What is Project Management Software?

Project management software is a powerful tool that offers an array of features to enable project managers to control project costs, achieve milestones, and meet deadlines. The main objective of project management software is to help businesses deliver on the commitments they’ve made to project stakeholders, ensuring project execution drives desired results.

For professional services organizations that drive significant revenue from customer-facing projects, the focus is on executing projects on time, on budget, and in alignment with the scope agreed with the customer in s statement of work (SOW). Many project management software solutions targeted at the professional services industry will even help managers keep track of customer payments and manage project expenses. 

Common project management software features include:

• Project dashboards that give managers the ability to make fast changes and understand project performance at a glance instead of searching through exported data.
• Time tracking software, where team members enter their time worked for specific tasks to support accurate customer billing and project burn rate tracking.
• Task management tools, which give managers the ability to assign detailed work related to a project to resources, with modern systems allowing all of this to happen in one easy to control dashboard.
• Gantt charts that define and control the flow of interconnected tasks that make up a project to improve utilization and hit deadlines. Gantt charts are often used in the SCRUM management style.
• Project templates that allow for quick and easy replication of projects when creating similar work to previous projects.

Throughout the course of a project, project management software will provide both information regarding its performance and the controls necessary to change the work being done. Everything from conceptualization and contract signing to product delivery can be completed and tracked within a strong modern project management software tool. And by living all within one location, organizations can be better equipped to control all aspects of work, as well as better understand where improvements can be made for future projects.

Plenty of people use project-management software, including everyone from airplane builders to employees performing non-billable work. Some industries rely more heavily on project management software than others, with professional services organizations in particular needing the support of project management software to deliver complex projects while working with many different customers simultaneously. Consulting firms, IT services providers, and marketing agencies, and technology companies with embedded professional services teams commonly use project management software to handle a massive project workload spread across many different customers. 

It’s not just project managers using these applications – in these organizations, nearly everyone involved in providing services to customers across a complex project delivery lifecycle touches project management software. This includes sales teams who set up SOWs, resource management teams who assign resources to tasks, consultants who track time and expenses and provide updates on assigned tasks, and finance team members who track project costs, payments, and revenue. These team members need tools that let them sustain high quality work, fuel creativity, make the most of their team members, and keep clients engaged and satisfied.

According to S&P Global Market Intelligence’s recent research report, “The Macro Technology Shift Impacting the Professional Services Industry,” there is a growing demand for stronger software solutions that can meet the growing demands of today’s professional services firms. According to the research, 41% of respondents want to break down collaboration barriers, 40% want to manage resources better across project life cycles, and 39% want to increase their agility and responsiveness to changes and scenarios based on data.

In professional services, each project is an opportunity to generate revenue. But it is also the chance to build lasting customer relationships that foster repeat business. This means more predictable profits and greater financial stability as a business.

Software that keeps track of the granular details that make up every project can help. But before choosing a project management software solution, you should consider the pros and cons of each option.

Project management software provides an array of advantages for companies seeking to optimize their operations, enhance efficiency, and maintain a consistent, seamless workflow. In a dynamic business environment, it is essential to maintain high productivity levels, and this is where project management software excels.

Improved organization and prioritization are some of the top benefits of project management software. These solutions allow managers to define tasks clearly, set deadlines, assign responsibility, and keep track of all project components in a centralized location. It further aids in scheduling and resourcing, preventing bottlenecks or under-utilization of resources.

Project management software also enhances communication and collaboration, particularly vital in a distributed or remote work setting. Team members can exchange ideas, updates, and feedback in real-time, leading to improved decision making, higher customer satisfaction, and better customer retention. Also, project management software provides a clear overview of each team member’s workload and progress, facilitating equitable distribution of tasks.

Another significant advantage of project management software is risk mitigation. These tools provide managers with insight into a project’s potential pitfalls and how to circumvent them, thus ensuring the project stays on track. Through early detection of any deviation from the set plan, preventive measures can be undertaken promptly, saving time and resources. 

Some applications reduce redundancy, particularly in businesses that are dependent on spreadsheets to manage projects and project resources — project management software consolidates systems so that information exists in only one place. This helps team members avoid file redundancies, which can contribute to what some call a “versioning nightmare.” In addition to mitigating the number of differing files, project management software also ensures teams use one method to track time, tasks, expenses, other budgeting items such as invoices and more. Having one system encourages teams to work creatively within a given framework and prevents miscommunications and errors that often come from using multiple solutions for one project.

Finally, modern project management software can automate many different recurring processes and provide a central hub to manage resources, tasks, schedules, projects, and communication. All this information living in one system gives you a huge opportunity to run progress reports — whether daily, weekly, monthly, or quarterly, all on an automated schedule. Today’s advanced systems can offer real-time progress reports, so you can easily visualize and share information related to project health. This not only gives you insight into where you can adjust your resources to make smarter project-delivery decisions; it also enables you to give detailed, transparent responses to stakeholder questions.

Despite its multiple advantages, there are potential disadvantages to the use of project management software that are essential to consider before its implementation.

One of the primary drawbacks is the initial costs involved. The purchase of software licenses, equipment upgrades, and training sessions can pose a considerable financial burden for small and medium-sized enterprises.

Additionally, using project management software might increase complexity rather than streamline it. With the plethora of features that such software offers, team members might become overwhelmed. Unless proper training is provided, user resistance and reluctance to embrace the software can negatively affect productivity.

Project management software also runs the risk of depersonalizing project management. Over-reliance on the software can make team members less connected, reducing the interpersonal and spontaneous communications that are key in a dynamic work environment. It can create a false sense of security, causing users to neglect or overlook significant tasks, believing that the software will catch any oversight.

It also introduces the potential for security and privacy issues. The sharing of sensitive information on a platform accessible to multiple users can be problematic if proper protocols and controls are not implemented.

Lastly, project management software often requires an initial time investment for users to get acquainted with its features and functions. This could result in a temporary dip in productivity as users navigate the software, interrupting regular workflow until familiarity and fluency with the system is established.

The project management software landscape is complex and multi-faceted, with hundreds of solutions vying for buyers’ attention. These solutions run the gamut from simple task management tools to collaborative work management applications to specialized industry clouds like Professional Services Cloud platforms that cater to the unique use cases of a specific sector. The good news is that the right solution for your business’s needs and core use cases almost certainly exists. The bad news is that it might be hard to find in a crowded project management software landscape, and there might be a lot of dead ends to explore on the way there.

Put bluntly, not all project management solutions are created equal. For professional services firms that have unique needs across the services delivery lifecycle, it is important to adopt software that is purpose-built to address the essential project management needs that come with managing revenue-generating, customer-facing services. This is where vertical-specific tools like Kantata’s project management software differ from horizontal point solutions.

Many project management software solutions are focused on getting work done, and not on the larger business impact of that work. In a survey from S&P Global Market Intelligence, businesses using popular project management tools in the collaborative work management category to manage client service delivery say their top three challenges with these tools are:

• Difficulty integrating financial information into how they manage their projects 
• Difficulty doing detailed resource management and capacity planning
• Lack of features specific to how professional services teams work

Using tools like these to manage revenue-generating, client-facing projects can leave project managers and team members clear on the next steps, but unclear on key performance indicators like utilization, burn rate, and margin. This is why professional services firms looking for solutions to improve project performance should explore industry-specific software solutions that include project management capabilities like Professional Services Cloud (PS Cloud) and Professional Services Automation (PSA).

Before you begin reviewing today’s project management software solutions, you should define what you want your new system to do for your organization. Once these are defined by a team of stakeholders that will be part of the decision process, you can begin your project management software research. Some trusted websites like G2 already provide reviews and rankings highlighting the best project management software out there to save you time.

Once you have narrowed down your search to a few leading solutions, use the following 5 steps to help compare and contrast software to find the right one for your company.

• 1. Do your research. Use sites like G2 to conduct research that helps you find your most promising project management software solutions.
• 2. Schedule a demo with a prospective software provider. Usually, this option appears on their website and will get you in touch with a representative.
• 3. Assess the full cost of software systems you want to consider. Don’t forget to factor in the hidden costs of integration, inviting clients to use your system, and training time.
• 4. Get your team’s buy-in. These are the folks who have to use the software, so let them evaluate the product you are considering so they can alert you to advantages and disadvantages they would know best related to actually using the software in daily work.
• 5. Build relationships with the provider’s staff. Your interactions with representatives will show you the quality of customer experience you will have once you adopt their technology.

Together, these steps will lead you to a solution that will address your company’s needs both today and for years to come.

What are the Best Project Management Tools Today?

Now that you’re familiar with what project management software is and what it can do for your professional services business, you’re probably interested in knowing what the best project management software is for your organization. The following are the top 5 project management software solutions, including their top features, pros and cons, and what businesses they are the right fit for.

1. Smartsheet: A good choice for teams that want the familiarity of spreadsheets.
2. Monday.com: A great solution for smaller teams managing simple projects.
3. ClickUp: An intuitive collaboration tool that helps teams manage projects.
4. Wrike: A classic choice for teams who have resources dedicated to customizing the software to their use case.
5. Kantata: The best project management software for professional services teams tracking billable hours against tasks and projects.

 

Smartsheet

Smartsheet is a service work management platform designed to bring people and projects together into a single platform, providing support for project management, event management, product development, and many other use cases. Functioning very similar to excel documents, Smartsheet project management provides a functionality that many newcomers to project management will find familiar and easy to start using as they begin to plan, capture, track, automate, and report on work at scale.

So, what exactly does Smartsheet bring to the table? For project managers, task management tools, automated processes, and customizable templates provide visibility into programs and portfolios and control over their work all in one place. Think of it as the command center for your work life, accessible from anywhere.

Top Features of Smartsheet

Smartsheet provides users with many different tools, which has helped it be adopted by a wide variety of organizations across many different industries. When it comes to professional services, some of its top features include:

Task Management: Smartsheet provides a straightforward and easy to use array of task management tools, including task assignment, prioritization, dependencies, recurring tasks, to-do lists, and more to get team members working quickly and efficiently.

Project Views: Smartsheet offers multiple project views to suit your particular flavor of management, including Timeline View, Board View, Grid View, Gantt View, and Calendar View, giving managers the ability to stay on top of projects.

Project Tracking: Tracking features including Gantt charts and timelines keep your projects on track while real-time collaboration and workflow automation ensure that your team works together smoothly.

Integrations: Smartsheet plays well with others, including Microsoft Office 365, Google G-Suite, and DocuSign, integrating their data with ongoing project work.

Customization: There are a wide range of templates and other customizable features, which help managers make every project their own and suited to their style.

Smartsheet Pros and Cons

Given that Smartsheet has been around for so long, the solution comes with a mix of strengths and weaknesses that make it a valuable asset for project managers that are beginning to improve their company’s daily processes, but limited for managers looking to go deeper with their work.

Pros:

• Smartsheet shines in ease of use and team collaboration with straightforward project tracking and automation. It’s the kind of user-friendly solution that makes you feel like you have a secret weapon up your sleeve.
• The platform is designed for teams of all sizes, from solo freelancers to mega-corporations. It’s got that universal appeal—like pizza, but for project management.
• Smartsheet is accessible from any device, so you can keep an eye on your projects whether you’re on your laptop, tablet, or smartphone.
• The solution is very affordable for small businesses and when used by small teams, making it a strong option for companies with less budget available for a new tool.

Cons:

• Project management is simply not Smartsheet’s strong suit, with the solution lacking strong PM capabilities and requiring in-depth knowledge from users to work well as it focuses more on other aspects of professional services processes in its features.
• Smartsheet very much operates like a classic spreadsheet, including all of its complex demands to calculate important daily insights and forecasting.
• Reporting must be done manually due to a lack of automation here, which can eat up many, many hours that managers could be dedicating elsewhere.
• Live time tracking is missing, making getting accurate hours for billing and improving time tracking compliance with your team more difficult.
• Version control can also be tricky, and having several team members edit simultaneously can cause errors to suddenly pile up without users noticing until it’s too late. In addition, there are no backup files to backtrack on a coworkers’ errors.

Who Is SmartSheet For?

Given that SmartSheet is designed for straightforward task management and project tracking that can be customized for the unique needs of a business, SmartSheet is the best fit for growing professional services businesses that want to move past simple spreadsheets but still want the familiarity of the process. Due to its need for manual reporting processes and lack of live time tracking, SmartSheet is best suited for companies with straightforward business processes and clearly defined team structures to avoid unnecessary complications.

Overall, Smartsheet has several clear drawbacks, but still has an overwhelmingly positive effect on businesses that use it. It’s user-friendly once you get over the initial bumps, excellent for team collaboration, and has automation features that can turn tedious tasks into background processes. Yes, it has its quirks and limitations, and you might find yourself yearning for a few more features. But if you’re willing to put in the time to learn the ropes, Smartsheet could become an indispensable part of your professional toolkit.

 

Monday.com

Monday.com is a versatile cloud-based work platform that has unveiled several products over recent years, including Monday Work Management, Monday CRM, Monday Dev, and Monday Service. This platform aims to simplify workflows and grant users transparent visibility across their teams, facilitating more confident decision-making in daily tasks. Moreover, Monday.com offers various pricing tiers, including a free plan, which provides more storage, features, and integrations with higher pricing options.

Focusing on ease of adoption and user-friendliness, Monday project management stands out as one of the simplest project management platforms for professional services. Its straightforward automation and task management features make it an excellent choice for organizations looking to make noticeable but uncomplicated improvements in their daily operations.

Top Features of Monday.com

Monday.com’s emphasis on delivering user-friendly project management tools makes it an ideal solution for professional services organizations seeking software that their teams can quickly and effortlessly adopt, regardless of their familiarity with similar tools. Some of its standout features for professional services users include:

Customizable Dashboards: Users can personalize their dashboards to highlight the most crucial information for their teams, selecting which updates and key metrics to emphasize for a project and which widgets to include based on various user roles.

Task Automation: No-code automation can be swiftly set up within the platform to perform a wide range of tasks and processes, determining when these are activated, progressing tasks through stages of completion, and updating teams without the need for manual intervention.

Visual Project Tracking: Visual boards organize campaigns and projects with Kanban, timeline, and calendar views that managers can choose from, helping users quickly identify whether a project is lagging or meeting deadlines, allowing for swift decision-making.

Work Collaboration: A variety of collaboration tools within Monday.com enable team members to work together in real time, with @ mentions, file attachments for tasks, and task comments all accessible in a centralized platform to keep all updates in one place.

Project Management Templates: Pre-built templates come equipped with task tracking, automations, and item updates, allowing projects to commence immediately, while users can further customize templates for future projects unique to their business needs.

Monday.com Pros and Cons

Although Monday.com is a relatively recent entrant among top project management solutions, it has consistently evolved and gained traction in the professional services industry due to the various tools being added to the platform. However, there are limitations to what Monday.com can currently offer to large, complex organizations.

Pros:

• Various plans with different pricing options are available, including a free plan for solo users and small teams, offering varying levels of support for companies of different sizes and needs.
• Quick setup and implementation make Monday.com faster to start using compared to many other project management solutions in the professional services sector.
• High customization potential means that Monday.com can cater to a wide range of businesses, allowing users to tailor the platform to their unique goals and daily requirements, as well as team size.
• The company consistently adds new capabilities, such as workflow duplication, workspace relocation, and AI text summaries, positioning Monday.com at the forefront of emerging demands from professional services.

Cons:

• Several essential features, including time tracking and certain integrations, are only available on higher-tier plans, preventing smaller businesses from accessing them for their operations.
• Timesheets are not an integrated feature, meaning that users who need to create timesheets for their teams will need to connect Monday.com with another solution.
• The platform lacks a focused approach on the specific needs of professional services due to its broad usability and adoptability, resulting in a deficiency of features and functionality that industry users require for their tasks.
• Reporting is one of the platform’s weaker aspects, meaning that data insights are limited, and managers have fewer tools available to optimize resources.

Who Is Monday.com For?

Monday.com is best for people who want a simple and basic solution that’s easy to use. Plus, its ever-expanding list of features means that if companies are currently dissatisfied with what is available, the tool they need is likely in development. However, some of those features may still be years away and may only be accessible through higher-tier plans. Nonetheless, for businesses that are confident in their current processes and are seeking an easy-to-use solution that they can continue to adopt further into the future by upgrading plans, Monday.com can be a straightforward choice.

With a wide array of tools and plans available within Monday.com, nearly every professional services business can find a use for it, regardless of their size or objectives. The effectiveness of the platform within an organization will depend on which plan is chosen and how much the company is willing to invest to access specific tools. This will ultimately determine whether Monday.com can truly meet all the needs for a professional services project management solution.

 

ClickUp

ClickUp stands out as a comprehensive productivity platform that prioritizes delivering an outstanding user experience through its highly adaptable software. The platform employs a visually engaging approach to managing projects and tasks, akin to a Kanban board, with whiteboards and Gantt charts being integral components. This design facilitates seamless and swift collaboration among users working on a range of projects. ClickUp is one of the most recent and rapidly expanding project management solutions available and takes a unique approach compared to many older PM solutions.

With multiple layers of highly adaptable collaboration features, ClickUp project management is crafted for those who appreciate visually-oriented organization and project management. It’s a tool engineered to allow professional services teams to collaborate in their preferred manner and customize the tool to align precisely with the structure and style of their ongoing projects, rather than altering their methods to fit the platform.

Top Features of ClickUp

ClickUp’s dedication to visually appealing and intuitive project management tools and charts is evident throughout its primary features. Professional services organizations aiming to enhance their team collaboration and who thrive in a visually-rich environment will find ClickUp’s key professional services project management features particularly attractive:

Structural Hierarchy: ClickUp offers users the ability to personalize how every layer of the platform is structured so that tools and tasks match their specific organizational framework. This begins with the Everything view and narrows down into teams, tasks, and subtasks.

Command Center: Accessible on all plans, the Command Center enables users to search through the various levels of the software to save time and locate exactly what they need. Additionally, Connected Search can be configured to make files outside of ClickUp searchable.

ClickUp Brain: The software’s AI, known as ClickUp Brain, is designed as a neural network that links users, documents, and tasks, providing greater context for work. It allows users to inquire about tasks and projects, delivering quick answers that support their activities.

Mind Maps: A visual representation of tasks and ideas for a project, which can be reorganized and transformed into dependent action items. These maps come with cascading views, sorting options, and customizable colors and layouts.

Visual Canvas: As ClickUp’s main workspace, users can utilize movable and resizable cards to customize the layout and arrangement of widgets, including on their homepage, overviews, and hubs, all part of the software’s focus on customizable and visually appealing workspaces.

ClickUp Pros and Cons

Pros:

• Flexibility in layout and hierarchy enables users to create a flow of tools that integrate well with their existing system and project requirements.
• ClickUp Brain AI provides comprehensive summaries of tasks and projects to onboard team members and offers writing assistance to support daily activities.
• Projects and tasks are easily consolidated, and project timelines are automatically generated, helping teams commence work promptly.
• Users can simultaneously manage a high volume of projects within the platform thanks to its layered hierarchical structure and real-time collaboration features.

Cons:

• The absence of resource management prevents users from understanding and improving team utilization rates, hindering their ability to optimize resource allocation.
• The extensive customization options result in a steep learning curve for users working to fine-tune the platform to meet their business’s specific demands.
• The interdependent layers and hierarchy of tools within the system can be confusing, making it challenging to locate specific information and tasks when navigating ClickUp.
• Certain features are restricted to higher-priced plans, limiting access to tools that might be essential for some businesses’ unique needs.

Who Is ClickUp For?

ClickUp’s primary aim is to provide its users with a comprehensive understanding of their workflows and enable them to enhance their project processes by visualizing every step and task involved. Consequently, companies or departments with highly intricate processes in need of refinement and control can significantly benefit from ClickUp’s capabilities and focus. However, the platform does have limitations regarding what is achievable beyond this application.

With the recent launch of ClickUp 3.0, the software has become more robust, offering more in-demand features than ever before and presenting a less cluttered interface for easier adoption and use. The platform’s well designed interface and high level of customization make it an excellent choice for visually-oriented users seeking a tool that mirrors how they perceive their daily work.

 

Wrike

Wrike stands as one of the most time-tested and widely recognized project management solutions within the professional services landscape. Since its inception in 2006, Wrike has transformed over nearly twenty years into a comprehensive platform that manages projects, organizes workflows, fosters collaboration, and speeds up execution. Wrike prides itself on being the most adaptable work management tool available today, boasting a user base that exceeds 20,000 organizations globally. The company is committed to maintaining its position as the most robust platform in the industry.

Despite numerous new features introduced over the years, Wrike project management operates like a traditional project management tool, utilizing projects, folders, and tasks to divide work into manageable sections. This approach allows users to customize the software to meet a variety of use cases, industries, and team structures within a business. Consequently, Wrike provides a wide range of capabilities that professional services organizations have adapted to their specific needs.

Top Features of Wrike

Wrike is designed to unite every member of an organization into a single space, simplifying project complexity and enhancing productivity so teams can concentrate on their most critical tasks. It’s engineered to scale with any business size and move as swiftly as the company requires, evolving into a platform that users are unlikely to outgrow. Some of Wrike’s standout features include:

Dashboards: Central to Wrike’s platform, these dashboards offer real-time updates on project progress, alerts for action items, and personalized settings that let users tailor the dashboard to their preferences. They also include customizable formulas for the specific data your company needs.

Pre-Built Templates: Wrike offers dozens of pre-designed project management templates catering to various work styles, roles, business models, and industries. This enables users to adopt a project management process suited to their organization right from the start, minimizing the need for extensive customization.

Work Intelligence AI: This self-learning AI and automation engine utilizes Wrike’s data model to automate tasks, forecast project outcomes, and provide work recommendations, including the generation of project descriptions from scratch.

Automated Workflows: Wrike’s GenAI aids users in automating their projects, workflows, and custom items by implementing rules across projects or specific areas. This ensures that tasks and data move seamlessly when certain conditions and timelines are met, accelerating day-to-day operations.

Streamlined Proofing: Wrike’s online proofing platform allows users to compare files, feedback, and approvals side by side in one location. It also includes version comparison tools to help create new versions of content and finalize documents as efficiently as possible.

Wrike Pros and Cons

Pros:

• Pre-made templates reduce the time required to launch projects and enhance the platform’s value by enabling teams to start using Wrike quickly.
• The proofing tool facilitates real-time collaboration among team members from any location, expediting work completion on the platform.
• Consolidating work and communication within a single platform significantly reduces email overload for companies leveraging Wrike.
• Task automation and proofing significantly decrease the volume of minor tasks, saving numerous hours per week and boosting team productivity.

Cons:

• The free basic plan lacks most features, while the paid plan may be prohibitively expensive for smaller teams that need access to these tools to maximize the software’s potential.
• Integrations with other software solutions can slow down notifications, leading users to miss crucial time-sensitive information for decision-making.
• The platform’s complexity may necessitate training and documentation for new users to effectively utilize Wrike from the outset.
• Due to Wrike’s extensive size and array of tools as a legacy platform, multiple experts within a company may be needed to assist users.

Who Is Wrike For?

With a proven track record of success, Wrike is an excellent choice for professional services businesses seeking a reliable legacy solution that adeptly handles traditional project management tasks. While Wrike may not be as flashy or revolutionary as some other project management tools, its dependable structure and the incorporation of several recent features designed to offer greater insights and support make it a preferred software for companies of various sizes and industries worldwide.

Radically altering the way projects are managed can be a daunting challenge for companies, especially those that have been operating in the same manner for years and may lack confidence in an entirely new system. Wrike’s conventional approach to project management facilitates easier adoption of the platform for your company, while its more advanced features can start to streamline and enhance your processes over time.

 

Kantata

Kantata is designed for bold, forward-thinking professional services firms looking to optimize their entire services delivery lifecycle. Recognizing project management as a crucial element that cannot function in isolation, Kantata surpasses the abilities of traditional project management tools by providing businesses complete control over the entire quote-to-cash process for all projects, teams, and customers. Project estimation and forecasting, monitoring project and portfolio health, managing time and expenses, project accounting, and project sentiment analysis are all integrated within the tool. This data is then seamlessly shared across the organization for improved project and portfolio health on a larger scale.

Born from the merger of Mavenlink and Kimble, Kantata draws on decades of combined expertise from two leading Professional Services Automation software companies. This partnership created a next-generation PSA platform designed to meet the unique and complex challenges of modern work. It provides insights and real-time data to enable smarter decisions, reduce risk, and enhance agility.

Top Features of Kantata

Having all of your data in one place allows you to see the big picture—or drill down into the details of revenue-generating projects. Kantata’s project management capabilities provide a home base for getting work done as well as unparalleled visibility into project and portfolio health with insights into profit margins, budgets, burn rates, and their financial implications that allow project managers to proactively course-correct where needed. Key features of Kantata include:

Portfolio Task Level Management: Kantata users gain total visibility across their entire project portfolio in a single location with the ability to see overall portfolio performance or drill down into the specifics of any project by checking the status of any task, using Gantt charts for real-time insight, collect and approve timecards, and more to hit their companywide timeline and budget goals.

Project Templates: Kantata provides an extensive array of tried-and-tested project templates, enabling companies to launch projects swiftly without delays. Successful projects can be transformed into customized templates, facilitating the replication of success in future similar endeavors.

Kantata Pulse: Pulse is a comprehensive sentiment analysis tool integrated into Kantata that tracks project perception in real time. It gathers feedback from clients and employees, reveals useful insights, and enhances project outcomes by enabling companies to address issues before they escalate into significant problems.

AI Project Assistant: Kantata’s AI assistant aids managers in swiftly identifying areas where projects need support, determining the appropriate resources for upcoming tasks, and making necessary adjustments to maintain strong profit margins. This tool is invaluable for professional services businesses managing demanding workloads.

Project Financials Insight: Kantata’s real-time financial insights help users manage their costs while they work, with tools including the ability to import, export, and remove project accounting records, revenue and earned value measurements and estimations, and on-demand financial analysis keeping your company’s finance departments informed and in control.

What-If Modeling: Know the impact of your decisions before you make them by viewing the potential effects of changes across all delivery engagements and other pre-sales activities. Kantata users are able to better understand the progress and profitability of their projects and make informed decisions to ensure their resources are being used effectively as possible.

At-Risk Projects View: Kantata’s real-time resource demand management includes an at-risk projects view, which identifies where usage overruns are happening across in-progress projects. This view includes identifying overrun impact on project costs on a resource by resource basis, helping managers make fast adjustments on resource assignments and project budgets.

Kantata Pros and Cons

Pros:

• The platform offers detailed insights into resources, covering skill sets, availability, and project task needs, which supports efficient resource optimization and enhances team utilization.
• Project leads have complete visibility into every project aspect. This openness enhances understanding of team strengths and weaknesses and improves the predictability of project delivery.
• The ability to access financial performance of projects in real time empowers project managers to make forward looking, data-driven decisions.
• The platform’s AI features and strong integration options streamline workflows and optimize processes, leading to quicker and more efficient project completion.

Cons:

• Due to its complexity Kantata has a steeper learning curve, necessitating comprehensive training for users to fully exploit its capabilities.
• Compared to other solutions, Kantata offers fewer customization options to preserve the integrity of its processes, requiring users to adapt to the platform.
• The project management capabilities are extensive and extremely in depth, but are likely too complex for teams looking for a basic stand alone project management.

Who Is Kantata For?

Kantata is ideal for teams handling client-facing, revenue-generating projects and professional services firms seeking an in-depth, real-time view of their projects, resources, and financial data in one solution. Unlike other software solutions designed to broadly cater to businesses across various industries, Kantata specifically addresses the daily needs and challenges of professional services companies. It values client and employee feedback, offering actionable insights into their sentiment data alongside budgets, actuals, and other critical operating metrics. These reports and the ability to quickly and accurately respond to them make Kantata an essential component for the ongoing improvement and optimization of people-powered businesses.

Choosing the right project management software for your professional services organization can feel overwhelming, but with so many great choices, there’s a right answer for every business’s unique needs. And for the company that wants both the insights and control they need for constant improvement over their projects, Kantata is the right answer.

If you are ready to start evaluating project management software, you can schedule a call with one of Kantata’s representatives to discuss your organization’s needs. If you have any questions, we’re available to answer them 24/7 by clicking the Live Chat button on the right. We look forward to working with you!.