20 September 2021
• Name: Henry Dewing
• Job title: Founder
• Company: DueTrade
• Industry: SaaS (Software as a Service)
• Location: Norwich and London
• Years of experience: 5
What is your favourite personal app?
Very stereotypical for a millennial but most of my screen time is spent on Instagram. It’s simple and engaging but badly addictive. Also, I love a bit of Chess - really got into chess recently, so sometimes to start the day I play a game of chess. Sad I know. Lichess is a good app for it. I think I’m probably meant to say Dewing Grains App or some of the others we’re developing.
Do you have a favourite piece of personal software?
Obviously, the ones we develop are favourites because they actually mean something to me but if we’re talking outside of work then Strava is great for tracking my exercise, I think it actually motivates me to exercise more. In work terms, though I’m a big fan of PandaDoc. PandaDoc is like DocuSign, it makes signing contracts so much easier for you and the client along with saving us both time, you can also track when the client has opened the contract just in case you need to nudge them with a phone call.
What was the first piece of technology you got really excited about?
Other than progressing from playing snake in black & white on a Nokia 3310 to the iPhone I have now?! Coming from Norfolk we never had Uber so when I moved to London having an app that could sort you a lift from anywhere, anytime was very helpful. Deliveroo was also a big one, having that convenience of ordering food to your door in a busy environment helps a lot.
What device improves your life most at work?
It’s a tool called Lusha, I’ll let whoever reads this look into it. Also PandaDoc.
I’m not just a tech user - something that has really improved my day to day life (throughout the week) has been physically writing down a checklist and ticking off the tasks as the day goes on. They’re predominantly work-related but could also be ‘Exercise’ or ‘Put on a wash’. Whatever the task, ticking the box makes the whole day feel more productive.
What app keeps you most productive at work?
LinkedIn. It’s a great way of networking and finding new businesses and prospects to contact to see if they could be interested in building a B2B ordering platform for their business. I say platform because we don’t just build apps we also build a back end web system for our clients to control what is used and seen on the app.
Is there any technology that has become extinct that you would like to resurrect?
Generally, technology improves as time goes on and so does the users needs. A lot of apps out there need to take a look at their user experience because it can quickly become outdated and some just have too much going on. I can’t think of anything that I would want to bring back. I do think it's time that the fax machine needs to be made obsolete the only person I hear that uses a fax machine is Dolly Parton when she faxes new songs to Miley Cyrus (BBC Radio 1 interview).
Is there any technology you would personally recommend that you don’t think enough people know about? (Hardware or software, work or personal)
There is a really good app called Moneybox which is a great way of saving money. You can add in as little or as much as you like per month but what it also does is when you spend say £1.20, it will round it up to £2 and invest the 80 pence. You get a much better return than you do a standard savings account.
A lot of people I know don’t use mobile banking enough, it has made my life incredibly easy when it comes to transferring money.
Do you think anything about your personal use of tech would surprise DueTrade followers?
I genuinely love an app. I have them for pretty much everything.
