Scheduling Projects to Repeat

For regularly occurring projects, like those as frequent as daily or as infrequent as yearly, Workzone can automatically schedule repeating projects at the appropriate time. Repeating projects are built from an existing template so you can be sure that processes remain consistent.

IN THIS ARTICLE

Creating a Repeating Project
Schedule Expirations and Renewal Intervals
Project Creation Timing
Managing Pending Scheduled Projects
Project Duration Maximums
Task Count Limitations

Creating a Repeating Project

When adding a new project, select the Use existing template method from the different methods for adding tasks, then chose an existing template from the Select Template dropdown list, and to the right of that, set the start on or end on option and a date:

To set up the reoccurrence of additional projects, check the Repeats checkbox, then choose from the displaying frequency options, Daily, Weekly, Monthly, or Yearly (the Monthly option is shown below):

When scheduling a project, you can decide how often new projects will occur as follows:

Daily scheduled projects can occur every (specified) 1-6 days.
Weekly scheduled projects can occur every (specified) 1-6 weeks.
Monthly scheduled projects can either:
- Occur on the selected start/end on date's numbered day, every (specified) 1-11 months.
- Occur on the same day of the week as the start/end on date, counted for the month, every 1-11 months.
Yearly every year

Iterations of repeating projects will be named with the original project name and the instance’s start date (for example, "Monthly Reporting - Jan 2, 2023"). Care should be taken with the name used for the first, original project, as the name of a repeating project schedule cannot be changed afterwards.

NOTE: Projects that are scheduled for a Monthly frequency cannot have a start on or end on date later than the 28th of the month without being defaulted to the last day of the month, since some months are shorter than others.

Schedule Expirations and Renewal Intervals

When scheduling repeating projects, an Ends date must be specified for when the last project will be scheduled, and cannot exceed:

Daily frequency, three months from the Ends date.
Weekly frequency, 12 months from the Ends date.
Monthly frequency, 24 months from the Ends date.
Yearly frequency, 5 years from the Ends date.

Pending schedules can be renewed on the Repeating Projects report showcased at the bottom of this article.

Project Creation Timing

Scheduled projects are created prior to the new project's start date with particular lead times:

Daily frequency projects are created overnight for the next day.
Weekly frequency projects are created three work days (distinguishing between a 5-day or 7-day workweek) prior.
Monthly frequency projects are one calendar week prior.
Yearly frequency projects are created three calendar months prior.

NOTE: Daily starting/ending projects will not be created on specified Holidays and Non-Working days, as well as on weekends on a 5-day workweek.

Managing Pending Scheduled Projects

Email notifications are sent, prior to the expiration of a repeating project schedule, to the original project creator or, if the creator is no longer a user, the designated Point of Contact. These notifications are sent out for:

Daily frequencies, one week prior.
Weekly frequencies, two weeks prior.
Monthly frequencies, one month prior.
Yearly frequencies, three months prior.

An email is also sent if a repeating project status changes to ERROR. Repeating projects can error for several reasons. Please reach out to support should an issue arise.

Every pending scheduled project is represented on the designated Repeating Projects report, found in the Reports area, under the PROJECTS section on the left column. Here's an example:

Clicking the renew link next to a project on this report extends the expiration date to today’s date plus the renewal interval. For example, a weekly repeating project would be extended to 365 days from today's date.

An existing project which was created from a repeating schedule will have a circular arrows symbol displayed to the right of the project name in the main Projects area, as seen here:

Clicking the repeat symbol opens the Repeating Projects report and highlights the row showing information about the repeating project. This report shows a row for each repeating project schedule.

In the report's TEMPLATE column, clicking the template name takes you to the template list filtered for that particular template.

Clicking the view link under the LOGS column will show an overlay with dates and descriptions of activities for that repeating schedule.

The schedule of a repeating project can't be edited. To change an existing repeating project schedule, you’ll need to delete the current one and recreate it.

A template that is used in a repeating project cannot be deleted until the repeating project schedule is deleted from the report.

NOTE: If the destination workspace for a repeated project already has over 2000 tasks, the next scheduled instance of a repeating project will not get created, and the repeating schedule will be paused with an email notification sent.

Project Duration Maximums

Scheduled projects have a maximum duration based on the repeating frequency:

Daily frequency projects can be no more than one week (depending on 5 or 7 day workweek) in duration.
Weekly frequency projects can be no more than four weeks (if workweek is 7 days) in duration.
Monthly frequency projects can be no more than 180 days in duration.
Yearly frequency projects can be no more than 730 days.

Task Count Limitations

Repeated projects have a maximum number of tasks allowed in each project to ensure optimal performance of the system. The total task amount limits are that:

Daily frequency projects are limited to 25 tasks.
Weekly frequency projects are limited to 100 tasks.
Monthly frequency projects are limited to 200 tasks.
Yearly frequency projects are limited to 500 tasks.

NOTE: If a pending project's creation template grows beyond the limits above, upon the next instance creation, the Status for that project's repeating schedule will be set to ERROR on the Repeating Projects report.