Space Booking: Building a Workspace Reservation System in Google AppSheet
Overview
With the rising costs of corporate real estate, many companies are opting for flexible, hybrid work spaces in favor of dedicated desks. As work culture shifts from cubicles to conference rooms and cafes, the way we plan out our work days is evolving too.
To help address the need for a more modern office environment, CloudWave used Google AppSheet to develop a workspace reservation system called Space Booking. Within Space Booking, employees can reserve conference rooms for collaboration and private workspaces for focus using innovative features like floor plan maps, filters for specific supplies, an employee locator search, and reporting dashboards for admins. The app integrates with any email or calendar system so that employees can schedule time slots and receive notifications seamlessly.
Project
Our team at CloudWave is always eager to innovate using emerging technology platforms. We chose the low code platform Google Appsheet to build this new application because it has numerous benefits for users: flexibility, affordability, and mobile accessibility.
When designing this app, our team kept the end users in mind throughout the entire process. They researched the most user-friendly system for scheduling reservations and included options for requesting supplies from office managers, receiving text message or email reminders, and even highlighting favorite work spaces to make it easy to find them and book them again. The most important feature we included was the option for businesses to upload a floor plan blueprint so that users can interact with a map displaying workspace locations within the facility.
We also designed Space Booking with versatility in mind. It can work for a wide range of different business uses ranging from large corporations with multiple office buildings, to manufacturing facilities with discussion spaces, to school campuses and education resource centers where faculty meet.
To ensure Space Booking would flow seamlessly into existing platforms and tools users interact with on a daily basis, our developers integrated it with Gmail and Google Calendar so that reservation dates and reminders are always handy. For businesses who rely on Microsoft Outlook or any other major email platform, Space Booking can be customized to integrate with that system instead.
Space Booking can be used on both desktop and mobile, and the team added some innovative features that can make the work day easier with just the tap of a button. An employee locator tool can help you find colleagues within the office based on their workspace reservations. A QR code scanner allows you to make reservations for a particular room or desk instantly rather than scrolling through the options in the app.
Our team understood that admins might need some additional controls in order for the application to be utilized as effectively as possible. We added customization options for specific rooms or wings of each floor plan so that admins can restrict access to include only leadership personnel as needed. We also created a dashboard with a variety of reports on how work spaces and supplies are utilized. Visibility into this info helps admins to ensure employees are both efficient and respectful when making their reservations.
Results
- The Space Booking app allows users to upload custom floor plan maps and reserve work spaces either within the app or in-person by scanning a QR code.
- Users can request supplies needed for their meetings or projects when reserving rooms, locate their colleagues based on reservations, save favorite work spaces, and more.
- Admins can restrict access of certain areas to specific leadership groups, and review reporting dashboards with details on how spaces and supplies are being utilized.
- The Space Booking app can integrate with any email or calendar system so that users can schedule their meeting or private work spaces ahead of time and receive both email and text message reminders about their reservations.
About CloudWave
CloudWave Inc. is an information technology consulting firm based in Virginia that provides end to end services from architecture to development in niche cutting-edge cloud technologies. CloudWave specializes in application development, integration, and cloud offerings - SaaS, PaaS, IaS, machine learning/artificial intelligence, analytics/business intelligence, microservices, and enterprise document management. Since 2012, the company has developed classified/unclassified, innovative, cost-saving, low-risk solutions to federal and commercial customers both within the United States and globally. The team has more than 30 years of exceptional systems and architectures experience managing complex and compliant projects.
CloudWave has successfully integrated Smartsheet with Salesforce, MuleSoft, Google Cloud, Azure, Jira, Hubspot, and more so that our clients can have real-time access to all relevant information across multiple systems.
With CloudWave on your side, you can feel peace of mind knowing that you are working with an official Smartsheet platinum Partner. Our team has the expertise and experience to determine your organization’s vision, and then design a powerful solution to meet those needs.
For more information, get in touch with us here.