Employee question
A person needs data, a report, or help understanding a result.
erpai · Internal tools · KancanUSA
From ERP data to useful answers.
Designing and testing a read-only connection to N41—and making employee access easier to manage.
- Company
- KancanUSA
- My role
- Design, testing & administration
- Platform
- N41 + read-only MCP
- Focus
- Data access & reporting
THE WORKSPACE / SENSITIVE VALUES HIDDEN
01 / Context
Help employees get more from the system they already use.
N41 is KancanUSA’s main business program. Employees need to retrieve its data quickly, generate reports, and turn information into findings they can act on.
erpai provides a read-only connection through MCP, the Model Context Protocol. Employees can work with N41 data in an AI-assisted workflow, while the connection does not write changes back to the source system.
My responsibility: design the experience, test it, and administer employee access. This case study focuses on the console that supports that access.
Read-only connection
erpai retrieves information from N41 through MCP.
Reports & findings
The information supports analysis and the next decision.
Conceptual flow. No business records or measured performance results are shown.
That connection starts with a practical question for the administrator: who should be able to use it?
02 / The workspace
Make access easy to enter and easy to understand.
The console brings sign-in, connection status, and employee access into a focused administrative workspace.
Entry point
A clear place for the administrator to begin.
The sign-in screen states what the console is for and presents one direct action. Its network context makes the internal nature of the tool visible.
Overview
See the connections, then choose the next action.
The dashboard combines summary status with the employee list. Search, status filters, expiration, and last-used context sit close to the controls for reviewing a connection.
From this overview, the administrator can issue access, locate an employee, and manage the connection over time.
03 / The workflow
Follow a connection through its lifecycle.
Four everyday tasks shape the experience: create access, find it, review it, and understand the result.
Step 01 / Issue access
Give every connection an owner.
The creation form ties access to an employee name, user ID, and department. Optional expiration and notes add context without making every field mandatory.
Identity before credentials
The administrator can recognize who the connection belongs to.
A visible lifecycle
The expiration helper explains what leaving the field blank means.
An explicit access state
“Enable this token” makes the intended state visible before saving.
The console states that the full token is shown only immediately after creation. Issuing a live token is outside this portfolio demonstration.
Step 02 / Find access
Move from the whole list to the right person or team.
Search accepts an employee, user ID, or department. A department query narrows the list while preserving the same table structure and access controls.
Step 03 / Review & adjust
Use a familiar form for ongoing administration.
The edit form mirrors the creation form. Ownership, expiration, notes, and the enabled state stay in the same place when an administrator returns to an existing connection.
Step 04 / Understand the result
Keep an empty list from becoming a dead end.
A search or status filter can return no matching connections. The empty state explains what happened and points the administrator toward adjusting the filters or creating access.
No matches for a status
No matches for a search
04 / Design library
A consistent language for everyday administration.
The same visual rules carry across sign-in, the dashboard, search, and employee forms. This library documents the interface’s current styles and the reusable patterns shown in the walkthrough.
E erpai
01 · Color foundations
Primary green
#26654EPrimary actionsHeading ink
#202A3ATitles and hierarchyMuted text
#7B8493Supporting informationBorder
#E5E9EFFields and dividersActive surface
#EDF6EFStatus backgroundActive text
#448365Status label02 · Typography
Inter · Segoe UI fallbackMCP token management
Page heading · 30 px · 700Manage employee connections and control access when needed.
Interface body · 12 px · 400EMPLOYEE ACCESS
Section label · uppercase hierarchy03 · Actions & inputs
Search field · default
⌕ Search employees
Search field · focused
⌕ Design×
● Active✓ Enable this token
Button radius 7 px · field radius 6 px · badge radius 5 px04 · Spacing rhythm
4 px
8 px
12 px
16 px
24 px
32 px
05 · Repeated information & feedback
Employee / user IDStatusActions
Alex Morganalex.demo · fictional● ActiveEdit Delete
No tokens to displayCreate a token or adjust your search filters.
Together, these patterns give the console a familiar structure as an administrator moves between tasks.
05 / Takeaways
Clarity matters on both sides of the connection.
I designed, tested, and administer erpai for KancanUSA. The work connects the employee’s need for useful N41 data with the administrator’s responsibility to manage access.
Keep the boundary visible.
A read-only connection has a defined purpose. The experience needs to make that purpose understandable alongside the access controls.
Give each connection context.
Identity, department, expiration, and access state help an administrator understand what they are reviewing before acting.
Measure usefulness next.
I would evaluate time to retrieve a useful answer, report accuracy against N41, employee task completion, and the effort required to manage access. These are future evaluation priorities, not measured results.
Images document the interface with confidential data redacted or replaced. Employee identities, token values, internal addresses, usage timestamps, and company counts are hidden. The onboarding example uses fictional details.
Next stop
