QuickBase: The Missing Manual

Chapter 5. Planning Your QuickBase Solution

QuickBase is flexible enough to match the way you work. After all, you don’t want to change the way you do things to fit some programmer’s idea of how to organize your data. But that also means that, in order to get the most out of QuickBase, you need to have a clear picture of what you’re trying to accomplish.

So before you jump in and start creating tables and applications, take some time to define the problem you want QuickBase’s help with: Analyze your organization’s workflow (the steps you and your colleagues follow while doing your collective job), decide what kinds of information you need to track, and determine who needs to know what to keep things running smoothly. Defining and refining your problem now saves time down the road.

Defining the Problem

If you don’t understand a problem, you can’t solve it. So start by defining the problem you want to solve. Try writing it down as a broad statement—something like, “Having too many different versions of the budget is driving everyone nuts!” or “Sales reps in the field don’t have access to the most recent promotions,” or “Client requests keep getting lost; clients getting angry.” Maybe your whole team’s drowning in too much information and you want a better way to distribute information efficiently. Whatever the problem, you can solve it only if you identify the specifics.

Clarifying Your Problem

To clarify your problem, it helps to ask yourself questions like the ones below. As an example, ...