How do you organize your business activities? Do you write down to-do lists on a piece of paper, hold long weekly meetings, or use spreadsheets? Perhaps all of the above. In case you didn’t know, there are apps to help you out in this area.
Recently, we talked to a marketing representative from ActiveCollab about the challenges a modern manager and team encounter.
What is ActiveCollab, and how long have you been around?
Since 2007, we’ve been a bootstrapped company developing software focused on team collaboration and project management. ActiveCollab is a tool designed to help professionals deliver their projects on time and within budget.
Who is ActiveCollab for?
We’re lucky to have users from all over the world, teams that vary in shape, size, and industry. Most of our customers are digital agencies and web designers, but we also have other software companies, dental practices, business consultants, and even boat manufacturers. The app adapts easily to any type of need, and it can also be used as a personal assistant.
What key features must project management tools have?
Task management, time tracking, real-time communication, collaboration with clients, and invoicing options are a must-have for project management tools. ActiveCollab is equipped with three project views, Gantt, Kanban, and list view. An integrated Stopwatch is available for those who charge by the hour, and time records are neatly sorted in timesheets and reports. Keeping track of a task’s progress is easy for both the team and the clients with real-time comments. Integrations with invoicing tools such as QuickBooks and Xero are available, so projects and tracked hours can be invoiced directly.
On top of these key features, it’s useful to have a tool such as Workload for planning a team’s future activities while keeping them from burning out. Additionally, if a company has many projects, it’s always handy to know which of these projects are profitable and how the budget is used at all times.
Data security is a big issue for many software users. What are your policies? ActiveCollab does not track its users! We’re very keen on keeping our customers’ privacy – private. There’s not one third party tracking script in our app, and this won’t change. We also have to highlight that we don’t sell data to third parties. Our users’ trust is of high importance to us.
The COVID-19 pandemic affected most companies. How did you respond to the crisis? First off, we shut down our offices to ensure the safety and wellbeing of our employees. Secondly, we prolonged our free trial period from 14 to 90 days and gave our existing users a discount. This way, we hoped to help businesses adapt more easily to working remotely.
Does this mean ActiveCollab is suited for remote work?
Absolutely. We’ve had many happy users telling us how ActiveCollab helped them make the transition. Apart from not commuting to the office and sharing the same space with the team, everything is the same. The workflow is not affected, and asynchronous collaboration works
perfectly. Real-time comments, file sharing, discussions, and features such as Workload make it possible to stay focused on tasks while having an insight into a project’s progress.
What sets you apart from the competition? There are plenty of project management tools out there to choose from.
We aim to provide our customers with a platform that will make the journey of transforming an idea into an invoice easy. So, ActiveCollab proudly offers an all-in-one solution for managing projects. Time can be tracked on projects or specific tasks, which is vital for those who work by the clock, and it also means no additional time tracking tool is needed.
When it comes to collaborating with clients, here are a few key advantages:
- An unlimited number of clients can be invited to ActiveCollab for free
- Estimates can be sent to them, and when approved, transformed into projects
- There are three types of project budgeting, adaptable to a client’s needs
We know project profitability is vital when juggling a portfolio of clients and projects. This is why we designed a whole system to keep an eye on a project’s budget. Employee hourly rates can be set up by job type. Also, internal hourly rates can be defined. Once multiplied by the tracked hours and added to expenses, the project’s cost is the result. It’s then displayed in an overview of costs vs. income for each project. Budget alerts are there to notify managers if the expenses have reached a certain percentage of the budget limit.
Another feature that sets ActiveCollab apart is Availability. Each team member can add their days off, vacation, or sick days. These availability records will apply throughout the system as they’re essential for planning. For example, when picking a task’s due date, the assignee’s days off will be marked red. Workload will also show each team member’s presence and absence. All the availability records are summed up on the employees’ profiles as well. We should highlight the space available for every account: 100 GB at disposal for any kind of file. Videos, PDFs, documents, etc., are all welcome as attachments to tasks and comments. If even more space is necessary, it can be additionally purchased.
Above all, a straightforward and intuitive design. Our designers concentrate on creating a platform focused on our users’ work: no flashy colors, no distractions. Just an effective and simple app whose core is functionality.
Why is teamwork essential in project management?
Imagine working in a dysfunctional team: people stepping on each other’s feet, due dates and budget breached, zero will to get up and start working in the morning. Not ideal if you want to complete projects and keep clients and customers happy. Although we can’t sort out everyone’s problems, we can give tips and tricks through our blog and create an environment that prevents misunderstandings.
The way we see it, if you have a person responsible for each task and they commit to a specific deadline, you’ve already avoided the famous “I thought you were going to do that” landmine. Breaking down big chunks of work into smaller units and to-do lists helps prevent chaos and blind spots. Keeping the entire workflow in one place saves not only money but also time and nerves.
What does the future hold for ActiveCollab?
Many more awesome features! We’re continually looking for ways to improve our customers’ experience and keeping our eyes open for opportunities to make their collaboration as smooth as possible. It’s not just a phrase – our Product Team tries to implement as many feature requests as possible and interview users on a regular basis when considering possible additions to the app. Other than that, we hope for a chance to see each other more in person rather than just virtually!
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