With Productive you can work on internal projects and see a detailed view of the time spent on each one. Internal projects generate cost, but they do not generate profit (due to your employee’s salaries). The time tracked is automatically added to the overhead. An additional benefit is that you can collaborate with the team on various projects using tasks.
Please note that, as their name suggests, clients cannot be added to internal projects.
Creating an Internal project
Open the Projects menu and click on the “+ Project” icon to add a new project.
Select “Internal project” and create a new project or create a copy of an existing one.
You can also set up the project to be visible to everyone or only to project members.
Finally, give the project a name and select Create project.
How to use Internal projects
An internal project will behave like the one you’d usually do for a client. You can easily assign different teams to different projects and add tasks.
You can also track time spent working on internal projects - the cost of working on them will directly go to the overhead. Employees can track time on internal projects as they would on projects for clients. This is important to track the workload, efficiency, and time spent on internal affairs and gives you a more detailed cost report.
Convert an Internal project to a Client one
To convert an Internal project to a Client one, simply open up the sidebar, click on Edit project and select a client company from the available options.
Internal Projects and Budgeting
When you create an internal project, you can choose to set a budget. If you do, two default services, "Open hours" and "Open expenses," similar to client projects, will be automatically generated. These services let your team start tracking time on the project even before specific services are decided.
⚠️ Keep in mind that internal projects and budgets only generate costs and can't make a profit. They are always non-billable. ⚠️
You can freely adjust and add services as your project progresses. Also, you can track internal project costs by setting the estimated project completion time and assigning costs per hour or per item for specific services, including additional expenses.
This tracking system helps you check if your internal project stays within the budget, see the total cost, track team involvement, and monitor the time spent either in the Reports section or directly in the project budget tab. In short, it provides comprehensive insights for planning non-billable efforts, very similar to client projects and budgets.
