Project Tasks help you create an organized schedule for all team members involved in a Project. By creating Project Tasks and assigning them to your team members, you let them know their involvement in the Project ahead of time. When team members work on their Tasks, they track their time, which helps you track the overall completion status of the Projects without any extra effort to track them manually.

When added to all Phases in a Project, Project Tasks provide a bird-eye view of all effort required to complete the Project. Creating Project Tasks early in a Project gives you time to define clear-cut Tasks that meet the goals and timelines of the Project.

Here are some concepts you will need to know to create and manage Project Tasks effectively.

A Phase is a specific Stage in the lifecycle of a Project in which similar Tasks are completed.

For example, Site Walkthrough and Prewire in the Rough-in Phase, Send POs and Track Delivery in the Order Materials Phase, and Install Ceiling Speakers in the Trim Phase.

You can define Project Phases to your liking in the Settings area in the left navigation panel.

A Task Group is a way to organize Tasks in a Project. A Task Group contains one or more Tasks completed in a specific Phase of a Project. A Task Group can also be associated with multiple Phases when the same set of Tasks is required in multiple Phases.

For visual ease, you can assign a distinct color to a Task Group. You can also specify start and end dates for each Task Group to better track the Project.

A Task is a subset of the overall work required to complete the Project. Tasks can be assigned to Office users or Field users.

You can associate the Products involved in a Task and track their installation status directly in the Task. For example, a Task for A/V Installation where the Installer installs the TV and Ceiling Speakers.

You can also attach Installation diagrams, Product specs, and other required file attachments that help Installers complete their Tasks successfully.

Check out this article about defining Project Tasks.

A Checklist is the complete list of sub-tasks required to complete a Task. For example, Running wires and Labelling wires are two sub-tasks in a Prewire Task.

Checklists help you list your expectations from the Task clearly. As the Installer completes the sub-tasks, they mark them as Complete. When all sub-tasks are Complete, the Task is deemed to be complete. You can always add a sub-task to a completed Task and reopen it for tracking.

Event is how you schedule Tasks for completion. Events can be scheduled for a few hours in a day, the entire day, or across multiple days. Events can have one or more Tasks associated for completion.

Events are primarily used to schedule Tasks for Field users and stay within the labor estimates shown in the accepted Proposal.

Check out this article about scheduling Tasks as Events.

There are a couple of ways you can add Project Tasks to a Project.

A Task Template is a blueprint of predefined Task Groups and Tasks that you can use across your Projects. Task Templates simplify your effort to add Project Tasks.

Once applied to a Project, the Project inherits the Tasks Groups, Tasks, and Checklists from the template. You can add or remove Tasks or fine-tune the ones that came with the template to suit the work required for the project.

Learn more about building effective Task Templates

If you run a diverse range of Projects that have unique Tasks, you can always add Task Groups and Tasks directly to a Project in its Task view. These work only for the Project.

Later, when you find that the Task Groups and Tasks worked well for a completed Project, you can permanently save the entire Task List as a Task Template and re-use the template for future projects.

Learn more about Adding Tasks to a Project

Tasks view and Events view (as Schedule) is available to both Office users and Field users.

Office users can track their tasks on the Dashboard or from the Schedule or Tasks menu items in the left navigation panel.

Field users also see their tasks in the Dashboard view and Schedule view on a Web app they use to track time when at work.

Check out this article about how Project Managers and Installers see their Tasks and Schedule.