How to Create Your Project Schedule

The Houzz Pro Schedule is both a project management and client collaboration tool that helps you make sure everyone — your team, subs, and clients — is on the same page. It’s a place where you can easily see the next steps in your project.

To access schedule, simply navigate to a project in the left-hand column, and then select Schedule from the left menu.

Once in the schedule, you can either create a schedule from scratch, or you can use preset templates or custom templates.

You can choose from the three views available on the top of the page. These are Gantt, Calendar or List view. You can select the one that works best for you and change back and forth between views depending on what you want to see.

Adjust Schedule Settings

As you set up your schedule, you can easily make adjustments to your workday settings, workday exceptions and start date to ensure it accurately reflects your project.

To start, select Actions at the top of your schedule, then select Workday Settings, Workday Exceptions or Move Project Start Date from the dropdown menu.

Workday Settings

If you select Workday Settings, a new screen will appear where you will be able to select the days of the week that you are available to work — you can select all day or adjust to specific times. Be sure to click Save once complete.

Workday Exceptions

If you select Workday Exceptions, you will be directed to your Houzz Pro settings where you can identify company holiday closures. Here, the national holidays will automatically populate — click the check box next to the holidays your company is closed for. You can select the recurring icon next to the holiday to continue the closure every year.

When you de-select a holiday, you will be asked to confirm if you want to remove just that holiday, this and following public holidays, or all public holidays.

If you have a custom company holiday you would like to add, click Add Exception. A new screen will appear — input the holiday name, start date and end date. Click the box next to Recurring if you would like to continue the closure every year. Be sure to click Save once complete.

Move Start Date

If you select Move Project Start Date, a new screen will appear where you can select the new start date from the calendar. Be sure to click Save once complete.

All the phases and items in your schedule will now automatically adjust to reflect the new start date.

Create Phases, Items, Milestones, Project Dates & Tasks

The Houzz Pro Schedule is broken into several tiers to best reflect your workflow. We have Phases, Items, Milestones, Project Dates and Tasks.

• Phases — You can group your items into a phase and at a glance see how long that portion of the project is due to take. 
• Items — You can create multiple items and group them under a phase. Here you will be able to create multiple dependencies between items. 
• Milestones — You can add important dates or events to your schedule for more context on your project.
• Project Dates — Similar to milestones, you can add important dates to your schedule, but project dates are linked to specific document due dates. These due dates will appear on your schedule with a link to the project document for reference.
• Tasks — You can break your items into smaller tasks and assign them to your team.

Use the dropdown menu in the left-hand column to add a new phase, item, milestone or project date. 

Add Phase

There are two ways to add a phase — you can either use the dropdown menu in the left-hand column, or scroll all the way down to the bottom, then select Add Phase.

When you add a new phase, it will appear in the left-hand column. Name the phase, then click the checkmark to confirm. You can then click to edit and add items to the phase as needed.

Hover over a phase in the left-hand column for the option to add an item, edit, delete or rename the phase. You can also change the order of phases by clicking and dragging the line item and moving it to the preferred spot.

Add Item

There are several ways to add an item — you can use the dropdown menu, click add item under a specific phase, or click directly on a date in the Gantt view of your schedule.

When you add a new item, it will appear directly on the schedule. Name the item, then click the checkmark to confirm. You can then click to edit the item and drag to move around as needed.

When you click on the item within your schedule, you will see a panel on the right side of your screen where you can make multiple edits including:

• Start & Finish Date
• Assign to stakeholder 
• Create a dependency (or multiple dependencies)
• Give a description of the item 
• Create a task 
• Color coding
• Attach any documents to a task

Add Milestone

To add a milestone, use the dropdown menu in the left-hand column. When you add a milestone, it will appear directly on the schedule with a diamond icon. Name the milestone, then click the checkmark to confirm. You can then click to edit the milestone and drag to move around as needed.

Add Project Date

To add a project date, use the dropdown menu in the left-hand column. A new screen will appear to ask you to select the relevant project document — click the check box next to the corresponding document(s), then click Add to Milestones. On this screen, you can also choose to automatically add future documents to your schedule.

Once you select a document, your left-hand column will automatically update with a project due date phase, and the project date will appear with a diamond icon on your schedule. You can then click to open the project date details — the corresponding document will be linked here for quick reference. 

To edit the project date, you can drag to move around as needed, or you can adjust the date within the details page by clicking the calendar icon.

Add Task

To add a task, click on an item in your schedule to open up the item details in the right-hand column. Under Tasks, click the + icon to create a new task for that item. You can also view existing tasks, where you can add a due date and assign items to team members or clients (more details below).

Create Dependencies

When building out your schedule, you can easily make multiple items dependent on the completion of another item. Creating dependencies in your schedule is useful if there are certain stages of the project that can't move forward until another stage is complete.

To create a dependency:

1. Click on the item you want to edit to open the item details.

2. Within the edit screen on the right-hand side, click on Add Dependency.

3. From there, you can select whether this item should begin after or end before another item. Select the relevant option from the dropdown.

4. Select the item you want to create a dependency on. In this instance, the level 1 subfloor needs to end before the level 1 framing begins.

5. You will now see a dependency shown in your schedule. You can add another dependency by clicking the + icon. You can also delete the dependency by clicking the x next to it.

Assign Items and Tasks

Within schedule, you can also assign items to your team members or clients. This will notify the assignee and make sure they are keeping up to speed with the project. 

When you click the item and bring up the panel on the right, you will see there is a dropdown automatically selected to Unassigned. Here, you can either invite team members to the system and assign them that way, or choose from a list of team members who are already using the system. 

On this screen, you can also view existing tasks associated with the item, or create a new task. To do this, select the Add Task icon at the top, or select one of the plus icons under the Tasks section.

Share Your Schedule

It's easy to share your schedule to keep the whole team informed of changes as they come up. Click the Share button above your schedule — you can then allow clients access in the Client Dashboard, as well as provide access to subs and/or vendors.

If you prefer to print and share, no problem. You can export your schedule in the Gantt, Calendar or List view as a PDF or PNG.

To start, select Actions in the top right of your schedule screen. Select Export As from the dropdown — you can then select from a PDF or PNG format. For Gantt view only, you can choose to export the schedule in the "current view” to see the schedule as it appears on your screen with filters applied, or in the “full Gantt view” to see the entire schedule.

Click Export to download the file and print from there.

View Schedule Overview

In the Schedule Overview section on desktop, you can view a detailed breakdown of your scheduled items across all your projects. This big picture overview quickly allows you to see the phase each project is in so you can keep everything on track.

To access, select the Search icon in the left-hand navigation, and click on Schedule Overview.

In Schedule Overview, you can easily customize what is shown. On the left, you can turn on and off the projects you see by clicking the check marks. On the top, you can select to view your schedule on a daily, weekly or monthly level. You can also filter by assignees, project status or items.

Schedule Overview is also available in the Gantt format, if you prefer. Within this view, you can even view projects on a quarterly or yearly basis for a higher level overview.

Advanced Settings for Schedule

Professionals with Custom packages have access to two additional schedule features — Live/Edit Mode and Baseline.

Live/Edit Mode

You can use the live/edit mode feature to make changes to your schedule and adjust what your client and subs can or cannot see as you work. There are two different modes — live mode and edit mode.

Live mode is the default. When you make changes in live mode, clients, subcontractors and your team will be notified. Edits will immediately be visible to clients and subcontractors with the correct permissions.

You can use edit mode when you are making a lot of adjustments to your schedule and don't want those changes to be visible yet. In this mode, clients and subcontractors will not be able to view your schedule until you turn it live again, and assignees will not receive notifications about changes. Only you and your team will see the edits you make to the schedule.

To change your mode, click on Live Mode (or Edit Mode) at the top of your schedule, and select the alternative mode from the dropdown.

You will see a confirmation screen that informs you of the difference between edit and live mode notifications and visibility. Select Confirm to adjust.

Create a Baseline

Once you set up your project schedule, you can use the baseline feature to take a snapshot of the current schedule. This will log the start and end dates for every item and phase. If the project timeline changes, you can compare the actual dates against the initial plan to help track and manage projects more efficiently in the future.

To create a baseline:

1. Open up your schedule, and select Set Baseline from the top menu.

2. A popup will appear to give you more information about the feature, as well as how to reset it if needed. Click Confirm.

3. Your project dates will now save as an outline within your schedule. If the dates move, it will show the projected timeline as well as the actual timeline. In this example, framing was delayed by two days, so adjustments made to the schedule reflect that.

4. You can select the baseline toggle to turn the feature on and off. If you would like to reset your baseline, you can select Reset Baseline from the Actions menu.