Item: Smartsheet
Rating: 8
Author: Verified User

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

Smartsheet is used for project management across the whole organization. It addresses the company's needs for tracking individual project tasks, responsibilities, due dates, completion percentage as well as to provide higher level schedules, expected deliverable dates, critical path activities, and the like.

Pros and Cons

Smartsheet is very good at tracking tasks and generating dependencies. The user interface for accomplishing these functions is very intuitive, especially for anyone who has familiarity with Microsoft Excel. It basically takes some of the functionality of Microsoft Excel and Microsoft Project and merges them into an application that is more user friendly.
Smartsheet is also very good at offering connectivity and collaboration. Because of the way in which non-project management users can log in, receive notifications, and interact with the Smartsheet, it doesn't feel like it is the project manager's domain but rather something that is a tool for everyone to make use of and share.
Smartsheet is very accessible. As a someone who used Microsoft Project in the past, it has been much more convenient to access Smartsheet through the web rather than having to ensure I have access to the latest file or ensure that multiple people aren't trying to work on the file at the same time.

There really isn't much up-front guidance offered on using Smartsheet. As with any company, they will provide training and obviously have a help menu, but it would be nice for there to be some "forced" tips and tricks or tutorials provided to give new users the ability to "power-use" the software more quickly.
Project files become very large, and it is often very difficult to work on different sections without getting lost within the project. This is not necessarily specific just to Smartsheet, but functionality that would enable modularization or more easy navigation to work on multiple parts of a sheet at once would be helpful.
Communication tools within Smartsheet are not very functional or not very intuitive. Because of its collaborative nature, it would be helpful for there to be more capabilities for communication within the application about changes being made or between users who are editing the same sheet.

Return on Investment

Smartsheet has been a great tool for us to use for project management, but it would be difficult to quantify the impact on the overall business objectives. It is certainly an important tool that would require some sort of replacement if it weren't available.

Alternatives Considered

Microsoft Project

I have preferred Smartsheet to Microsoft Project because it is more intuitive to use and better lends itself to collaboration. It also is more convenient to use because of the fact that it is accessible through the web.
In my experience with managing relatively small scale projects, there has not been an instance when I have not preferred Smartsheet to Microsoft Project for project planning tasks.

Other Software Used

Skype for Business

Likelihood to Recommend

Smartsheet is well suited for detailing project tasks, assigning task responsibilities, and tracking project progress, especially within a team of people. Its accessibility makes it ideal for when people are working remotely or when the project information is intended to be shared with a lot of people. The project files are easy to share, and since it is housed in the cloud, there is never a question of whether it is the most "up-to-date" file or not.
It is an invaluable tool for project management but can also be used for any sort of complex task management. The only scenarios in which it seems like it is not very appropriate is if the project or task is too small to require much planning or has too few people to require any sort of collaboration or visibility.

Smartsheet - a user-friendly and functional project management tool

Overall Satisfaction with Smartsheet