The Project Tracking and Rollup template set is the quick and easy way to get a project up and running and report on risks and milestones to stakeholders.
Download the Template Set
Plan Requirements: This template set has been designed to utilize the full suite of functionality available in Smartsheet. If you are on a limited plan you can still use the template set however not all premium functionality will be available. Click here to see a list of discontinued plans and identify your plan and user type here.
Capabilities, Benefits, and Overview
Use this template set for:
- Plan, schedule, and assign project tasks organized by phase
- Stay on top of at-risk tasks to ensure project success
- Access project information through a Project Rollup Dashboard
Read on for a step-by-step guide on how to get started, and navigate to the Learning Center if you have any questions along the way!
How Does It Work?
What's Included?
Setup & Customize
1. Create a New Workspace
A. Open Browse. From the browse tab, hover over Workspaces with your cursor, right click, and press Create New Workspace. In the menu that appears, name your Workspace and press OK.
B. Select the template set folder in your Sheets folder. Drag and drop the folder in to the workspace you just created.
Note: Using a workspace is a best practice when building a collaborative process. Workspaces allow you to centralize your work and control sharing with different stakeholders.
2. Modify the Project Plan Sheet
Use the Project Plan sheet to track and maintain critical data about a project. Project sheets in Smartsheet have dependencies enabled and include columns such as Duration, Predecessors, and % Complete.
The project plan will automate your project timeline from the start date and will provide an estimated end date based on project tasks. It’s best to enable dependencies for projects with deadlines to ensure every milestone in your project is tracked, on time, and ultimately meets your deadline.
A. In the Task Name column, name the project phases in the parent (colorful) rows.
B. Use the indented grandchild (white) rows in your hierarchy, to enter tasks in the Task Name column.
C. Starting on row 3, enter dates in the Start Date and End Date columns.
D. The other data on your ancestor and parent rows, including Start Date, End Date, % Complete, and Duration are auto calculated by the tasks below the parent row.
E. Attach documents or links to webpages to the row in the Attachment (paperclip icon) column to keep all of your project information and resources in one place.
F. Track the progress of your project by viewing the interactive Gantt timeline to see which tasks are complete (green), which are late (red), which are in progress (blue), and which are on hold (orange). Conditional formatting rules apply formatting automatically to rows or cells based on the values they contain.
3. Sheet Bonus: Use Baselines to track project status
Licensed sheet owners and admins can enable a baseline on this sheet. A baseline is a fixed reference point in time to measure and compare a project’s progress to completion. Capturing and comparing variances between the current actual schedule and the originally planned schedule is essential for tracking any deviations and allows project teams to quickly reprioritize to get projects back on track and delivered on time.
A. From the Project Plan Sheet, click the Baselines button on the right side of the toolbar.
B. Click Set in the summary modal to enable the baseline.
C. Three new non-editable columns will get added to your sheet: Baseline Start, Baseline Finish, and Variance, and you’ll see the baseline visualized as a grey line underneath the Gantt bars.
D. Click the Baselines button again to bring up the summary modal. From here, the sheet owner or admin can toggle the baseline on/off, Reset, or Remove the baseline altogether.
E. As dates shift around, the Variance in the summary modal will give you a quick visual snapshot of overall project status displayed as Days behind, Days ahead, or On schedule.
Learn More: Baselines
4. Adjust Durations & Predecessors
"Duration" and "Predecessor" are two unique column types that exist in project sheets.
A. Set the duration of each task in the "Duration" column.
B. Set predecessors, or relationships between tasks, in the "Predecessors" column
5. Assign tasks to team members
Assign tasks to individuals by adding their email addresses in the Assigned To column. A contact includes both their name and email address, which drives the delivery of automated actions, alerts, reports, and more.
A. Add contacts in the Assigned To column by individually creating a new contact, or adding an existing contact from your Contact List.
6. Adjust alert
An automatic alert workflow is a great way to let your team know they have new tasks to fulfill as soon as they are assigned. An alert has been set on the project sheets to notify anyone shared to the sheet right away when a new task has been assigned to them.
A. To edit the alert workflow, click on Automation and select Manage Workflows in the dropdown menu.
B. Then double-click on the workflow itself in order to edit the criteria.
7. Recurring reminder
An automated recurring reminder is a great way to save time and keep track of deadlines. The Recurring Incomplete Task alert will notify the contact listed in the Assigned To column every day when the End Date is in the next 3 days and where the current Status is On Hold, Not Started, or In Progress. Note if you set up recurring reminders for other people, be thoughtful about how often you send the alert.
A. Modify the reminder by going to Automation and selecting Manage Workflows in the dropdown menu. Then double-click on the workflow to open the editor window.
B. To customize the workflow’s schedule (trigger box), click on the dropdown that begins with Every day starting on and select Run once to trigger on a single date, or choose Custom to edit the recurrence schedule.
C. Customize the workflow conditions (condition boxes) to add criteria and then click Save.
Learn More: Alerts and Reminders
8. Sheet Bonus: View or edit your project summary data
This template set utilizes the sheet summary feature. The Project Plan sheet includes a pre-populated sheet summary that provides a standard, robust way to organize and report on project information in your sheet.
Here you can see a quick recap of the status of tasks and the count of those at risk. Open the sheet summary on the right panel to view or edit your project summary fields to get a portfolio view of your work. You can use formulas and reference another summary fields.
A. Click the sheet summary icon to expand the sheet summary. You can expand and collapse the right panel to stay in the context of your sheet or maximize your sheet real estate when you don’t need to view it.
B. To add fields, click + New Field.
C. Name your field and select the field type: Text/Number, Contact list, Date, Dropdown list, Checkbox, or Symbols.
D. To edit the field properties, hover over the right side of the field and click on the vertical ellipsis (â‹®) to open the field options dropdown menu.
9. Update status and filters
After the task has been assigned, the task owner can update the status by selecting an option from a custom dropdown list in the Status column. If there are multiple owners, filters are an ideal way to help people cut through the noise. On the Project Plan sheet, we created a shared filter called Tasks Assigned to Me. Anyone viewing the sheet can select that filter and see only their assigned items.
A. Click on the Filter button and select Tasks Assigned to Me to see tasks assigned to the current user viewing the sheet. You can also select any of the other filter options to perform other tasks.
B. Select the Filter Off button in the toolbar to create, use, or modify filters.
Learn More: Dropdown List, Filters, Shared Filter
10. View the Project Milestone Report
The Project Milestones Report tracks all the critical project milestones by displaying any rows where the duration is equal to 0 (the definition of a milestone), and the Task Name is not blank. The information in this report also appears on the Project Rollup Dashboard.
Learn More: Reports
11. Use the At Risk Tasks Report
A task is automatically flagged as At Risk if the status is not Complete and the End Date is in the past. This report surfaces all at-risk tasks in one view, and also displays them on the Project Tracking and Rollup dashboard.
Learn More: Reports
12. Use the unique formulas
The At Risk column on the project plan leverages a formula to automatically flag Tasks that have an End Date in the past and do not have a status of Complete. The formula looks like this:
=IF(AND([End Date]3 < TODAY(), NOT(Status3 = "Complete")), 1, 0)
The logic states that if the End Date is less than today (in the past) and status is not Complete then 1 (flag the row as at risk). If these statements are not true, then 0 (do nothing), and don’t flag the row as at risk.
Learn More: Formulas and Functions
13. Monitor your Project Tracking and Rollup Dashboard
The Project Tracking and Rollup dashboard is the keystone of your template set. It pulls together all of the critical project information you need to track. Dashboards are made of different widgets that pull in real-time information from your sheets and reports.
A. Click Edit in the upper left corner of the dashboard to begin customizing. Hover your mouse over any widget and select the pencil icon to start modifying the widget and its contents.
B. Project Information is a Metric widget that summarizes key project data in your project plan.
C. Link to Resources are Shortcut widgets that you can use to link sheets, reports, and other resources that reside outside of Smartsheet.
D. Update the Key Contacts with information about your team.
E. Both Project Milestones and At Risk Tasks are Report widgets, which display your live reports in your dashboard.
14. Share Your New Solution
Sharing is the best way to collaborate with others involved in your projects. You can share your entire workspace with members of your department, or share individual items within the workspace.
Learn more: Workspace Sharing
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Helpful Resources
We have lots of resources to help you get started and become even more productive in Smartsheet. We also love hearing from our customers, please use the form at the bottom to submit feedback about this template set!
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Last Updated: 03/31/21
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