I created the Master Board workflow to help companies to obtain insights from an unlimited number of projects at the same time being able to show all of them in one dashboard and one portfolio board.
This approach also facilitates the team members to work in dozens of projects at the same time using only one board to work and communicate.
The master board approach is best suited to the following uses cases:
- You have dozens of standard projects or clients (20+) that you want to manage and report from one place.
- You want your team to work from one board instead of going to different client or project boards.
In this article I will explain how to build and set up the master board workflow but you can directly obtain the template with all the boards in the in the following link.
GET THE MASTER BOARD TEMPLATE
Get all the boards to start using the Master board workflow.
Yes, I want it!How to set up the master board
The Master Board is a many to one connection, where many boards are connected to a principal one using the Connect boards and Mirror columns.
This workflow can be extended incorporating previous steps like a CRM where the leads are managed before becoming clients.
The process starts in a Portfolio board from where the project/client boards are set up and automatically created when desired using a pre-built project template.
The template contains the standard activities for that type of project within the required columns to manage it. The template is using mirror columns because the main information will be hosted in the Master board. The projects are manageable both from the Master board and the project board at the same time thanks to the features provided by the mirrored columns.
HOW TO SET UP YOUR PROJECT BOARD
Once the individual project board is created, the new project board can be configured. The configuration will depend on the specific needs but I like to add the project name and project number so they can be incorporated in the activity when it’s connected to the Master board for a better traceability.
The connection between the project board and the Master board is performed using the following automation.
In the following video I describe how to set up the Master Board workflow once you have received the link to the app.
HOW TO MANAGE THE WORK USING THE MASTER BOARD
After the automation has been launched, the activities are connected to the Master board, the work can then be managed at the same time from the Master board or from the individual project board depending on the needs. A good use of the Master board is to create a dashboard for each employee where the can manage the tasks and communicate using only the Master board.
The Master board can also show different views for each department aggregating the information from all the connected boards.
REPORTING
Having one board with all the projects makes very easy to create a Management dashboard where all the work and financial information can be retrieved from an unlimited number of projects.
Finally, you can also connect the Master board to the Portfolio/High Level board so different layers of information can be obtained.
I hope this explanation provides a first overview of how to set up a Master board and that you can use it in your account.
You can contact me if you need additional details about how to implement this process.
Do you want to know more about the differences between the Master Board and the Multi board mirroring. Check this article:
The Master Board vs Multi-board mirroring. Differences and use cases
GET THE MASTER BOARD TEMPLATE
Get all the boards to start using the Master board workflow.
Yes, I want it!
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