40 Hours Flat: How AI-Assisted Development Propelled Globalia's HR App
When a critical HR tool abruptly ends its free membership tier, how do you respond? Instead of scrambling for a costly, temporary subscription, our team utilized AI-assisted development to design, build, and launch a custom application custom application within a strict 40-hour budget.
Using an AI-first approach driven by Antigravity, Gemini, Claude, Supabase, and GCP, the development team boosted its capacity to focus on a zero-friction user experience and crush the standard 200-hour turnaround time.
The Need
Software Payment Model Rushes Migration
Globalia already thought its legacy HRIS software was clunky, with disjointed paths to complete time-off requests and confusing fields for "leave type" and "reason.” So, when the vendor announced it was switching its payment model, the team wasn’t exactly sad about saying goodbye a little early.
Good thing, too, because as a free-tier member, Globalia would be immediately impacted. Investing in a short-term subscription for a tool the team already disliked didn't make sense. The goal was to create a 'bridge' solution that was actually better than the tool it was replacing—fast, simple, and automated.
Using a spreadsheet was not an option—that would be a nightmare to follow all the data. So, AI came to mind, and I asked the developers, ‘Do you think it's possible to build a tool quickly?’ They told me, ‘Everything is possible.’
Our Solution
Rapid Custom App Development
- Custom application development
- Employee dashboard
- Admin dashboard
- Payroll reporting
Forty hours is like a heartbeat in the development world. To hit this aggressive deadline, our developers leaned into a specialized AI-assisted workflow. This allowed them to act as an extension of the HR team’s vision, moving from concept to a full-stack tool in a fraction of the traditional time. The result? A full-stack HRIS tool capable of managing the entire workflow, from an employee’s initial PTO request to management approval.
The team created a custom application with impressive speed, giving Globalia a temporary solution to manage time off until the wider enterprise HRIS system went into effect. But you would never know the tool wasn’t built to last, offering simple ways for both staff and HR personnel to manage information.
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Dashboards: Individual staff users have a full view of their PTO balance and can submit new requests, while HR administrators can manage requests and manually adjust employee balances.
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Payroll Reporting: Administrators can export comprehensive payroll reports for a specified date range.
Phase 1: Kickoff & Scoping
The team defined all key requirements regarding employee time-off balances, PTO requests, and payroll reporting.
Phase 2: Functional Demo (First 10 Hours)
Developers incorporated AI tools, including Antigravity, Gemini, and Claude, to build a prototype that was fully functional in its first iteration.
Phase 3: Testing & Refinement (29 hours)
The team tested payroll export scenarios and refined the admin dashboard to iterate toward the tool’s ideal end state before finalizing the application.
Phase 4: Go-Live (Hour 40)
The development team launched the tool as an interim solution ahead of SmartBug and Globalia’s HR tool migration.
The Results
A Frictionless Experience in Record Time
