Pipeline tool

The Pipeline tool is a pipeline management tool for executive search consultants. It tracks client projects through stages — from initial inquiry through active engagement — and gives a team of consultants real-time visibility into assignments, workload, and project status.

Why it exists

The team I built this for had intended to manage their pipeline in spreadsheets. That would have worked, up to a point. But as the number of active projects grew, the spreadsheet they were intending to use wouldn’t be able to answer basic questions quickly: Who’s overloaded? Which projects are stalled? What came in this week? The Pipeline tool replaced that future workflow with something purpose-built.

How it was built

The Pipeline Tracker was built entirely with Claude Code, Anthropic’s AI coding tool. The process was iterative — I’d describe what I wanted in a session, Claude Code would write the implementation, and I’d review, test, and steer. Across dozens of sessions, the project grew from a blank directory to a production application.

The stack is Next.js 16 with React 19, Supabase for the database (PostgreSQL with row-level security), and shadcn/ui for the component library. It’s deployed on Vercel.

What it does

• Pipeline stages — Projects move through defined stages, giving the team a clear view of where everything stands.
• Team assignments and workload tracking — Each project can be assigned to consultants. The system tracks who’s carrying what, making it easy to balance work across the team.
• Role-based access control — Admins can manage users, configure settings, and see everything. Regular users see what they need to do their work.
• Automatic activity logging — Every significant change is recorded via database triggers, creating an audit trail without any extra effort from users.
• CSV export — Pipeline data can be exported for reporting or sharing with people outside the system.
• Email notifications — The system sends notifications when projects are assigned or updated, so nothing falls through the cracks.
• Built-in help system — A help page documents how the application works, written in Markdown and rendered directly in the app.