“Our company succeeds when something we’ve made makes the world better.” – David Clark, Createc

For more than a decade, we’ve had the opportunity to work with incredibly innovative companies and the wonderful people who run them. We are in awe of our customers’ varied and often groundbreaking work, and can’t thank them enough for their continued support. To celebrate Beebole’s 12th Anniversary we’re sharing a few of their stories and projects.

The team at Createc, based in Cumbria, United Kingdom, is behind some of the world’s most advanced technology in robotics and computer imaging. They strive to “bridge the gap between academic research and industry” with the hope that their efforts will lead to real-world technological innovation and problem-solving.

Createc’s work has spanned from nuclear decommissioning, transport, and energy to defense and security. Along the way, they have received awards from the Institute for Engineering and Technology, the International Atomic Energy Agency, and the Nuclear Decommissioning Authority, as well as two Queen’s Awards for International Trade and Innovation. To learn more about the Createc team and how it works, we spoke with Operations Manager David Clark.

How do you use Beebole to manage your team and help in day to day operations?

We’re using Beebole for our teams to log their hours worked against projects. Createc has more than 15 live projects at any one time, and tracking time is very important with people working on many projects in a single week. The simple interface allows team members to select the project and enter hours without excess clutter. Project managers can then call up a simple table report to see who spent what time on their projects.

Createc has been a Beebole customer for many years. Has the way your team tracks time, or your motivation for tracking time, changed in that time?

Initially, time tracking was just for a project management perspective. But as Createc has grown we are now using it for leave and sickness tracking and reimbursable projects. It has become a key to understanding the team’s workload and forms a key part of our management reporting.

How would you measure success in your role or sector?

Createc is a company where applied R&D is the primary activity. Our mission is to create wealth for our customers and ourselves by using emerging technology to achieve more using fewer resources. As such, Createc succeeds when something we have made goes out into the real world and makes it better.

Any productivity or time management tips for our readers?

Brian Tracy’s famous “eat-a-frog” technique based on the quote attributed to Mark Twain. It’s really hard to do, but getting the toughest thing out of the way first makes your day so much better and more productive.

What are you reading or listening to for professional inspiration and motivation lately?

“Lean Startup” by Eric Ries and “Scrum: The Art of Doing Twice the Work in Half the Time” by Jeff Sutherland. I’ve also been listening to the BBC podcast “The Life Scientific” with Jim Al-Khalili.

Finally, what is something that you are excited about in the coming year?

Createc has just won its second Queen’s Award for Enterprise, a very rare accomplishment. Off the back of this, we are set to grow even more and take on some very exciting projects. Our Robotics Research team has been developing a new system of work for nuclear decommissioning. It should be deployed on-site to deal with the UK’s nuclear legacy. The Instrumentation team is developing new radiation detection equipment. This will be deployed at Fukushima-Daiichi next year, in what will be a world first.

You can learn more about Createc’s work for nuclear decommissioning in the above video. It’s not only important work but also very cool.

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Photo by Peter Nguyen on Unsplash

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Helen Poliquin

Managing Inbound and Customer Success at Beebole. Connecting with teams and managers worldwide, identifying their obstacles, and communicating the creative solutions that Beebole can offer. Working remote from the Canary Islands.