Project Management
A project is agreed in hours. Give it planned hours and give its tasks estimates, and the project page tells you how much is used, what is still expected, where the project will land and whether that is fine, in one word. Every change to the plan is kept with a reason, and an alert can warn you before the budget runs out.
The first step is enough for a budget; the second makes the forecast meaningful; the third is a safety net.
Give the project its planned hours
Create project, or Edit project → Planned hours
Enter the hours agreed with the client or sponsor for the whole project. That is all the Budget card needs to show Used, the share of the budget used and the status.
Give open tasks an estimate
Open a task → Estimated hours
Only open tasks with an estimate feed Remaining estimate and Forecast. The card says how many open tasks still have none, so you know how much the forecast can be trusted.
Add a warning (optional)
Alerts → Rules → New rule → Project budget used
Fires nightly when tracked time reaches 90% of the budget (or the share you choose), for every project with planned hours or for one project, and emails organization managers and the project's team leaders.
Hours are decimals, as the forms take them; everything measured from tracked time is shown as hours and minutes. Here is a project called Website, then what each number means.
Worked example
Website
The planned hours, plus scope that was added or redone, minus scope that was removed. The planned figure stays visible underneath, so you always see both the agreement and where it has moved.
planned hours + scope added + rework − scope removed
Every second tracked on the project since it began: timer slots and approved manual time on any of its tasks. A date filter on a report never changes it.
every tracked second on the project, all time
What the open tasks still expect. For each open task with an estimate, the estimate minus what it already logged, never below zero. Tasks without an estimate add nothing, and the card says how many those are.
Σ over open tasks with an estimate of max(estimate − logged, 0)
Forecast is where the project lands if the estimates hold: used plus remaining. Variance is the forecast against the budget; a positive number means over.
forecast = used + remaining · variance = forecast − budget
The chip on the Budget card, with a sentence underneath that says why.
Two different things can move the budget, and the card keeps them apart.
The agreement changed: edit the planned hours
Edit project → Planned hours. Setting a budget for the first time needs no reason; changing or clearing one does, and the reason is kept with the old and new hours in the budget history. Nobody can rewrite that history.
The work changed: record a scope change
Budget card → Record scope change. Say whether work was added, removed or redone, how many hours, and what it was. Added and rework hours raise the budget, removed hours lower it. Removing a scope change keeps it in the list as removed, with who removed it.
Every change is audited
Planned hours changes and scope changes write entries to the organization's audit log under Security & Compliance, with the project, the hours and the reason.
Budget, Used, Remaining estimate and Forecast with the variance, one sentence saying why the status is what it is, a bar for the share used, the scope changes with who recorded them, and the history of the planned hours with every reason.
One line, “48h of 110h · 44%”, next to the task count, so the state is visible before scrolling.
A Budget column with all-time used against the budget for each project, and the same figure in the CSV export's project total rows. The report's own columns stay limited to the selected dates.
Each task carries an estimate in hours next to its worked time. Only open tasks with an estimate feed the remaining figure.
A “Project budget used” alert names the project and links to its page. It stays open until the project is completed, its budget is raised past the line, or someone acknowledges it.
The plan is a project-admin decision: an organization manager, a product manager on the project, or its team leader. Estimates belong to whoever works the task. Alert rules are an organization manager's.
| What | Org. manager | Product manager | Team leader | Employee |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Set or change a project's planned hours | Yes | Own projects | Own projects | No |
| Record or remove a scope change | Yes | Own projects | Own projects | No |
| Set a task's estimated hours | Yes | Own projects | Own projects | Assigned tasks |
| See the Budget card | Yes | Own projects | Own projects | Own projects |
| Add or change the “Project budget used” alert rule | Yes | No | No | No |
Roles themselves are explained in Roles and permissions; how a member's own capacity is read is in Capacity, holidays and leave.
The first budget needs none. Changing or clearing one does, because the number a client or a sponsor agreed to is a commitment: the reason is stored with the old and new hours in the budget history and in the organization's audit log, so the project can explain itself later.
Editing the planned hours says the agreement changed. A scope change says the work changed while the agreement stands: a module added, a platform dropped, work redone after a change of direction. Each one moves the budget by its hours and keeps its own description and author, and removing one keeps it in the history as removed.
No. Planned hours cover the whole project, so Used counts every tracked second on it since it began. The report's Time, Activity and Spent columns still follow the selected dates; the Budget column is deliberately all time, and says so.
Only open tasks with an estimate count. The card says, for example, “2 of 5 open tasks estimated”; give the other three an estimate and the forecast becomes meaningful. A task that already logged more than its estimate adds zero, never a negative number.
No. A task's worked time is the sum of its tracked and approved manual time only; it cannot be typed in. The estimate is the one planning number a task carries.
No. Planned hours are a project-level figure read against tracked time. A member's capacity and utilization come from their expected weekly hours, holidays and leave, as the capacity guide explains.
Yes. On Alerts → Rules, add a rule from the “Project budget used” template. It fires when tracked time reaches the share of the budget you set (90% by default), for every project with planned hours or for one project you pick, and it emails organization managers and the project's team leaders. A project with no planned hours is never judged, and the alert closes itself when the project is completed or its budget grows past the line.
Still have a question about budgets? Email support@colabio.org.