Projects in ServiceTitan: Keeping Multi-Trade Jobs on Track

ServiceTitan Projects is crucial for organizing complex, multi-trade operations, and Channing Morrison, Residential HVAC Project Manager at Barron HVAC, Plumbing, Electrical & Solar, has become a big proponent of the tool. 

“Before Projects, we would make a customer page in OneNote that had all the information, which our coordinators had access to,” Morrison says. “When we started project management, we’d have to include them. Service would go to the job, but wouldn’t have the notes. 

“So, we’d have to try to get everyone on the same page,” Morrison adds. “We don’t have to do that anymore. We have forms with triggers and alerts set up so the next person in line gets notified when something’s ready to go.”

In a recent episode of the Mastering ServiceTitan podcast, Morrison explains how Projects keeps large installations on track by coordinating multiple trades, simplifying customer communications, and creating visibility for all team members. He also shares how new features like Project Templates and Project Portfolio are transforming their workflow and speeding up job completion.

Read on for the podcast highlights. 

What is ServiceTitan Projects?

Projects is a feature in ServiceTitan that enables companies to group together all the information on related jobs into one location. 

“Projects keeps the ball rolling by tracking each step and when to do it,” Morrison says. “We have all the individual jobs included in the project, each with their own technicians scheduled to them, their own times, arrival windows. All the financials for those individual jobs to be allocated in different business units live together in that one place.”

Projects is ideal for complex jobs. For example, when a tech performs a minor repair with a part on the truck, the company wouldn’t create a project. However, for replacements, Barron often involves air solutions, plumbing, electrical, and HVAC crews. 

“So, there’s a lot to organize,” Morrison says. “Projects is where the estimate gets sold, then we divvy those out into separate jobs.”

Designating a Project Manager 

Within each project, Barron lists the project manager, who will typically be from the unit doing most of the work. For example, if a heat pump is added as part of a solar job, the solar manager will still be the project manager. 

“They'll bring their information to plumbing, and plumbing will organize who's gonna be out there,” Morrison says. “It just gives us one point of contact to see everything through from start to finish as the project is built.”

The idea to designate a single point of contact came from customer feedback.

“When we first started doing the whole home and we had all these different pieces that were coming from different people, customers gave us the feedback saying, ‘I know it's Barron, but it feels like we're working with three different companies here,’” Morrison says. “We want to be the one whole-home solution. Having the ability to assign one person as a point of contact is a huge benefit.”

Projects Features

While Projects is like a folder that houses all the project details, the Project Portfolio feature provides a high-level overview of projects, including budget, invoices, and payments due. You can also set a custom project status to appear on this page. There are custom fields to add project details, like affidavit numbers for prevailing wage jobs. 

“One of the recent additions that I find very valuable is the time and status,” Morrison says. “We have a way to look at all the jobs that are currently scheduled. We can see how long they've been sitting there. So if I've built a bunch of jobs and we're waiting to schedule them, that's just a way for a manager to poke in there and say, ‘Hey, why haven't we called on this yet?’ It’s a good way to keep the ball rolling.”

A new feature slated to release soon is Project Templates. This allows jobs to auto-populate based on your preferences when you create a Project

>> For early access to Project Templates, click here. 

Another upcoming feature is Project Groups. 

“Say Northwest Choice Builders is doing 12 model homes all in this one location,” Morrison says. “You build each individual project to include individual notes for the homes. Then, you can take each of these projects and group them together into a master project. You’ll be able to view all the financials together.”

>> For early access to Project Groups, click here. 

Implementing Projects

When configuring Projects, Morrison recommends involving all of the stakeholders who will use the feature, so you can customize it to display the most valuable information. Including more people in the process helps them get on board when it’s time to ditch old methods for a new standard operating procedure. 

For more advice on new features, implementation, and more, Morrison recommends getting involved with ServiceTitan, joining beta groups, and completing the Spark and Ember sessions.

“One phrase I hear a lot and, and it's echoed across other companies I work with, is the rising tide floats all boats,” Morrison says. “We're all kind of riding that ServiceTitan tide, and everybody's gotten better.”

You can find this interview and many more by subscribing to Mastering ServiceTitan on Apple Podcasts, on Spotify, or here. 

Know a business that could use a bit of muscle from ServiceTitan? Refer them here!

Listening on a desktop & can’t see the links? Just search for Mastering ServiceTitan in your favorite podcast player.