How Airtable Transformed our Project Management System
Our business looks a lot different right now than it did when we started. When we first started it felt like we were just making mistake after mistake (what can we say, it’s how we learn!)
We were charging too little, saying yes to clients who weren’t right for us, missing recurring projects with sloppy systems, not getting firm project timelines from clients, and taking on last minute work all the time.
Then one week, Emily was out of the office and I felt like I was drowning. Every time I finished something, three more emails with client projects that “needed to be done ASAP” would come in and down the hill my boulder would roll again. I started to cry, because I knew there was no way I could keep this up, no way I could pull my weight at this pace, and it was putting not only my livelihood, but my sister’s livelihood at risk as well.
And after that nice little cry, I was able to be a little more rational about it.
There were a few problems that were getting the better of me, that came down to the structure of our business and project management:
The constant need to say yes to work I couldn’t reasonably manage because I simply needed it–our rates weren’t high enough to allow for a reasonable, sustainable workflow.
The way we managed projects was too chaotic. Trello was the system we were using at the time, but it often wasn’t intuitive for our clients, so we wound up with comments in weird places, tasks set as one time tasks when they were supposed to be recurring, missed notifications, etc. It only exacerbated that anxiety that I was constantly forgetting something (because sometimes, I was!)
We let clients drop us projects as needed. There was no “please get us the details by X day before the due date” just “send us what you need done and we’ll take care of it!” That method worked when we only had three or four clients, but when we got to 8, 10, 15 clients…it just wasn’t working anymore. There was no way to budget our time and it completely burned me out.
Some of the solutions were obvious: we needed to raise our rates so we didn’t have to book out every possible hour of our time. We needed a new project management system that would be easy for clients to manage and organized enough to make sure nothing was lost or misplaced or forgotten. And we needed firmer timeline expectations for client projects, what constituted a rush job, and our standard turnaround time.
The less obvious solution was how to make space that could meet all of those project needs in one space without a lot of work.
I wanted to keep it simple, so I started playing around with Airtable because it was something we were already using for our own business needs, and something I used in my personal life too. So I was familiar with how to set up new bases, how to share it with others, and how to navigate all the features available on the free plan–which wound up being comprehensive enough to account for the new project management system I developed within it.
Airtable has a lot of templates available for various professional goals, but in wanting to keep it simple I went with a basic, blank spreadsheet and built it out based just on the information we needed from clients for each individual project.
There are a lot of functions you can use and, just like with Excel, if you become proficient with Airtable bases you can create formulas and automations to do some crazy shit within the software. But in thinking about who would be using it–namely our clients who were working with us in order to simplify their lives–it didn’t seem worth it to dive too deeply into that. The information I wanted to cover in the base included:
What the project was
The needed details (accounts needed, steps to take, goals for the project) for each project
Any needed files or attachments to get started or finish up
Setting a project due date
The calendar week the project should be started
A section to update the status of the project
Some way to indicate that it had been added to our calendar.
When we launched this new project management system, we also launched a new project management timeline. Our new policy was to ask for clients to provide tasks for the upcoming week by 3pm on the Friday before. That way, we could wrap up our week by mapping out our schedule for the next week–and not worry about coming back to too many emails & projects to get through on Monday.
To make it simpler on our clients, we made a video to demonstrate exactly how they should be using the base, as well as how we would be using it so that there was no confusion moving forward. Here’s a walk through of the base we use:
Want to create your own project management base? Grab a pen.
First, what is it you need the project management system to accomplish?
Allow clients to send tasks to me
Allow clients to set due dates on projects
Provide an internal communication space for my clients and I
Notify me of upcoming due dates
House any files or documents related to projects
Notify clients of upcoming due dates
Keep track of project status
All of the above
Only some of the above
If you answered 3, 4, or 6, Airtable might not be the project management system for you.
While you can tag other users in Airtable and get notified that way, there’s no built-in way to set notifications for upcoming due dates or chat with other users. There’s a comment section on each cell, but the history disappears after two weeks, so we added a long text section for notes that we would need long term (you can see what we mean in the tutorial video above).
And while no in-house chat feature may be a dealbreaker to some, we actually prefer it–if clients have need to communicate about something outside of the individual projects, it’s easier to refer back to a searchable email inbox than an endless chat thread.
How tech savvy are your clients?
Not tech savvy at all. Any project management system would be a huge ask.
Extremely tech savvy, my clients usually work with project management systems themselves.
Moderately savvy, they can usually play around and figure things out if I give them a decent jumping off point.
Could probably manage a simple project management system if given a tutorial to refer back to, or a meeting to walk through it.
In our experience, clients with minimal to moderate tech savvy are able to manage our system with no problem. Since we provide a video they can refer to, they can easily troubleshoot their own questions, and we offer to hop on Zoom and chat with anyone who is struggling to get a handle on it–that way we can assess if it’s something they can manage or if we should stick strictly to email for that client’s convenience. It’s a good idea to have a second option for managing projects in case a client really struggles to figure out your main system–sometimes repeated energy teaching a system is better spent finding an alternative.
If they are not tech savvy at all, the question we’d ask you to consider is if you need a client facing project management system at all. You can absolutely develop one on your end to keep track of what needs to be done and when, but if teaching the system seems like a waste of effort then it probably is. Just stick to email and get really weird into organizing your folders. Sometimes basic is the best way.
How do you best process information?
I’m a visual learner, so having things visually organized with options like color coding helps me process and understand the information better.
Visual elements actually make it more difficult for me to process information; just hearing instructions is the best way for me to get a handle on my responsibilities
I also find visual elements distracting more than helpful, plain text is the easiest way for me to make sense of information.
Answered 1? Airtable is a great option for you. You can sort and group data by any category you choose, implement color coding and checklists and more.
If you answered 2, Airtable could still be an option depending on what else you need to work on projects, but you could request clients include a Loom video or a voice note as instructions. Or you could use an app like Voxer where clients could message you a voice note directly–or just have your clients share them with you via email.
If you answered 3, honestly a project management system might just make your life more difficult. Stick to email and your calendar for keeping track of due dates!
If you don’t feel like reinventing the wheel, you can get a copy of the client management base we use right here.
