ProjectPlace process flows

A workspace is a place where team members can communicate, collaborate, plan work to be done, and follow up on work progress. Critical information about your project's status at the workspace level is rolled up to portfolio-level reports. Typically, the PMO, project manager, or ProjectPlace administrator is responsible for creating project workspaces.

There are a few steps to set up your workspace:

1. Create a new workspace. You can create a blank workspace and choose the settings yourself, or it can be based on a template with certain predefined settings
2. Define workspace settings. When you're just starting out with a workspace, we recommend taking some time to update the following workspace settings:

• Change the workspace manager. When a new workspace is created, the workspace manager and the workspace head administrator roles are assigned to the same person by default.
• Add additional workspace administrators to help you manage the workspace.
• Set up workspace automation rules for the workspace if you have recurring processes you want to automate, such as onboarding or task management.
• Check password and security settings for the workspace, such as password requirements and two-step verification.

3. Set up workspace security:

• Create member groups. Member groups are used to facilitate communication (for example, @-ref'ing a group containing multiple people) and to define access rights for the workspace.
• Deactivate any tools each group isn't likely to use to reduce workspace clutter.

Note: It's best to set up user groups and define basic workspace settings before inviting members to the workspace. After that, it's up to you to determine the point at which you invite the people you want to be involved in your project.

Build out initial plan; define milestones and activities

Project managers build out the initial project plan by adding activities and milestones. Once your plan is in place, activities in the plan can be connected to cards on team boards, ensuring that team members stay aligned to the plan.

To build your project plan:

Create boards

Project managers or workspace administrators create boards to help plan work (represented by cards) and visualize the progress of the work being completed. It is recommended that only one board is created for project execution. Project managers are able to prioritize the work to be completed on this board by connecting the board/cards with activities on the plan.

Create a new board and give it a descriptive name. If desired, boards can be customized to fit different ways of working through definition of the status columns, WIP (work in progress) limits, labels, and more.

Connect activities to boards/cards

Connecting the board with activities in the plan ensures that team members are always aligned to the plan and keep focus on the highest priority tasks.

Create cards for all planned work

Who creates cards in ProjectPlace depends on how work is managed and planned:

• When using bottom-up planning, the project team creates the cards necessary to execute activities put on the board.
• When using top-down planning, the project manager creates all the cards on the activities in the plan, with or without the help of templates. The project manager may assign cards, but ideally, the project team is allowed to pull cards on the board when they have the capacity to do so.

As you create cards, each card should contain information about the task to perform, either in the form of a description or a checklist of items to be completed.

Assign resources to cards

Once cards are created, resources must be assigned to complete the work. Multiple people can be assigned to a single card.

Other card details you may want to include are:

• Due date or planned start date: The date the work needs to be completed or started.
• Label or tag: Cards can also be categorized using labels or tags, making it easier to filter or find work items with the same type or subject matter.
• Dependencies: Cards can be linked to each other using dependencies. When a card that depends on another card is completed, the person assigned to the dependent card will be notified that it’s time to get to work.

If desired an organization can track time spent to complete work by having team members report time on the activities they have been working on. This can be done using the Time Reporting tool, or it can be tracked on a single activity or card.

If the Planview Portfolios - ProjectPlace Connector is installed and the Team Member FLEX Timesheet enabled, users can report time directly to a connected Planview Portfoliost project.

Update card status

The status of a card is represented by the status column in which the card currently resides. The first column to the left represents work that has not yet been started. When cards are moved to the second column, they are considered to be started, and cards in the last column are considered to be done. You can update the status by moving the card from one column to another.

Maintain plan; update milestone/activity status as work is completed

As planned work is executed, maintain the plan by updating the status of activities and milestones. When all the cards associated with an activity have been completed, mark the activity as Done.​​​​​​

Maintain document library

To set up a document library, create a folder structure or upload an existing folder structure to keep documents organized. Different colors can be used to differentiate folders from each other, for example, to specify a particular color for a specified stage in the project.

You will also need to set folder access rights. Document security is controlled at the folder level, so any documents stored inside a folder all have the same access level. You can use the Public Documents folder to provide documents to users outside of ProjectPlace, but you can’t restrict access to public documents, and only administrators can edit them.

You can set document rules to automatically delete recycle bin items after a certain amount of time, or to request new people in a workplace read certain documents.

Upload working documents and attach to cards as required

With a document library in place, you are able to upload your documents to the relevant folder. Files can also be added to any relevant cards.

If you store documents in another system, ProjectPlace's third-party integrations make it easy to link to documents from Box, Dropbox, Sharepoint, Google Drive, and more. Work with your team to establish standards for which kinds of documents will be stored in third-party repositories, and which ones will use the native ProjectPlace document repository.

Work on documents

From here team members can keep track of any changes to documents, and version management can be applied if needed.

Send documents for review and approval as required

Team members can gather structured feedback on working documents using document reviews and review workflows. Documents can be sent to a single reviewer or to multiple reviewers, who are notified of review requests via email and ProjectPlace notifications. Anyone can be invited to review a document, but only ProjectPlace users are able to edit documents.

Use the Knowledge Base for repeatable projects, gate-driven deliverables, etc., to easily update standard documents that apply to all workspaces using a particular template. When you add something to the Knowledge Base, it is available for use in all relevant workspaces as a read-only document. For templates specific to a workspace, you can create them separately; however, Knowledge Base is the recommended method.

Do work

As work is progressing, team members move cards through the board from left to right. Throughout this process updates, information, and files can be shared in the cards for collaboration with other team members.

Communicate with team through comments, conversations, and meetings

Team members collaborate by leaving comments on cards, documents, milestones, and activities. In addition to comments, the Conversations tool can also be used for general communication with team members and stakeholders. You can also attach documents or use tags when posting.

In both comments and conversations, you can @-ref people to let them know when you have a comment or a question about an item or want to call a conversation to someone’s attention, and they will be notified in the service. You can also @-ref the All members group If you want to communicate something to all workspace members.

Note: Tags are a great way to organize conversations by topic.