Well, hi there. It's Brandy, your host, and this is Elevated the Snackable Weekly podcast, helping kitchen and Bath designers build a better business. In this episode, we're talking about how not to get dazzled by jazzy software features that are about as useful as a kitchen island with no overhang. You know what I mean? Looks great in the renderings, but try to actually sit at it. Doesn't happen. It can be hard to stay focused on the right things in a world of attention grabbing shiny objects. Software companies are out there showing off their latest AI features, like they're the greatest thing since soft closed drawers. But here's the thing, just because something's shiny. Doesn't mean it's useful. Just ask Carmen, who invested in an expensive project management tool because it had AI powered project forecasting, but it couldn't talk to her accounting software. Whoops. Today we're gonna learn how to separate the must haves from the nice to haves, and by the end of this episode. You'll have the tools to resist being distracted by fancy features that don't solve real problems. Grab your worksheet@fieffects.com slash choose if you need it, and let's create your feature evaluation checklist. We're going to use Carmen's story as our cautionary tale. First up, the integration investigation. Before you even look at features, ask yourself, what software do you already use that you can't live without? What needs to talk to what? Where are you currently doing manual data entry? Because the systems don't connect. Carmen learned this the hard way. The fancy new software couldn't connect with her accounting system, her drafting software, her document signing tool. Suddenly those AI features didn't seem so impressive when her team was copying and pasting data all day. Next up is the must have checklist. Here's how to figure out what you actually need. First, look at your daily frustrations. You listed those previously. Remember? Uh, two, write down what would fix each one. Three. Those are your must haves. Let me give you a real example. Sarah's firm thought they needed new design software because their current one was slow, but when we dug into it, the real problem takes forever to create proposals, actual must have the ability to save and reuse product specifications. The not important, the AI powered room suggester, they were drooling over. So then let's look at the nice to have Nebula. This is where things can get tricky. Software companies are masters. I'm making everything sound essential. Here's how to cut through the noise for each feature. Ask, does this solve a problem? I actually have then will I use this daily, weekly, monthly? And then finally, is it worth the added complexity? Here's what happened with Carmen's team. They're nice to have lists included. AI project timeline projection, automated task assignment, and smart resource allocation. Sounds amazing, right? But when we matched these against their actual problems, no one was struggling with timeline creation. Uh, task assignment wasn't broken, and resource allocation was handled in team meetings, what they actually needed. Integration with existing tools. And easy to file share with contractors. Simple change order tracking and basic timeline templates they could reuse. So then let's talk about the reality check exercise. Try this, write down every feature that excited you about a piece of software. Then write down every task you did yesterday. How many of those exciting features would've helped with yesterday's actual work? Carmen did this exercise and realized the AI powered features that sounded great and she was excited about wouldn't have helped with a single task from the previous week. So here's your homework. First off, list your non-negotiable integrations, then write down your actual daily tasks. Third, map out what features would make those tests easier. Fourth, separate everything else into the nice to have or don't need pile. Pro tip, if you're not sure if something's a must have, try this test. Would you pay extra for just that feature? If the answer is, um, maybe it's a nice to have. Let's talk about the happy ending here. Remember Carmen, she ended up choosing a simpler system that integrated with everything, had templates for common tasks. Could handle change orders easily and bonus, it was half the price of the AI powered option, and our team actually uses it next time we're walking through integrations because the best software in the world is useless. If it doesn't play nice with your other tools ready to sort your must-haves from your nice to haves, head to fiery effects.com/choose. Grab that worksheet and let's start making features work for you, not against you.