Building my own Tooling
I build tools for others. Either directly, or with them, as an advisor. I love coding. But coding for myself is a personal no-no. I have long avoided the urge to build my own tooling. For most technical needs, there are plenty of out-of-the-box applications.
So building a time and billing system was not something I would do myself, or that I recommend for the clients I work with.
So in the summer of 2024 I changed my mind.
I had been a fractional CTO for a year. I had 5-8 clients at different stages with different needs. Keeping track of the time I worked was a challenge. Spreadsheets are not great. SaaS solutions like Harvest App were even worse than a notepad or a spreadsheet.
Change of Mindset
In the summer of 2024, AI had started to change my thinking about how software can impact the basic economics of code. Since that summer AI has continued to have more and more impacts on how we hire, how we build teams, and how we leverage human experience.
One Size Fits All Software
My biggest insight in that period was that the reason I disliked a lot of time and billing systems was how the tool felt. The idea of using software has a feel. When I use some software it just feels like more work.
Maybe it’s the color scheme, maybe it’s the layout of features. I almost never see myself or my approach in the software I use. I started to look for software that generated a strong positive emotional reaction. Github.com. I like it. The tools fit the use case.
I am still working on my definition.
Enter Google Calendars
I started to notice that my entire day involved keeping my Google Calendar updated.
I noticed that the UI and UX on both desktop and mobile were pleasing.
I also noticed that a calendar entry had no need for me to enter a time of day. Every calendar entry has a date, start time and end time. All I needed was to add a client, and my calendar would tell me how much to bill at the end of the month.
Version 1 - Local
My first version was a simple application that ran on my laptop. It connected to the Calendar API and let me track client work. By adding a simple code to the entry summary, I had groups of times for each client.
My first goal was to test if I could get the utility out of a different approach to tooling. I decided to continue and break my long-held aversion to writing my own tools.
Three months in and I was hooked. Thankfully. Building my own time and billing system was a real distraction from actual client work.
Version 2 - On the Cloud
In November I made the jump to the cloud. Now my solution worked from anywhere.
That was when I had my second insight. For a fractional, an invoice is a bill rate, and a start and end date for a report.
Over the next few months, I fit new features into times between work. In December, Vibe coding became a reality.
Version 3 - AI Tooling
My last big insight was the ability to scale a single-person solution into a production-ready system.
It’s Live
Now we are launching Fractional Tools and making it available for others to use.
So if you have more than one client at a time. If you bill hourly or use retainers, then this is the solution. The best part is that while we have an app, the user never needs to leave their calendar.
