Services

Software roadmap for Irish SMEs

The sequence that works for most Irish SMEs between 5 and 100 staff. Designed to be usable before, during, and after an Enterprise Ireland Digital Discovery engagement.

Five phases, in this order

We see Irish SMEs stumble when they install a CRM or an AI tool before the accounting and banking foundation is stable. This is the sequence that tends to work.

Phase 1

Banking and the basics

An Irish IBAN business account, a Revenue-integrated accounting tool, and a reliable invoicing setup. This is foundational for Revenue filing, supplier payments, and the bank feed that every later tool will rely on.

Phase 2

Payroll and HR

The minute you employ anyone (including yourself as a director on PAYE), you need PAYE Modernisation-compliant payroll. Add structured HR once you pass 10 employees.

Phase 3

Sales, CRM, and project delivery

Once revenue is coming in and the basics are stable, invest in a CRM to manage pipeline and a project management tool to run delivery. Free tiers work fine initially.

Phase 4

Operations layer

Sector-specific tooling: POS for retail and hospitality, inventory for product businesses, field service for trade and installation. Pick these once the layer underneath is stable.

Phase 5

AI layer

AI tools on clean data give you real leverage. Copilot, Claude, Gemini, or domain-specific AI in your CRM or accounting platform. Avoid AI before your data foundation is solid.

Let the AI Stack Finder do the heavy lifting

Our free tool scores verified Irish vendors against your company size, sector, budget, and priorities. The output is a stack recommendation you can hand to your consultant.

Find My Stack takes about two minutes. It asks about your company size, sector, budget, current tools, and priorities, then returns a structured stack with Irish compliance notes against each recommendation. You can download the brief or share it with your accountant.

Open Find My Stack

Get the roadmap as a shareable brief

We will email a one-page version of this roadmap adapted to your company size and sector. Useful in a Digital Discovery kickoff meeting.