Portfolios are items within OneDesk that allow for easy grouping of projects together. While portfolios cannot contain items directly, the projects within these portfolios contain all the tickets, tasks, articles, and other item-types which you may be working with and are used to. Additionally, portfolios can include other portfolios within themselves as parent portfolios. The main benefit of portfolios within OneDesk is the ability to quickly delineate projects by a certain entity. It is recommended that portfolios be used to denote either departments within your company or organizations/customers with whom your company is doing business.
Creating a Portfolio
Creating a portfolio is easy – just follow the same steps as creating an item internally. From the top bar, select “Add” and choose the portfolio option. From here, you can name your portfolio, choose any custom item-types you have made, and add a parent portfolio if needed.
Once created, your portfolio is ready to be used. The portfolio will initially have nothing inside it, but you can drag and drop any existing projects into it if you wish. Additionally, with the use of OneDesk’s workflow automation tool, processes can be set up which automatically create several projects within a new portfolio whenever it is created.
You can put a project into a portfolio when you create the project. In the project creation form there is a section to designate a portfolio.
Once your portfolio has been created, you can drag and drop it wherever you wish. This is useful if you have forgotten to designate a parent portfolio in the creation menu, or if you wish to rearrange things later.
Organizing your Portfolio
Best practice when using portfolios is to have them represent organizations you are working with, or departments within your company. Parent portfolios can be used to further stratify these organizations or teams. For example, if you are doing projects for multiple departments within a single customer organization, a parent portfolio designating the organization at large, as well as portfolios representing several departments within the organization may be prudent.
Portfolios serve as containers for your most important item – projects. Therefore, keeping your portfolios organized and easily accessible should be a high priority within OneDesk. Being able to differentiate between organizations and specific departments is a main way in which OneDesk allows for clients to keep their work organized.
In General: Best Practice for Portfolio Organization
- Portfolios are collections of all your projects.
- Portfolios are best used to represent separate clients you are working with, and/or separate departments within your organization.
- Portfolios can belong to parent portfolios, which provide a further way of separating projects within a larger organization.