Forum Discussion

MarkComish's avatar
MarkComish
Qrew Assistant Captain
8 years ago

How can I create and relate a Parent Company and a Subsidiary Company

I have several companies in my "Companies" table that are Parent Companies.  I have several Subsidiary's of the Parent Companies listed as Companies as well.  How can I relate the Subsidiaries and the...
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MelissaDoran's avatar
MelissaDoran
Qrew Cadet
8 years ago
I had the same problem with jobs (parent/child jobs) as well as customers. 
It's a little confusing at first, but I kept all customers in one table and created a relationship customer-customer. This allows for a company to be a parent or subsidiary. I hadn't looked into any of the implications of doing it this way, but maybe someone can come along and tell my why it's not a recommended option? :) 

On jobs for example - our form has a 'related jobs tab' you can either assign the parent or view child jobs from the tab. 
  • EvanMartinez's avatar
    EvanMartinez
    Moderator
    8 years ago
    That is another way of doing it. From a technical standpoint creating a self referencing table causes some options to no longer be available such as copy master detail buttons. Self referencing tables disable this function and require an entire re-architecture in the future if that is something that becomes needed or requires a custom scripted button.

    From an experience standpoint, being in a Care role before this I've just seen a number of customers who caused themselves a great deal of heart ache trying to navigate a self referencing table when it comes to reporting and keeping the flow of their information clean and organized. Self-referencing tables are functional but I usually prefer to break things up into distinct tables to leverage that separation as a tool. Also long term it helps to keep the tables from individually growing too large as the data is naturally broken up. 
  • MelissaDoran's avatar
    MelissaDoran
    Qrew Cadet
    8 years ago
    Thanks for the reply!