Tools, Tools, Tools!
AT A GLANCE
Gotta find the right tool at the right time to finally get it right! This takes a bit of research and testing but if you land well, you can scale well.
Jira, Monday, SmartSuite, Click-Up, Asana, Basecamp - I've used them all! Which tool is the best? Well...that depends on the use. One thing's for sure, they are not created equally; their strengths and weaknesses can make or break a project's unique needs.
SCHEDULING & BUDGETING PROWESS
Asana was used for a team calendar and is best for campaigns and launches, with a simple learning curve.
SmartSheet was good for keeping track of our assets...good, not great.
ClickUp was used for scheduling and is the most customizable, but a big learning curve.
Basecamp is the OG of all scheduling, and is the simplest and easiest of them all - no kanban board, no calendar, no frills...exactly as their motto suggests, "no nonsense".
SmartSuite was used for scheduling and, while somewhat customizable, had a unique intuition we found useful for our studio projects at the time.
Monday was used for scheduling, and while a heavy-hitter app that advertises relentlessly, it did not include some of the features we were looking for at the time.
Jira is another OG we used for tech projects, and it's an evolved favorite.
WORKFLOW AUTOMATION & DYNAMIC PAGES
Google Sheets with Appscript is fun and used for prototypes.
MS Power Apps with Sharepoint Lists is powerful for building processes, workflow automation, and dynamic web pages.
Zapier's agentic approach is great for business process automation and app integration. In a little over a year, the company has evolved the product to seriously scale.
SharePoint has been slow to evolve, limiting our intranet and content management capabilities. Nevertheless, it's an industry-standard go-to for file sharing and knowledge.