Dynamics 365 and kept what made it good, then shaped it round how AAA actually runs: confirmations that mean three different things to sales, ops and the yard; a spill that rebuilds the week within the hour; a reason recorded every time a job slips past month end. It's still being shaped, because the business keeps moving.
The Thursday board that remembers everything →
02
It runs faster
Hyforce had field service, time clocking, quoting and sales in separate systems that didn't talk, and a licence bill for the privilege. Now it's one system on the Office 365 they already paid for. Crews clock on from the phone on site, timesheets and job records land in the one place, nothing is re-typed between quote, job and invoice, and the licence costs went down.
How Hyforce runs field service now →
03
You can see all of it
Impact's monthly management meeting used to depend on the director asking the right questions. Now nine live report suites ask them, opened inside the system the team already works in, with every page owned by the person who has to answer for it. Payroll prep went from up to two days to about two hours on the way through.
The reporting that runs the meeting →In their words
From the people we work with, in their words.
“What's been different with Brendan is that it's been done with us, not to us. He's in the boardroom with us regularly, working through how the operation actually runs and what we need next, and we build it together from there. Nothing gets handed over as a finished thing you then have to live with. The result is a system that works the way AAA works, and a team that understands it because we were part of making it.”
“We've got over sixty people across a lot of sites, and for years the office ran on paper timesheets, freeform orders and re-keying. Brendan has worked through it with us one piece at a time: sign-in and timesheets, purchasing, the reports we run the monthly meeting off. Payroll prep that used to take someone up to two days is about two hours now. He gets into how we actually run before he builds anything, and he's still here.”
“We had a field service system that made us work its way and charged us for the privilege. Brendan replaced it with one built around how Hyforce actually runs, on the Office 365 we already had. The crew clock on from their phones, timesheets come straight through to me for payroll, and quoting and jobs are in the same place. When something's not right I send him a note and it's fixed.”
“When we started hiring out formwork we needed to prove what left the yard and what condition it was in, every time, or we were carrying the risk on every job. Brendan built us a delivery docket app on the iPad that records the lot and gives the customer a proper docket on the spot. It does exactly the job and it's taken that liability off the table. He understood what the business needed rather than selling us something bigger.”
“A lot of our work starts with an idea or a problem that does not fit neatly into an existing product. Brendan can take that idea, work through the detail with us and turn it into something practical. He works as part of our team and stays involved well beyond the initial build.”
Bloom Building Consultants
“It works because he took the time to understand how my business actually runs first. I’m a one-person business doing a job most people can’t describe, and some days I think he understands it better than I do. I’m working more efficiently than I ever have, and I’ve already sent several people his way.”
“The team at Knight Solutions are genuine experts at understanding complex business process and financial issues. Their ability to distill this into workable solutions is a reflection of their true expertise. The reporting will deliver a significant improvement in productivity and decision making ability.”
“He takes the time to understand how you work and then tailors his advice and solutions accordingly. He has a wonderful ability to make complicated IT issues feel easy, while leaving you completely confident that everything has been done properly.”
“Now we can share everything clearly and connect our social media links so that information is available in one central place. We’d happily recommend a dedicated website to any other netball or other sports club wanting to strengthen connection with their community.”
How we start
A chat, a longer chat, then a proposal.
- 1 A chat
Short. Usually more than one.
- 2 A longer one, in the business
The specifics of how yours runs. Bring the people who own the processes.
- 3 A proposal
For an entry package, sized to the first problem.
After the first problem, most clients keep going, problem after problem. That's the journey.
Not ready for a chat? 22 questions, five minutes, instant results, no email needed.
Check your business health →Start with the first problem
from $10,000 ex GST
Not a quote for the whole job. A fixed-price start: we get into the business, work out with you what's really going on, and begin on the one thing that'll give people time back.
You finish it with a clear picture of how the business fits together, our advice on what comes next, and the first fix under way.
Sized together after the longer chat. We keep the whole business in view the whole way through; it just gets done a brick at a time.
Tell us what isn't fittingWho this is for
- Construction and trades, anywhere in Australia
- Owner-run, somewhere between 10 and 200 staff
- Several systems, and a way of working that’s your own
- The owner or a director is the one reading this
And who it isn't for
- IT support: no help desk, no break-fix, no managed devices
- One-off websites or brochure sites on their own
- Businesses outside construction and trades
We're not IT support. You keep your IT provider and we work alongside them. If you're outside construction and trades, we'll probably point you to someone better placed.
Who you'll be dealing with
Brendan Erofeev
Founder, The Techy Side
Brendan has spent decades in software, integration and reporting, most of it inside businesses rather than at a vendor.
He's the person in your business on the first visit and the one who works out with you what to keep, connect, build or buy.
There is a small team of developers behind him, and you own everything they build.
Fair questions
The ones people are usually thinking but don't ask.
- We've already got an IT provider.
- Good. Keep them. Devices, security and licensing are their job, and they do it well. We work alongside them on how the business runs.
- Why not just buy Simpro or AroFlo?
- That may well be the answer, and if it is we'll say so and help you put it in properly. They're good systems. But they'll only take you as far as their world goes. The rest of the business still has to plug into it, and that's the part we cover.
- It's basically one person. What if something happens to you?
- You own everything we build. There are other developers behind me. And nothing we do is proprietary or mythical; most of it is common sense applied to how your business works, so someone else can pick it up.
- AI makes software easy now. Can't we just do it ourselves?
- You could, and some do. We use AI too, so you already get that advantage with us. But writing the software is the small part. The rest is the whole change: what to build at all, how it fits with everything else, moving the data across, the pace your people can take it at, and someone being there when it breaks at 7am on a Monday. A first-year apprentice can have the same tools as the leading hand; it's the years on the job that make the work come out right.
Tell us what isn't fitting
Two or three sentences is plenty.
We'll read it and come back to you within a business day to set up a chat.
A real person reads this. No newsletter, no drip sequence.
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