Just like in real life, you can’t start a Project until you’ve won a client! So… when you click the ‘Create new Project’ button on the Project tab Periscope immediately wants to know what organization you’re going to be working for.

If you’ve already given Periscope information about the organization(s) you work for then click on the drop down list and Periscope provides you with a list of all the organizations in the system. Select the organization that has commissioned this Project.

If you’ve not created any organizations then you’ll need to do that first and then return to create a new Project.

Your next job is to name the Project. There’s no need to include the client name in the Project title because you’ve already told Periscope who you’re working for.

It’s best to use a descriptive title.

E.g. ‘Annual Report and Accounts’ or ‘Phase 2 website’ or ‘Update showreel’. Don’t agonise over the title – Periscope will let you change it at any time throughout the lifecycle of the Project.

The overview should broadly describe in note form what you’re being asked to achieve. It can be as long or as short as you like and typically might contain the notes from your initial client briefing.

E.g. Annual Review: (dispatch in September but needs to be designed 2nd half of July) to go to key shareholders.
 Core message: client not sure. Us to come up with concept and design. Client to write content. They’d like an unusual format.

Here’s where you define exactly what you’re getting paid to do. E.g. Concept, design, artwork, print and delivery of 5,000 Annual Report and Accounts brochures.

If you calculate fees by estimating how long a job will take, then here’s the place to record how long you’ve budgeted (in hours).

You can skip this field but if you fill it in and record time spent (in the Timesheet area) then Periscope will automatically remind you when you’re at 50%, 75% and when you’ve hit 100% of the budget. In fact, whenever you update your timesheets Periscope will update every job you’ve worked on and display a running total of what % of the overall budget has been spent to date.

The Estimated Value is the fee you hope to charge for the job. It can change as the client’s requirements change and at this stage it might only be an estimate but that’s fine.

Pretty self-explanatory… but it might not always be the final delivery deadline you want to record: If the job’s not firmly landed yet you might want to use the deadline field as a place to record when your quotation or proposal needs to be with the client. Periscope’s easy either way.

There are 4 different types of Project Status:

1. Prospect: A job that might or might not come off. It’s not yet a firm order.
2. In Progress: A job that has been confirmed and is underway.
3. Invoiced: N.B. Periscope doesn’t have a status called ‘Completed’ or ‘Finished’. All jobs remain ‘In Progress’ until you mark them as ‘Invoiced’ or ‘Dead’.
4. Dead: You can’t win ‘em all, so when a job doesn’t come off, mark it as Dead. Periscope knows that Projects sometimes rise from the grave so even your Dead Projects are safely stored away and can be reviewed at anytime.

If you work on your own then this’ll always be you!

If you work with a team of people it’s a good idea to appoint a Project Owner. The Owner of a Project might change as the Project develops. A director might be responsible for winning the job and then pass it onto an account handler or a project manager… who might pass it on to a designer or a developer… and so on.

To avoid Project drift and for a Project to be successful, it’s critical that the Owner knows they are the Owner. That’s why Periscope will list all the Projects you are currently the Owner of – on your Dashboard.

There are 4 different levels of Priority you can allocate to Projects. The first 3 are pretty self-explanatory and you can allocate them at your discretion.

1. Low
2. Medium
3. High
4. Late

Periscope automatically classifies Projects as ‘Late’ as soon as the Deadline date has passed. If you’ve really nothing better to do one night then watch the status change as the clock strikes midnight – spooky!

Clicking the submit button will send all the data you’ve just input into the Periscope cloud for safe storage. As son as you click Submit, Periscope will automatically take you to the Project View where all your hard work is displayed, plus you’ll see that Periscope has generated your Project a unique Project number for easy identification and future searching and tracking.

Click on the Project tab to see your new Project in the list!