Project Management | Docs, Keep, Sheets, Calendar | The Apps Show

Another week, another introduction - meet Pryscilla! She is a sales representative here at Google, and she hosts The Apps Show Brazil with Andre. In addition to sales, she also manages a lot of projects. She's here this week with Debbie to discuss vital project management techniques using Google Apps.

First up - agendas in Google Docs. Keep your action items and notes for recurring meetings in Docs, and attach that agenda/meeting notes document to your Calendar invites.

Next - Google Keep. Did you know that you can have shared to-do lists in Google Keep? You can share a list with other team members so you can all check off items as they're completed.

Sheets - Do you LOVE Gantt Charts? Well, then check out our handy guide for making a Gantt Chart in Google Sheets WITHOUT downloading any extra add-ons!

Calendar - Finally, use Calendar to create different project calendars, and to schedule in your tasks.

Thanks for joining us this week!

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Closed Caption:


DEBBIE LIU: Hello and
welcome back to the App Show.
PRYSCILLA LADEIRA: Hi, everyone.
DEBBIE LIU: I'm Debbie,
and this is Prycilla, who
co-hosts the App Show Brazil.
PRYSCILLA LADEIRA:
Yep, and this week,
we're going to talk about
project management and Google
Apps.

DEBBIE LIU: When you
manage a lot of projects,
using the right tools can
make all the difference.
PRYSCILLA LADEIRA: There are
powerful third-party tools that
work great with Google Apps.
They are designed with project
management techniques in mind.
DEBBIE LIU: But, to
start with, we're
going to keep things simple.
So today, I'm going to
show you a master Google
doc that I use to keep track of
a project called The App Show.
Here we have our agenda that
we attach to every recurring
calendar event.
There's a centralized
list of assets
that link to their
respective files or sites.
Each meeting has
notes, and we'll
make action items from
that meeting bright orange.
Once completed, we change
the color to green.
Now, it might be easy to
ignore an action item that's
just written in a doc.
You might "forget to check it."
So one thing I like to do
is highlight an action item
and insert comment.
I'll then type plus
y and click Comment.
That way he gets an email
with his action item.
This works well for people that
use their inbox as to-do list.
PRYSCILLA LADEIRA: Like
me-- I really liked
to use to-dos in my inbox.
I also like to use Keep
for to-dos that are
shared between team members.
Just click the little
person on your note
and add your team members.
Now they all share these tasks.
It's very lightweight
and simple.
DEBBIE LIU: Which
can be really nice,
but sometimes I'm looking for
a big complicated spreadsheet
with everything
at my fingertips.
Here's a spreadsheet full of all
the products we're working on.
There's a lot you can
do with this data,
but I'm going to add some
conditional formatting.
First, I'll select the
column for percent completed
and then Format and then
Conditional Formatting.
And then I click Color Scale.
Here you can change the
colors and make adjustments.
Well, that's it.
Now I've got a nice visual
for my project's completion.
PRYSCILLA LADEIRA: Another nice
visual for project management
is a great Gantt chart.
In your spreadsheet with tasks,
start dates, and finish dates,
copy and paste the
headers below your data.
I'm going to add the formula
HU to copy my first task here.
Next I've got to
convert these dates
into days using this function.
Then I'm going to
use this function
to see how many days
the task will take.
Now I copy the formula
down by dragging
this little blue square.
Once I've selected the data
range, I can Insert Chart.
Go to Charts and select Bar.
Then go to Customize,
Remove The Legend,
set the major grid lines to
Auto and then scroll down
to the Series section.
Here I'm going to select
Start Date from the drop down,
and on the color select None.
From here, feel free to
customize the axis titles,
but that's pretty much it.
Now you have a Gantt
chart that will
help visualize your projects
and their timelines.
Credit for this tip goes
to Dolly at [INAUDIBLE].
DEBBIE LIU: And remember,
anything in Docs, Sheets,
or Slides can
easily be published
to a website for clients
or stakeholders to review.
PRYSCILLA LADEIRA: Lastly,
schedule everything.
DEBBIE LIU: I like to create a
new calendar for each project.
Here you can see
the many projects
I've got that I can
easily click on and off.
Having a to-do list is
great, but it really
helps to schedule a time
to finish each task.
If it doesn't definition
the scheduled time,
I duplicate it and
schedule it again.
One of the things a lot
of people forget to use
is Calendar Search.
When I get asked
about a project,
or I'm looking for
specifics on what
got done when, I can just
type the name into the search,
and it shows up here in this
list, which is easily printable
or saved as a PDF
for fast sharing.
Thanks for watching
and let us know
how you guys manage projects.
PRYSCILLA LADEIRA: And
if you like the video,
share it or give it plus one.
DEBBIE LIU: We'll
see you next week.
PRYSCILLA LADEIRA: Ciao.
DEBBIE LIU: That was cute.
Because of I/O, there's
been so much news.
PRYSCILLA LADEIRA:
For one, inbox
is now available on all
Google Apps accounts.
DEBBIE LIU: If you haven't
given it a shot yet, try it now,
and I'm sure we'll do
an episode on it soon.
PRYSCILLA LADEIRA:
In the meantime,
check out the App Show Brazil.