Using the summary bar to monitor a project's progress

Effective project management requires more than static numbers. It demands real-time insights, clarity over how the project progresses throughout the timeline, and proactive controls to correct the course before facing real issues.  

The summary bar in the project detailed view is a powerful tool for tracking project health and progress at a glance.

You can customize the metrics shown on the bar for any project type.

For one-off projects, the summary bar also includes the following functionalities that make it easier to identify risks quickly and take proactive action in a timely manner:

• Enable trend lines for metrics to show 7-day trends, helping you detect early warning signs, such as declining profitability or stalled progress, and act before issues escalate.
• Set up watchdogs to get automatic email alerts when key financial or operational thresholds are reached, eliminating the need to monitor these project metrics manually every day.

1. Customizing metrics in the summary bar

You can easily customize the metrics you want to see in the summary bar of any project type by doing the following:

1. Click the three-dot button on the left side of the summary bar
2. Tick or untick the checkboxes to select the metrics to show on the summary bar
3. Click Apply to save your preferences.

There are different metrics available depending on the project type:

• One-off project metrics
• Retainer project metrics
• Internal project metrics

1.1. One-off project metrics

Below is a breakdown of all the time, monetary, and progress metrics you can add to your one-off project’s summary bar and what each of them takes into account:

Time metrics

• Total hours – shows the hours you've already spent on a project.
  • If you've set a time budget for the project, you also see another metric right below it, which helps you understand what percent of the time budget is now used up by the spent hours.
  • The completed hours are divided by the budgeted hours.
• Billable hours – the total billable hours spent on a project.
• Non-billable hours – the total duration of billable time entries on the project.
• Remaining billable hours – the total remaining billable hours on the project.
• Remaining hours – the number of hours you have left to use for the project/filtered period, with the percentage of budgeted hours shown below.
  • Completed hours are subtracted from the total hours budgeted for the project.
  • A negative value indicates you have exceeded your time budget.

Monetary metrics

• Used budget – the amount you have spent from the budget based on the work you've completed.
• Actual cost - your actual costs based on the work you have completed and planned.
• Forecasted profit margin - the estimated percentage of revenue that will remain as profit after all projected costs and expenses are deducted.
  • Available only if you have permission to see labor costs.
• Forecasted budget at completion - the amount that is estimated to be spent from the budget based on the work you have completed and planned.
• Forecasted cost at completion - your actual costs based on the work you have completed and planned.
• Earned revenue – the amount you have earned from the work you have delivered to the client
  • If you’ve enabled the Include bills and expenses toggle in the project modify view, the metric calculations will also consider bills and expenses.

Progress metrics

• Overdue tasks – the number of overdue tasks for the project.
• Remaining days – the number of work days left for the project.
  • Available only when the project has a due date.
  • You can compare this metric with the used hours and earned revenue metrics to evaluate progress.
  • If your site also includes weekends in the workweek, the remaining days counter will consider weekend days.

By default, the summary bar for one-off projects shows the following metrics:

• Used hours + % of total
• Remaining hours
• Used budget EUR + % of total
• Remaining days
• Overdue tasks
• Earned revenue + % of budgeted

1.2. Retainer project metrics

The summary bar for retainer projects shows the metric values based on whether you're viewing a specific retainer period or the summary of all periods.

There are different metrics you can add to a retainer project's summary bar depending on whether you've filled out only the Hours per period (your time budget), the Budget per period (your monetary budget), or both. Below is a breakdown of all the time, monetary, and progress metrics you can add to your retainer project’s summary bar and what each of them takes into account:

Time metrics

• Total hours – indicates how many hours you have already serviced the client during this period.
• Billable hours – the total billable hours spent on a project.
• Non-billable hours – the total duration of billable time entries on the project.
• Remaining billable hours – the total remaining billable hours on the project.
• Remaining hours – shows you how many hours are left to use for the filtered period. Completed hours are subtracted from the total hours budgeted for the period. A negative value indicates you’ve exceeded your time budget.

Monetary metrics

• Used budget – indicates how much work you have already delivered to the client, money-wise, in the filtered period.
  • Completed hours are multiplied by the selling price.
  • If you’ve enabled the 'Deduct bills and expenses' toggle, then any bills and expenses linked to the period are also included in the calculations.
• Used budget (%) – indicates the percentage of the monetary budget you have already depleted for the filtered period.
  • Completed hours are multiplied by the selling price and then divided by the period budget.
  • If you’ve enabled the Deduct bills and expenses toggle, then any bills and expenses linked to the period are also included in the calculations.
• Remaining budget – shows you how much money the client still has left to use for the filtered period.
  • The used budget is subtracted from the total period budget.
  • A negative value indicates that you’ve already delivered more than the client has paid.
• Earned revenue – Scoro will not track budget burn on the summary bar if you have not set a monetary budget. Instead, it tracks how much revenue you could already recognize based on the work you’ve done. Completed hours are multiplied by the selling price. If you’ve enabled the 'Deduct bills and expenses' toggle, then any bills and expenses linked to the period are also included in the recognizable revenue calculation.

Progress metrics

• Remaining days – shows you how many work days are left in the filtered period.
  • Compare it with the used hours and the used budget to evaluate progress.
  • If your site also includes weekends in the workweek, the remaining days counter will also consider weekend days.
• Overdue tasks – shows you how many are overdue in the filtered period as of today.
  • Make sure to take action to ensure the overdue tasks are completed and won't cause any delays.

1.3. Internal project metrics

For internal projects, you can enable the following four metrics:

• Non-billable hours – the total duration of non-billable hours spent on the internal project. Time entries and events in internal projects are always non-billable.
• Overdue tasks – the number of overdue tasks for the internal project.
• Actual cost – your actual costs based on the work you have completed and planned.
• Forecasted cost at completion – your actual costs based on the work you have completed and planned.

2. Enabling metric trend lines

To add context to the numbers shown on the metric cards, you can enable trend lines to see a trend line from the past week’s data. This can help you assess whether your budget, profitability, and work progress are following a healthy trajectory.

Unlike most graphs in Scoro, which typically display live or up-to-date data, the trend line data is based on snapshots of data taken at a certain point in the past and is updated once every hour.

To enable a trend line for a metric:

1. Hover over the metric you want to add the trend line to and click the gear icon
2. Enable the Show trend line for the past 7 days toggle
3. Click Save.

Once enabled, the metric card will show a trend line, and changes in the trend will be displayed as a percentage.

3. Setting up Watchdog alerts

You can set up Watchdogs to monitor specific project metrics in the summary bar and receive an email notification if they exceed a certain threshold.

To set up a Watchdog for a metric:

1. Hover over the metric card and click the gear icon
2. Tick the Notify by e-mail checkbox
3. Select the watchdog condition and enter the value
4. Click Save. 

Once your alert is saved, the metric card will show a grey watchdog icon.

Watchdog monitors the changes in the metric hourly. As soon as the conditions match, you’ll receive an email notification immediately. The notification email contains a link to the project so you can react right away.

If an alert was triggered and a notification was sent, the watchdog icon on the metric card will be orange.

4. Frequently asked questions

What currency is shown in the project summary bar?

The project summary bar and the Budget section show the monetary metrics in the Display currency that the user has set in their profile. Each user can change it under Settings > My settings > Preferences.