Inspectors stopped doing paperwork and started doing inspections.

Quality inspectors were spending six hours a day on documentation instead of actual inspections. We shadowed three inspectors through full inspection cycles and mapped the current workflow from measurement to final report. Fourteen separate tools and handoffs. Reports sitting in email chains for three to five days before reaching management. Frequent transcription errors from manual data entry. The trigger: a major client threatened to pull their contract after a critical defect was documented but never escalated in time because the report was stuck in someone's inbox.

We built mobile inspection forms with photo capture, automated report generation from the inspection data, a real-time dashboard for the QC manager, and an alert system for critical defects. Everything integrated with the existing ERP and SharePoint. We preserved Excel exports for legacy compatibility because the downstream processes still needed them. The senior inspector's tribal knowledge (the hardest part) was captured through recorded video walkthroughs during actual inspections, then transcribed and structured into the system.

All five inspectors adopted the system within the first week. The ones who said they'd never give up paper became the system's biggest advocates once they saw 90% of their paperwork disappear. Report generation went from three to five days to two hours, automated. Data entry errors dropped 87%. Inspection coverage went from 60% of production runs to 95% because inspectors finally had time to inspect. The QC manager can now spot trends and prevent issues proactively instead of reacting after the fact. The client who threatened to leave renewed.