Use Project Brief to Build and Manage Projects

Applies to

Resource Management

For more information about plan types and included capabilities, see the Smartsheet Plans page.

Every project has an individual Project Page where you build new projects and monitor them regularly as you progress.

From the Project Page, you can:

  • Set a project budget in time, fee, or expenses (non-labor costs). This is your estimated goal to meet your targeted profitability or deadline.

  • Add people to the project and create a work plan that fits the estimated budget.

  • Create Work Items and assign project responsibilities and due dates to your team.

  • View real-time progress of the project and monitor your budget.

  • Use quick links to project reports to analyze the data behind the work progress

The Project Brief shows the project description, people currently working on the project, a visualization of the project timeline, and progress of current work. All project properties are also visible on this page.

Project brief

 

Project Title and Description

The title section of the Project Brief includes:

  • Client name
  • Project name
  • Project start and end dates
  • Project description (up to 2,048 characters, including line breaks)
  • Clickable links contained in the description

Schedule

The Schedule displays project phases and people scheduled to work on the project, with the current day represented as a vertical grey line. Click anywhere on this schedule to access the Project Schedule tab. Right click (or ctrl + click)  to save the schedule image for sharing with your team or other key stakeholders.

Current Work

Current Work shows any phase, work, or assignment with a date range that overlaps with the current day. This section shows current project assignments, assignment types, and status of each assignment. 

Click a phase name to access the Worklist. Click an assignment row to go to that specific assignment in the Worklist.

Project Properties

Tags and Custom Fields describe the project. Links added here are clickable.

Project Status and Reports

Status for the project’s work, time, and fees appear on the left side of the Project Brief. The Show dropdown filters what data is displayed.

You can see information about:

  • The entire project (default)

  • Non-phase specific

  • Specific phase

Quick links to the Time + Fees and Budget Reports are at the bottom of the left pane.

You can use Project Brief in weekly team meetings as an agenda, and a way to record and clearly communicate each person's responsibilites.