Project Management Dependencies

[Tamara_Cook]

Hello!

I just joined my company and I am entirely new to Airtable. I’m a project manager and I’m looking to use dependencies in my grid to automatically update my project schedule that I’ve created. For example, I’d like to make task B dependent on the conclusion of task A (finish-to-start relationship) AND, if I update the end date of Task A, the start date of task B should update based on the new end date of task A, as well as any other tasks on my schedule that are dependent on B and so on. I’ve figured out how to create dependencies but it doesn’t auto-update any of my dependent tasks when I update dates which is VERY manual and time consuming as a project manager. I’ve also noticed that Airtable only accommodates finish-to-start relationships and I often time need start-to-start relationships. Does anyone know if this functionality exists or if there are work-arounds?

I’m coming from a company that used Smartsheet for project management and I’m really struggling to equate the functionalities :frowning:

Thank you for your help in advance!

[TheTimeSavingCo]

Hi Tamara, to do what you’re looking for I think you’d need to use a lookup field to pull the predecessor task’s end date to your current task, and also need a field for you to set up the type of relationship the link is (finish-to-start or start-to-start)

From there, you’d be able to create a formula field that would help you calculate these dates as required

If you foresee a single task being linked to multiple other tasks, each with a different type of relationship, you’d need to create a junction table I’m afraid, but it’s still doable

[Gordonhoj]

Sorry for the late response. I've also used Airtable for project management before, and I understand how frustrating it can be when dependencies don't update automatically. Unfortunately, as far as I know, Airtable only supports finish-to-start relationships, so there may not be a straightforward solution to your start-to-start dependency issue. However, you could try creating additional columns to manually adjust the start dates of your dependent tasks when you update the end date of task A. It's not ideal, but it might save you some time compared to updating everything manually.Alternatively, you might want to check out project management and crm in one. They may offer more robust dependency management features that suit your needs.

[Tamara_Cook]

Please Airtable, can we add this feature?! Would be a gamechanger.