Tasks

Tasks in Factor allow you to define and track the individual deliverables, activities, and scope items within a project. Tasks are optional — they are not required for any project — but they provide valuable detail for planning and tracking.

Tasks and budget phases are separate features. Budget phases define the financial structure of a project (how fees are broken down). Tasks define the work items or deliverables. You can optionally link a task to a specific budget phase, but they exist independently. A project can have budget phases without tasks, and tasks can exist without being linked to any phase.

Each task can include:

Tasks can be organized into categories and arranged into parent-child hierarchies using sub-tasks. Tasks can also have dependencies linked between them.

When employees log time, they can optionally select a task from the project's task list. This links the time entry to a specific task, allowing you to compare estimated hours against actual hours logged. Employees can also mark a task complete directly from the time entry screen.

Note: time must be logged to leaf tasks — if a task has subtasks, time cannot be logged to the parent task directly, only to the subtasks beneath it.

Before creating tasks, set up categories on the project's Tasks tab. Categories provide organizational structure — for example, you might create categories for each project phase, deliverable type, or team involved. Each category has a name and a color.

When you type a task's name, Factor suggests names your firm has used before. Typing a new name adds it to this firm-wide list automatically. To view or remove obsolete or misspelled task names, go to SETTINGS > Lists. Names can't be edited directly - to correct one, remove it and add the corrected version. A corrected name that differs from the original only by capitalization can be added even while the original is still listed.

On each project's Overview tab, under project settings, there is an option to require employees to select a task when logging time. Only enable this if tasks have already been added to the project — otherwise employees won't be able to log time because there are no tasks to select from.

The most efficient way to set up tasks is through project templates. When you create a template, you can define categories, tasks, sub-tasks, estimated hours, and relative date ranges. Any project created from the template inherits this task structure. Templates are especially valuable when your firm performs similar types of projects repeatedly.

Tasks can be anchored to milestones, and milestones can be anchored to phases. This creates a cascading date relationship: when phase dates shift, anchored milestones shift automatically, and tasks anchored to those milestones shift as well. Set up these anchoring relationships on the project's Schedule tab.

Task management is controlled by permissions configured under SETTINGS > Your Team. Users need task view and edit permissions to see and modify tasks.

For each task you can configure:

On the PULSE Timelines page, you can view tasks across multiple projects. With task edit permissions, you can modify task dates by dragging them on the timeline, lengthen or shorten tasks, add quick tasks directly from the timeline, and click any task to open its detail panel for editing.

Task icons appear in weekly cells where tasks are due. Clicking the icon shows the task list for that week, where you can modify assignments, update estimated hours, change dates, and mark tasks complete — all without leaving the scheduler. You can also use remaining task hours to automatically load schedule assignments.

As team members log time and select tasks, the Tasks tab rolls up actual hours against estimated hours. Project managers can see who marked a task complete, how many hours were logged, and can choose to approve the task.

If a project has task selection required but no tasks have been added, employees won't be able to log time. Either add tasks to the project's Tasks tab or disable the task requirement on the Overview tab under project settings.

Time must be logged to leaf tasks — parent tasks that have subtasks beneath them cannot accept time entries directly. The employee should log time to the appropriate subtask instead.

Tasks only appear as icons on the Resource Scheduler in weeks that fall within the task's start and end dates. If dates are not set on the task, it won't appear on the scheduler.

Editing tasks from the PULSE Timeline requires task edit permissions. Contact your firm administrator to update your permissions under SETTINGS > Your Team.

Task estimated hours and budget phase amounts are tracked independently. Assigning estimated hours to tasks does not automatically adjust the budget phase, and vice versa. If you want these aligned, manually ensure the total estimated task hours for a phase match the budgeted hours for that phase.

Actual hours on a task are calculated only from time entries where the employee specifically selected that task. If an employee logged time to the project and phase but did not select a task, those hours won't appear on any task's actual count. Encourage team members to always select the appropriate task when logging time.

Tasks only shift automatically when they are anchored to a milestone that is itself anchored to the phase. Tasks created with fixed dates and no anchoring will not move when phase dates change. Set up anchoring relationships on the project's Schedule tab.