Why switch from MS Project to Smartsheet Project?

I'm new to Smartsheet and am considering in switching from MS Project to Smartsheet but there seem to be limitations:

1) Progress Lines - either I can't find it or there's no on/off for progress lines. it's quite messy when you have 1000s of entries.

2) Views - can't customize views based on users and audiences

3) Duration - can you use working and elapse days?

4) Calendar - can you assign different calendar to different summary of activities?

These are a few observations based on a few hours of learning Smartsheet. Any feedback, suggestion, and/or confirmation to these limitations are greatly appreciated!

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IT & Operations

Project Management

Enhancement Request

Comments

Travis

Hi Jay! While Smartsheet might not have all the features included in MS Project, there are a lot of reasons to make the switch. I’ll answer your specific questions below….

1) There are no progress lines but if you want to track baseline you can do so by adding a baseline end date column and a ‘difference’ column. Copy all your dates from your end date column to the baseline columns and use a formula in the difference column to compare the two set up dates.

2) There are a couple options here. Filtering your sheets will give you a customized view of the sheet. Filters are personal for each user (I wouldn’t see a filter you applied). Another option is reports which you can use to build customized views of a sheet or multiple sheets. You can build a report for each user so they only see the data relevant to them.

3) Working days already exists and elapse days will be included in our release on Saturday, July 11th.

4) Could you elaborate on what you are referring to for this question?

Jay Bautista

Thanks, Travis! Here are some follow-ups.

1. I ask for the "progress lines" switch with on/off because having many arrows connecting or showing the relationships can be too messy or cumbersome for 1000s of tasks. Perhaps this is something Smartsheet will consider in the future.

2. The reports option is definitely great. I will watch the video and teach myself on how to use it. Two thumbs up on that!

3. Working and elapse days feature - Seems like one of my wish list has been checked off.

4. In working with project schedule, I often encounter subs or staff that work with different schedules. Some are on 4 day 10 hour shift or 6 day shift. It would be great if I can assign a customized calendar to a task or task summary where applicable.