Which Tool Should We Use? The Alex & Maria Story
Alex runs a service company with 75 full-time employees and onboards 100 extra people every peak season. Maria runs an e-commerce shop that ships across Europe, and about 80% of her business is making the client gifts for Alex's company.
For years they juggled all the hype tools. Then they found out a baby was on the way, and they sat down one Sunday morning and said: "We need ONE system that works for each of us, or we'll never sleep again."
So they called me.
Over 18 conversations, at the kitchen table, on park benches, in cafees and in a half-painted nursery, we went through every category of business software. Every tool got a fair hearing and only good things were said, because every tool on the list was built by people who wanted to solve a real problem. The question each time was the same:
which one fits Alex and Maria's two businesses best, so they can spend more time on what's coming?
Chapter 1: Project Management
Alex is on #Teamwork, Maria has #MicrosoftProject because "it was already on the laptop." Together they explore #Asana, #Monday, #Trello, #Jira, #Basecamp, #Wrike, #Smartsheet, #Notion, #Linear, #Airtable and more, with Alex translating tech jargon into IKEA furniture and meal prep. They choose #ClickUp to run both businesses from one place.
Time back: about 9 hours a week.
Maria is on #MicrosoftTeams, Alex runs everything on #WhatsAppBusiness. Between paint coats they explore #Slack, #Discord, #Zoom, #GoogleMeet, #Loom, #Telegram, #Webex and more. Conversations move into #ClickUpChat, right next to the work.
Time back: about 6 hours a week.
Chapter 3: Documents & Sheets
The same spreadsheet in four places.
Maria lives in #GoogleDocs and #GoogleSheets. Alex confesses he still emails #MicrosoftWord files to himself. They look at #Notion, #Coda, #Confluence, #Craft, #LibreOffice and more. Everyday docs move into #ClickUpDocs, while #GoogleSheets and #MicrosoftExcel keep the jobs they do best.
Time back: about 5 hours a week.
Chapter 4: Knowledge Library
Alex's team panics every time a senior employee goes on holiday. Maria's sourcing process lives only in her head. They explore #Confluence, #Guru, #Tettra, #Trainual, #Document360 and more, then build their knowledge library in #ClickUpDocs, linked to the actual work.
Time back: about 7 hours a week.
Maria keeps inbox zero in #Gmail. Alex has a slightly different relationship with #Outlook, 4,127 unread messages.. They discover #Superhuman, #Front, #Hey, #ProtonMail, #Shortwave and more. Both keep their inbox, and the emails that matter move into tasks with #ClickUpEmail.
Time back:about 4 hours a week.
Alex learns what a sales funnel is. Maria builds hers in #Systeme.io, Alex's coach recommends #GoHighLevel. They also explore #ClickFunnels, #Kartra, #Kajabi, #Unbounce, #ThriveCart and more. Two businesses, two funnel tools, both feeding into #ClickUp for delivery.
Time back: about 5 hours a week.
Chapter 7: Scheduling & Marketing
Maria loved #SocialChamp and switched to #Postflow because it connects to #ClickUp. Alex keeps #Calendly for client calls. They explore #HubSpot, #Mailchimp, #ActiveCampaign, #Buffer, #Brevo, #Drip and more.
Time back: about 8 hours a week.
Chapter 8: Finance & Invoicing
The Word template invoice. Maria's stack is already clean: #Stripe, #Wise and #InvoiceMe. Alex finally retires his Word document and moves to #QuickBooks. Along the way they explore #Xero, #FreshBooks, #Wave, #PayPal, #RevolutBusiness and more.
Time back: about 4 hours a week.
Chapter 9: Automation & Integrations
Alex discovers that Maria's orders process themselves. #ClickUpAutomations handles everything inside the workspace, #Make connects the outside world. They also explore #Zapier, #PowerAutomate, #n8n, #PabblyConnect and more. Alex's 45 minutes of Monday data entry now takes three seconds.
Time back: about 10 hours a week.
From #ChatGPT and #Claude to #Perplexity, #Gemini, #Grammarly, #Otter.ai and #Descript ("that's witchcraft"). #ClickUpBrain becomes the AI that knows their actual work, and #DeepL keeps Maria's product descriptions sounding right in every European language.
Time back: about 17 hours a week.
Chapter 11: Time Tracking & Reporting
Alex's managers track one week and get a surprise. Maria learns her gift baskets take 55 minutes, not 30. They explore #Toggl, #Harvest, #Clockify, #Timely, #Hubstaff and more, and settle on #ClickUpTimeTracking, right on the task.
Time back: about 6 hours a week, plus better pricing.
Sticky notes in the recycling bin. "Grow revenue" is a wish. "Ship 500 gift sets by December" is a goal. They explore #Lattice, #15Five, #Weekdone, #Quantive, #Leapsome and more, then set real targets in #ClickUpGoals that update themselves.
Time back: about 3 hours a week.
Alex's CTO wants to switch sprint tools for the third time. Maria learns a sprint is like cooking in courses. They explore #Jira, #Linear, #Shortcut, #AzureDevOps, #ZenHub and more. #ClickUpSprints gives developers their world and everyone else visibility.
Time back: about 5 hours a week.
The lost napkin strategy. Coloured pencils, flower doodles and one very messy sheet of paper. They explore #Miro, #FigJam, #Lucidchart, #Excalidraw, #MURAL and more. On #ClickUpWhiteboards, every sticky note can become a real task.
Time back: about 3 hours a week.
Alex wants his whole business on one screen. Maria wants to know if the orders are on track. They explore #Databox, #PowerBI, #Tableau, #Looker, #Metabase and more, then build their morning screens in #ClickUpDashboards.
Time back: about 4 hours a week.
A tax number sent as a voice message. At the garden centre, picking a lemon tree for the nursery, Alex discovers forms. They explore #GoogleForms, #Typeform, #JotForm, #Tally, #Formstack and more. With #ClickUpForms, every submission becomes a task.
Time back: about 5 hours a week.
Chapter 17: Screen Recording
The eleven-paragraph email. From the sofa, in pajamas, they explore #Loom, #Vidyard, #OBS, #Camtasia, #Tella and more. #ClickUpClips attaches every recording to the task it explains, so 100 seasonal hires can watch instead of asking.
Time back: about 6 hours a week.
Chapter 18: Customer Support & Ticketing
The baby is weeks away. They explore #Zendesk, #Intercom, #Freshdesk, #HelpScout, #Gorgias and more, then build support with #ClickUp Forms and Automations, so nobody waits while Alex and Maria are at the hospital.
Time back: about 5 hours a week, and zero dropped requests.
What Alex and Maria Got Back?
When they added it all up, the hours they used to spend switching apps, retyping data, hunting for files and answering the same questions went back to the things that matter: slow walks in the park, a finished nursery with a lemon tree on the windowsill, reading stories to the bump, and two businesses that keep running while the three of them settle in at home.
Their whole system costs about as much as a weekly coffee date per person.
Want a System Like Alex and Maria's?
If you recognised yourself in their story, too many tools, too many tabs and not enough hours, a Workflow X-Ray is the fastest way to see what to keep, what to connect and what to let go.
Your business doesn't need more of you. It needs a better system.
