A recap of the August 13 call, for anyone who could not attend.
BST Technical Training · What Nick Covered
Nick Newman, from the Baltimore office, led the first of 2 live BST sessions. This one covers setup and navigation. Session 2 lands September 17 and covers reading the data. This summary carries the substance of the full call.
Justin teaches the behaviors. Nick teaches the tools.
Nick Newman, from the Baltimore office, led BST technical training as a session of its own, separate from the weekly PM Excellence calls. Today covered 3 blocks: general navigation, your 3 responsibilities as a PM inside BST, and the project document itself.
Make BST yours: set your dashboard, save your views
Own your 3 responsibilities: billing, resourcing, and project health
Work the project document: the info, tasks, and resources tabs
Session 2 lands September 17. It moves from setup into reading the data: project performance against budget, the pre-bill and billing process start to finish, and profit analysis.
Before The Project Opens
4 steps happen before BST ever sees a project
This question came up more than any other in past sessions. Nick laid out exactly what a PM owns, before a project number exists.
1
Confirm the opportunity in monday.comThis is Grace’s marketing tracking CRM. Only practice leaders and studio leaders can add or update it, so ask them to check it if you do not have access yourself.
2
Submit the MILO project number request formFind it under the project number request tab on MILO. Expect a project number within 1 to 2 days, sooner once the current process finishes streamlining.
3
Deliver the fee and budget spreadsheet to your project accountantDo this as soon as the project is won. Your project accountant uses it to build the preliminary task dates and hourly budget for you.
4
Review the info tab for accuracyOnce the project is live, check the client information, project type, and who is listed as project manager.
If a project number does not show up within 2 days, go to your project accountant first. They can trace the request faster than anyone else, including BST support.
3 Responsibilities Inside BST
Billing, resourcing, and project health all run through one dashboard
Nick grouped every PM task inside BST into 3 areas. Each one has its own cadence and its own tools.
BillingDrive the monthly pre-bill and bills process
Use your bills inquiry and your BST to-dos every month to move bills through review.
Resourcing and SchedulingKeep the schedule and the team current
Update BST weekly, and again any time a date or a resource changes. Project staffing 6 to 8 weeks out.
Project HealthCheck performance weekly, at minimum
Use the project summary inquiry, the project detail inquiry, and the receivable aging inquiry. Check daily if you run a single project.
One dashboard runs all 3
The project and resource management dashboard holds billing, resourcing, and project health in a single screen. Set it as your home screen, and every BST session opens straight onto your own portfolio.
The One-Stop Screen
Set it once. See your own projects every time you open BST.
2 steps put your dashboard in front of you for good.
1
Open Dashboards, then Project and Resource ManagementThe dashboards icon looks like a small record, near the top of your BST screen.
2
Right click the tab and select Set as HomeFrom then on, this dashboard loads every time you open BST or hit the home icon.
Restrict the dashboard to your own portfolio, then save that restriction as a view so you do not rebuild it each time. Do the same after you add or reorder a column. BST reloads whatever view you last saved.
BST11 general guide
The full walkthrough of setup, pre-bill, and scheduling. Find it on MILO, under Process, then BST 11 Project Management Resources.
Standard inquiry views reference card
Recommended restrictions, columns, and column order for each inquiry. Set your columns to match it, then save your own view.
Common language reference
Maps old Ajera terms to their BST names. Phases in Ajera are tasks in BST. Start here when a screen does not match what you expect.
The Record Itself
3 tabs matter to a PM: info, tasks, and resources
Everything else on the project document belongs to your project accountant.
InfoClient, type, and status
Fee and budget effort populate on their own from the budgets tab. Leave the Ajera service line as is on transitioned projects. It only affects revenue recognition.
TasksStatus and dates
Bold parent tasks take their dates from the child tasks under them. Change the child task, and the parent updates on its own.
ResourcesWho is assigned, and for how many hours
Estimated hours pre-populate from your fee worksheet. Schedule hours by task, by week, for each person assigned.
Save is not submit. Saving only keeps a draft. Hit the green submit button to send your change to your project accountant for approval, and make every change you want first, because submitting closes the document to further edits until it comes back.
2 shortcuts came up more than once on the call.
1
Hold Ctrl and click to open a project in a new tabYou keep your place in the tab you started from.
2
Select the cell under a date you just changed, then press the period keyIt copies the date above into that cell, useful when several tasks share the same new date.
What Comes Next
One more BST session, then back to the regular schedule
1
Set your dashboard as your home screen this weekDo it before the next call, so every BST session from here starts on your own portfolio.
2
Session 2 lands September 17Nick returns to cover reading project data: performance against budget, the pre-bill and billing process start to finish, and profit analysis.
3
Route new BST questions through JustinHe collects what comes up in PM Excellence and passes it to Nick. Those questions shape the next session.
4
Access issues are getting resolvedIf BST does not show your dashboard or your assigned projects, message Justin. Emerging PMs are getting temporary access while the fix rolls out.
PM Excellence