Enterprise License - Add Ons Intro and Configurations

What is an Add On? High Level Explanations of: • Projects and Tasks • Work Status • Project Status • Project Types • Companies • Departments • Resource Types • Health • Project Phases How these Apply to Users and Projects Template with Task Creation

Transcript:

Hello! In this video, we are going to go over what a Project Insight instance looks like when it's brand new. This is an enterprise license, and I have the ability to show you how it works. We will be going through some add-ons and explaining how those work as we build a workspace.

Here, I can see that I'm logged into the homepage as an administrator. I know that I am an admin because I have the admin icon here. It's pretty straightforward, and it allows me to come in and manipulate the add-ons, which is what we're discussing here. Add-ons are additional pieces of Project Insight that are waiting to be turned on; they sit dormant. They are essentially different components of our tool that you can utilize.

Today, we will be going over just a few of the more high-level pieces. I have the option to see what is installed or to get additional add-ons. When you first start out, it's going to prompt you to get more by default because you might want to get the workspace started. The projects and tasks section, however, is quite powerful, and you can configure it on its own.

As we add add-ons, they will be populated here, and you will have access to configuration tutorials. Configuring add-ons within Project Insight is pretty easy; it's just a matter of clicking "Configure." You can then see the different pieces. In this instance, we are looking at the different views that are optional. At the project level, you can even get pretty granular. For example, under task default settings, if a task is overdue, I want it to appear red in the work list. This way, I can easily see what is overdue in our task list.

Ultimately, we are going to be adding more add-ons. So again, add-ons are the additional pieces of the tool that we want to track or examine. Under "Get More Add-ons," you have the option to scroll down and search for what you want. Maybe you want to add project templates; you can see the description of the add-on and what it will do, along with some helpful links. Once you've decided, you can simply install it. At that point, you will have the option to configure it, or you can just go ahead and click "OK" and continue browsing different add-ons.

Where we're actually going to start is with what we call "Work Status." This is one of the more granular pieces of the tool. You can see here what this is. I can click "Install," and then we will configure these as we go. I'm going to click "Configure" under Work Status. What this will do is give me the ability to control what dispositions I see at the task level. By default, we say that you have the options: Not Started, Started, In Progress, Almost Done, and Done. You can see the work percent complete here; this is what will actually roll up in the task view of any project or even in a report as percent complete for this task.

We are going to change these a bit based on the requirements we've been given. First, we will rename "Not Started" to just "Not Started" and assign it a color of light blue. To do this, we just click "Save," and now we’ve successfully updated the name and assigned a color to it. You also have the ability to control things like the display order; for example, if I wanted "To Do" to be first, I can save that as well.

The next status we need is something we will call "Working On." This gives us the ability to delete "Started," as "Working On" is really the same as "In Progress." This group is not looking to be as granular with their tracking, so we will go ahead and get rid of "Started." Working on is noted as about 50% complete, so we will configure this status accordingly. We're going to assign it a dark shade of blue.

Now we can show the color coding: you have "Not Started" (light blue), "Working On" (dark blue), and “Done.” One additional disposition we want to track is "On Hold," which we will set to yellow. This indicates that we've paused on this task, and there is no update on the percent complete work-wise. We just want to remain stagnant on this status. These different dispositions then become reportable within the tool from a task report perspective, alongside every other detail.

Next, when work is in progress, we will call it "Working On." This indicates that I am actively working on this particular task. Now that this add-on is configured the way we want, we will go back to our add-ons home screen. This will give us the ability to add additional pieces, and we can see the ones we’ve added since the video started: Project Templates and Work Status.

The next add-on we will look for is "Project Status," which is very similar to Work Status. I'm going to use the search function here. Project Status will give us the ability to have high-level dispositions at the project level. By default, what we have will work great for this organization. They are looking for "Planning," "Active," "On Hold," and "Complete." We will add these and change the order as well. We will keep our color scheme as yellow for "On Hold," and we will add "Complete" with a display order of three. This way, we align with what we're looking for.

Now we have additional pieces of Work Status, where we can state whether this project is active. From a resource capacity and financial planning perspective, it's essential to note which projects are in flight. If we are completed, we will say that this one is not active anymore; it’s a done project, but we will keep the reference point there. If we are in an active state, we can rename it to anything we like, and "Planning" is often designed to look ahead and see what might be upcoming.

These will be the project-level dispositions that we can report on. We will review these when we get into our project-level pieces. Moving forward, we will go into what we call "Project Types." Here, we differentiate the different pieces of the project. We can see that we have gotten our Project Template updated, a little bit of our project/task data updated, our Project Statuses, and now we are at Project Types. This is a way to differentiate the work being done here.

We will install and configure a handful of types. The first one is "Professional Development." I’ll stick with the Project Insight standard color palette, although I can select any color palette that suits our organization. Ultimately, I'm just going to add a handful of these and quickly get them added, as it's quite simple in the tool due to its inline editing capabilities.

We have "Community Outreach" added, which indicates the different types of work being done. This categorization allows it to be more efficiently organized within our tool. I will quickly assign a color to "Community Outreach," changing it to blue. You can see how quickly I’ve differentiated these, and this will roll into the reports at the project level.

Next, we will go back into our add-ons and add an "Users" section to define how we differentiate the type of person using the tool. We will explore several ways to do this, the first being the concept of "Companies." We can click on this option, and once we configure it, it is straightforward to say what organization you belong to.

You can add a company from here or directly from the line. When you click "Add Company," you can fill in the name of your organization, for example, "Rorg." You also have the ability to designate the type of company you are. Are you internal? If you're adding additional add-ons, you can specify if you are a client company. This gives them access to our client portal, which is just a different add-on.

Companies will allow us to differentiate at the project level regarding who this work is for. Is it for us, a vendor, or a client? This also lets us manage our resources better. The next piece we are looking at is "Departments," which similarly applies to users and/or projects. This will help us differentiate who in the organization is involved.

We've got our Communications team, Finance, Operations, and Programs. The idea is to track these groups within the broader organization. I'm going to head back into my add-ons and do the next piece here, which is going to be "Resource Types." After that, we will quickly add a user to show what these pieces build up to, followed by adding a piece for "Project Phases."

Resource Types allows you to assign skills that apply well to our resource allocation pieces. I can add any colors I want here, but I'm not going to for this demonstration. For example, I’ve got an IT resource and a Board Member, and I will add a marketer and an accountant to ensure we have our communications team covered. Finally, I can add a Project Manager and a Director, who may have visibility across all projects, not just those specific to one Project Manager.

We’ve added a few different pieces here, and this lets us go out of our add-ons briefly to touch on our admin section. We can see the fact that we have the add-on of companies enabled. We can view which companies are present. In this case, we are jumping to users. There are two functional ways to work in this section: you can go into the advanced settings to import or export users and look at everything more systematically.

However, you also have the ability to see the pieces we just added: which company you work for, what part of the company you're with, and what type of resource you are. You can edit this info and differentiate users. For example, I can update my information to reflect that I work for Rorg as an Admin and am a Project Manager. Once saved, this will allow me to be differentiated in various reporting ways within the tool.

Now, if I want to add an additional user, I will see that same screen. I can input their name, assign them to the organization, and give them the specific department that corresponds to the resource itself. You can even clone users, which is helpful if you need to bulk add similar profiles.

All of these functionalities have been provided in the workspace via the add-ons. The key here is that as we add the necessary components within Project Insight to manage our organization, the workspace accommodates the pieces that matter to us without being cluttered with other features we might not need.

When we click on "Get More Add-ons," we can see what's available. It's straightforward. If you want to track time on specific tasks, you can do that here to create a time entry. This connects directly to any tasks that are available. We also need to focus now on Resource Capacity and Allocation, as we’ve grown into how we utilize these features.

We will install this add-on now because it plays a crucial role. While we’re on the topic, we want to focus on "Project Phases." This feature shows a quick way to look at project health and offers an overview of the overall health by various indicators. You’ll see generic red, yellow, and green indicators. You can track these metrics based on what is critical for your organization to be aware of.

To keep track of project health effectively, you have the option to designate which aspects of a project to monitor. For instance, if you want to keep an eye on the schedule, budget, and so on, you can easily customize these parameters. There are also automatic health indicators, meaning you can set up notifications for when you're falling behind schedule, ensuring you're always informed about your projects' status.

Every time you enable an add-on, it appears in the relevant section. Because I have the permissions needed, I can manage what is installed and even uninstall or disable features that I no longer require. For instance, if I want my users to have access to a mobile application, we can implement that as well.

The goal of the add-ons is simple: as I identify a need within our workspace, I can enable it, learn more about it, and install it if necessary. If I want to configure these phases, we will now do so to build a quick template using them. For the initiation phase, for example, I can color it appropriately and define other phases like "Planning" and "Execution." We aim to maintain compliance and structure, allowing the organization to function efficiently.

Once the project phases are enabled, many organizations will often build a quick project template. You can add new templates that reflect the phases just configured, allowing for easier initialization of future projects. When naming this template, we’ll consider which department is doing the work and for what purpose.

The date noted during setup is more of a byproduct of when each project will commence. Once the new task list starts, we can proceed through adding summary tasks that roll into the specific phases.

We’ll create an initiation summary task that serves to aggregate the children tasks below it. So we could say the project request will take five days to complete, with a realistic workload of only ten hours. After saving that, I can add dependency relationships more effectively; for example, that we can only proceed with developing the project charter once the project request is complete.

This was just a brief overview of how to establish tasks and track them within the project. The planning phase functions similarly. Here, we would set tasks and assign corresponding time for completion. The ability to insert tasks, manage dependencies, and build detailed templates is perhaps one of the more critical features to take advantage of.

Final organizational structure ensures that you're effectively managing your resources, assigning tasks, and understanding the overall timeline of projects from start to finish. Project Insight makes it easy to visualize these relationships and track overall progress.

In summary, the add-ons within Project Insight allow for detailed, customizable project management efforts based on your organization’s needs. I truly hope you found this demonstration helpful. If you have any questions, please reach out to us at sales@proinsight. Thank you so much!