Changemaker Spotlight Series: Connecting trusted tradies to happy homeowners at hipages

From quick plaster patch-ups to major kitchen renos, hipages helps solve all the big problems in and around the house. The online platform is the trusted home to over 31,000 professional tradies, connecting them directly with residential and commercial customers.

What we love about hipages is how the company has transformed the trade industry by smashing down stereotypes about how tradies work. They’ve embraced technology to improve every aspect of the previously tedious task of finding and securing a handy-person for fix-it jobs. 

So you can imagine our excitement when hipages Chief People and Culture Officer generously agreed to share her time with us to geek out about all things technology and tradies. We were delighted to host Jodette Cleary in this recent webinar (yes, you can watch on-demand now). Here are some of the highlights from our chat.

How the People and Culture team went 100% paperless

When Jodette joined hipages in 2015, the company was still using many manual processes – and the paperwork was piling up. “When I joined, administration was very time consuming, particularly with things like employment contracts. We’d print out two contracts, post out via snail mail and, if needed, follow up mistakes. It was a nightmare,” she said.

This manual way of working was pretty typical for a fast-growing company like hipages. As Jodette observed, companies that grow at a rapid clip often don’t have time to stop and look at the processes they’re using to make sure they're right for today and the future.  

Jodette brought a fresh perspective and the energy to change things up. “I’d come across Docusign in a previous role, and quickly introduced it here.”

The key features that helped to convince Jodette and the wider hipages team that Docusign was the right choice were things like its robustness, security, core functionality, and back-ups. “But my favourite feature would have to be the workflow. Knowing who signs what, when, is such a help and timesaver. At any point, you can jump in and see where a contract is at,” she said. 

Since starting out with Docusign, the People & Culture department at hipages is now proudly 100% paperless. 

Happy hipages employees, happier customers

Recently, hipages was named the second best place to work in Australia. Jodette believes a big part of this is because of how the company uses technology to improve business processes and make life easier for staff. “Getting to paperless has saved so much time, freeing us up to work on real value-adding services,” said Jodette.

“One of my core deliverables is to enable the rest of the team to do their best work every day. Streamlining internal processes and removing roadblocks is a huge part of this. It means we can all do our best work and serve our customers better.”

We love this attitude. It’s a sentiment we share here at Docusign. We’re all about helping the businesses who are still saddled with paper-based processes to transform and start reaping the benefits of digital systems. To find out how we could help you, get in touch today.