Leap Session Q&A: Leveraging Kick-Starts within Workfront | Community
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alexs45480655
alexs45480655
Level 2
July 21, 2020
Question

Leap Session Q&A: Leveraging Kick-Starts within Workfront

  • July 21, 2020
  • 4 replies
  • 1797 views

I had a great time presenting at LEAP 2020 on how PGA TOUR Creative Studio has leveraged Kick-Starts for multiple use-cases. Hopefully you learned enough to build a custom Kick-Start template of your own.

Please comment below if you have any questions about the session. I'd love to continue the conversation here on Workfront One.

Here's the session if you haven't had a chance to watch it yet:

https://event.on24.com/wcc/r/2425825/DE506475402341A7B95A30308688C296

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    4 replies

    kynabaker16
    Adobe Employee
    kynabaker16Adobe Employee
    Adobe Employee
    July 21, 2020

    Hi Alex,

    Thanks for sharing your presentation and knowledge. My question isn't specifically about kick-starts but about the process that led you to use kick-starts. If I understood correctly, you have your clients use the spreadsheet to do a large list of requests for projects that relate to supporting a campaign... does this mean that you guys do a different project for each deliverable on each campaign? Can you explain a little bit more about how that works?

    I also love that it helps make sure that the entire campaign is planned out in advance. Do you have any tips on how you got the campaigns team to be so fully planned out ahead of time to not do those last minute requests you mention?

    Thank you again for sharing!

    Kyna

    alexs45480655
    alexs45480655Author
    Level 2
    July 22, 2020

    Hi Kyna -

    You are correct that each of our campaign deliverables has its own project within Workfront. For instance if we have a print ad, a set of digital ads in multiple sizes, and a 30-second TV spot for a campaign, each has its own project (3 projects total).

    We chose to organize these deliverables at the project-level instead of creating tasks for each within a larger project for several reasons. This setup aligns with how our team has been working for many years. Even before Workfront, each deliverable requested from our clients was a 'job' and had a single database entry in the system for us to track relevant job info. Additionally, we prefer simple project timelines with relatively few tasks when possible, so breaking out each deliverable into its own project allows us accomplish this. Usually our project tasks align with core components of the creative process: Concepting > Approvals > Finalize.

    To ensure planning is happening at the campaign level, we have a weekly status meeting with our Brand Marketing team. For the meeting we export a campaign milestones report which shows progress of active/upcoming campaigns on a single Gantt chart. As we approach the production phase of each campaign, there is a planning stage during which our client fills out the Kick-Start spreadsheet for all the deliverables that will be required. This covers most of the campaign deliverables, though there tend to be a few last-minute requests for each campaign that fall outside of this workflow. We've found that planning the deliverables through Kick-Starts has given our team more bandwidth to quickly turn around those last minute requests.

    Thanks for the positive feedback. Let me know if you have any other questions regarding our process.

    Best,

    Alex

    kynabaker16
    Adobe Employee
    kynabaker16Adobe Employee
    Adobe Employee
    July 22, 2020

    That's nice! I sometimes think that would be nice if I did things like that too, smaller projects that make up a portfolio to be able to close things out faster.

    Thank you so much for sharing your story! I love hearing how other teams do things.

    Doug_Den_Hoed__AtAppStore
    Community Advisor
    Doug_Den_Hoed__AtAppStoreCommunity Advisor
    Community Advisor
    July 21, 2020

    Hi Alex,

    Thanks for sharing your Kickstart presentation -- you've got a pretty slick process refined for importing re-occuring projects! I'd like to add a few thoughts for those considering likewise:

    • our Excel Updater solution does handle Updates (and Inserts), where Kickstarts are Insert only
    • both Excel Updater and Kickstarts also use a concept called "pound-set" (#set) to dynamically look up ID values based on their "English" labels (in case you'd prefer that approach rather than maintaining Excel validations as Alex presented -- noting that the latter are a wonderful convenience for your end users, and could well be worth the time to set them up)
    • either way, if you load data but then realize you need a mulligan (a more appropriate analogy I suspect I'll never find...), you can filter the data (e.g. "entered by me, within the last hour or so") and then delete it again
    • taking practice swing (ok, now I'm overdoing it) in your preview environment first isn't a bad idea either, provided its data is recent enough to cover all the cross-referenced IDs (such as Groups) with which you're working

    Regards,

    Doug

      alexs45480655
      alexs45480655Author
      Level 2
      July 22, 2020

      Thanks for the feedback Doug! Kick-Starts have definitely streamlined our process and allowed us to spin-up recurring projects quicker and more efficiently than ever before.

      Great info on using pound-set to look up ID values instead of Excel validations and lookup tables. Our current setup is working great as-is, but when we re-evaluate the process in the future I may consider transitioning to pound-set.

      Best,

      Alex

      S
      ShiraliGa1
      August 13, 2020

      Alex- thank you so much for your presentation. It was really useful in helping me with my first kickstart. In my custom form I have a check box field in which more than one option can be checked. Is it possible for me to still use that field in a kickstart?

        S
        slbrookman
        September 9, 2020

        +1 - I have the same question.

        A
        AdinaPi1
        Level 9
        September 9, 2020

        To import multiple values on a custom field, make sure you have the Preferences tab on your Excel file, and set it up like this (if you want to use a comma):

          alexs45480655
          alexs45480655Author
          Level 2
          September 9, 2020

          Shirali & Serenna - great question. I set this up exactly as Adina has illustrated except I use "|" as the delimiter instead of a comma. Additionally, I use an Excel macro on the client-facing worksheet ('Projects to Import' tab) which allows the user to select multiple options from a dropdown cell. These values are then pulled into the Kickstart tab using formulas.

            S
            slbrookman
            September 9, 2020

            @Adina Pierce‚ @Alex Smith‚ Thank you so much for the information. I actually ended up figuring out the preferences tab and have been using the pipe and was able to upload the multi-select fields.

            The Macro for adding the pipe is a great tip, however, it seems that may be a more advanced formula than what I have experience using. Are you able to share?

            Thanks!

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