This guide covers managing projects, assigning team members to them and billing & invoicing,
A project is a collection of information about a specific engagement with a client. It includes information about the client, the scope of work, the budget, the timeline, invoices, and the team members assigned to the project.
You can view all projects by clicking on the Projects icon in the navigation bar on the left.
Projects are visible to leadership and project roles.
Projects can be created in two ways:
From the projects screen, click the + button in the top left corner to create a new project and enter project details into the dialog. The project will start in the Planned status.
Preferably, projects are automatically created when a deal is dragged to the closed won pipeline stage. All of the details configured in the deal - such as timeline, client, team allocations, and invoice schedule are copied from the deal to set the project up for success.
To navigate to a project detail screen, click on the Project title in the list of projects. The project detail screen is divided into several sections, each with its own set of information and actions.
At the top of the project details screen is the overview section. This shows key project information, such as project health, team utilizations, budget progress, and start/end dates.
To change the project health, click the color-coded health indicator and select a new health status from the dropdown. The health is a signal of how the project is progressing and can be used to identify potential issues.
To change the budget, click on the edit icon next to Budget to enter a new budget amount.
While the project is in planning mode, the start date can be updated as many times as necessary. Once the project starts, the project start date is no longer editable. When a project is completed, it won't show up in your list of projects. You can see historical projects by clicking Show Completed Projects in the list of projects.
At the top of the screen is a tab selector to choose which part of the project you want to view. There are four sections detailed below.
The project plan is used to manage the tasks, deliverables, timelines and milestones of the project. There are two view options for projects detailed below.
Use task-based projects for simple projects that don't require a lot of planning or tracking. A task is simply a container that users can bill time against. For example, a project might have two tasks Design and Project Management. Users submitting a timesheet for this project can select one of those tasks (or no task at all).
To create a new task to bucket hours, click Add Task in in the top left corner of the project plan tab and edit its name. You can edit a task name later, and it won't change which hours have been bucketed to this task.
In task-based projects, the end date of project is manually set by clicking the End On button in the Project Overview.
A new project starts in Task-based planning. For projects created from a deal with a timeline or staffing plan, the Timeline viewer is the default project plan.
By default, a project created from a deal using the Timeline or Staffing planner will start in a Timeline view. To switch to a Timeline view in a Task-based project, choose Timeline from the planner picker on the Project Plan tab.
A timeline project is organized by milestones and activities (workstreams or deliverables). These are displayed in a Gantt chart view: every activity and milestone has a start and end date that appears as a bar on a timeline.
To mark an activity as complete, click the checkbox next to the activity name. Once all activities in a milestone are complete, the milestone is marked as complete. The top-left corner of the planner shows the progress of all activities and milestones.
To add or edit activities and milestones, click the Edit button in the top left corner of the project plan tab.
To add an activity, click the Add Activity button at the bottom of the list of activities for a milestone. To add a milestone, click Add Milestone at the bottom of the list.
You can edit the name of an activity or milestone by entering text in their row.
To change the dates of an activity or milestone, drag the timeline bars. For activities, you can drag the left edge to change the start date, the right edge to change the end date, or the whole bar to move the activity.
For milestones, you can drag the whole bar to move every activity in that milestone.
You can also reorder the activities and milestones by dragging them up or down in the list. When you drag an activity underneath a milestone, it becomes a part of that milestone.
Once you're done editing the project plan, click the checkmark icon in the top-left corner of the planner to save. To revert changes, click the cancel icon.
The end date of the project is automatically calculated from end date of the last activity of the project.
The Team tab shows all team members assigned to the project. You can add or remove team members from this screen. See Assignments for more information.
The invoices tab shows all invoices associated with the project. You can manage invoices from this screen. See Invoicing for more information.
In the project overview, you can see the project's current and forecasted profitability and other performance (like how it is tracking against budget and timeline).
Profitability is calculated by comparing revenue collected against the cost of the team members assigned to the project. To ensure accurate calculations, make sure that all team members are assigned to the project and that their cost rates are set correctly. See User Management for more information.
