Set up your Resource Management account

Step 1: Select your account settings

Navigate to Account Settings. 

• If you are working in Resource Management in Smartsheet, select the kebab menu in the top right corner, then select Account Settings.
• If you are working in standalone Resource Management, select Settings > Account Settings.

In Account Settings, set company defaults and add important business information such as project dropdown lists, locations, and official holidays. 

Account Owner

In the General section of the Account Settings page, you can change the account owner. Only Resourcing Admins can be the Account Owner, and there can only be one owner. The Account Owner is responsible for setting up the account. 

Time tracking

If your organization wants to use Resource Management to track time, determine which increment fits best.  If you’re not sure how your organization should approach timesheets, you can learn more about time tracking. If you don't plan to track time in Resource Management, you can integrate with other time-tracking tools.

Incurred hours

Select the Incurred Hours and Amounts option that works best for your team. If you're tracking time in Resource Management, select Confirmed hours only or Approved hours only. This way, actual hours from the timesheets show up on the Project Status as incurred time or fees. If your organization isn’t officially tracking time, select Confirmed hours and unconfirmed past scheduled hours for passive tracking.

When you make an assignment on the schedule, time entry suggestions appear on a person’s timesheet. That person can choose to confirm or change these hours. Unchanged are considered unconfirmed in Resource Management; changed hours are confirmed.

Time tracking settings

• 1/2 Days: This option is great for teams with little variation in their daily activities, typically because people are working on one or two projects at a time.
• Hours & minutes: This setting combines the efficiency of ½ days with the accuracy of itemized. People can enter the exact amount of time spent on each project or phase and confirm the suggested hours for the days they work according to the plan. This design has a timer (available in Day view), to eliminate guesswork when it comes to entering time.

• Itemized Hours & Minutes: This is the most detailed time entry setting. People can assign a category to each entry and add more detail in the notes field. Use these same categories to assign sub-budgets per project for an additional reporting layer.

  This is the best option if you want to understand how long work actually took to complete – and compare it against scheduled timeframes. 

Approval workflow

Select the approval workflow that works best for your team’s needs.

Here you can:

• Enable the approval workflow for time and expenses

• Lock entries upon approval

  You need to lock entries upon approval to ensure users cannot add any additional time or expenses after entries have been approved. Without this setting enabled, users cannot edit any approved time or expenses, but they can add additional time or expenses to approved entries.

• Allow project owners to approve time and expenses for projects they own.
• Set up email notifications for time and expense approvals
• Allow the approver to unlock any submitted time and expense entries

Step 2: Set up roles and disciplines

Before adding team members, add Roles and Disciplines from your Account Settings. Disciplines are the departments in your organization (ex: Finance, Research, Visual Design), and Roles are the levels of expertise you use (ex: Director, Junior, Lead).

Step 3: Set up bill rates

If you're a professional services company, and you charge clients for your time, use Bill Rates. You can assign a bill rate to each person based on their Discipline/Role, or a bill rate unique to the individual. If you have multiple bill rates based on position and title, break that down in the bill rate matrix. If you’re not sure, start out with a blended bill rate. You can make changes later.

If you don't want your team to view project financials or bill rates, you can hide this information when you set permission levels.

Step 4: Add & invite people to your account

• Add a roster of team members and needed placeholder resources. Add all the resources you plan to include in the software. If you have your employee list in Excel, you can import your roster.
• While only first and last names are required to add a person, you can add more properties later on to filter or group your team.
• Before giving access, check the permission levels for each person to make sure they can view or make changes as desired.
• Once you add people, you can invite them to your account. They’ll receive an email to accept your invitation and create a log in.

Add properties to your people

You can add locations (city, county, team, etc.), bill rates, utilization targets, and any other custom fields that your organization uses to group people, such as skill sets, the person’s manager, certifications, etc.

Create Placeholders

When staffing a project, you don’t always know who you'll need for your projects. Setting up Placeholder Resources gives you the flexibility to hold a project assignment without having a specific person to assign it to.

Step 5: Add projects and clients

Add two to five projects. Build them out to test and understand how your process maps to Resource Management. Now that you’ve added the basics of each project, provide more detail on the Project Page with phases, budgets, team members, and tasks.

Add clients. Enter information about clients and the projects your company is working on. You can segment project work into phases when you add them or edit them to suit your plans later. Learn about adding clients & projects.

Step 6: Using the schedule

You have Account Settings, people, and a few projects. Look at the Schedule to see who’s working on what, when people will become available, when projects are coming up, and more.

Collapse the schedule view to see a condensed view of your team's availability. Select the drop-down menu above your team on the People view of the schedule and select Hide All Details.

Step 7: Utilize reports

Spend the first week or two setting up projects, budgets, and expenses. Once you have enough information in Resource Management, you’ll be able to take full advantage of the Reports page. This is where you’ll find key insights about your business. Learn about reports.