Creating and Administering a Track

Overview

What is a Track?

The concept of Tracks is based on a Kanban board, allowing you to visualise your work items on a number of columns. As work flows from left to right, each column represents the status of the work, for example ‘To-do’, ‘Doing’, ‘Pending response’ ‘Resolved’. You see a shared team view of all the work that is in the system which encourages prioritisation and collaborative working. A track could be used to manage Freedom of Information Requests (FOIs), correspondence, referrals, customer service and much more.

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What is a Track Item?

An Item is a piece of work represented on the Track, it progresses through the columns until it has been completed. An Item can be given a category, assigned to a member of the team and have Documents and Connected Initiatives attached to it.

Visibility

Other users can see a Track and its items if they’re a part of the team, as with all pam Initiatives. You can check who has access to the Track by clicking Team in the top right hand corner of the screen.

Instructions

Navigating to Tracks

Find Tracks in the Initiatives menu on your main navigation bar.

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Creating a new Track

In the Tracks area of pam, click create new Track.

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Give your Track an appropriate name and purpose and goals then click Create Track.

Tracks

Track settings

Navigation to Settings

Click Settings in the top right hand corner of your Track, here you can change the name and description of the Track and customize the statuses and categories.

Name and Purpose and Goals

You can change the name and the purpose and goals of your Track at any time, remember to click Save Settings after making amendments.

Status

Statuses form the basis of the Track and help you to track Items as they progress towards completion. They also help you identify any build-ups in the system, so you can ensure work flows freely.

There is a column on the Track for each status. There are two mandatory statuses; ‘To-do’, which is always at the start and ‘Resolved’, which is always at the end. Add, edit or delete statuses in between to meet your needs.

You can have as many statues as you need and the screen will expand to fill your monitor ensuring you can visualise your work across the whole system.
pam Tracks

Categories

Items can be assigned to Categories in your Track to enable a quick and easy filtered view for team members. For example, in my Academy Track I assign Items to ‘Help Guide’ or ‘Video Tutorial’ in order to quickly see the volume of work for each category. For more information on filtering your Track click here.

pam Tracks

By clicking on individual items, track items can also be assigned multiple categories to ensure quick and easy filtering without losing the complexity of the item. In this example, the item already has 2 categories assigned to it. I can add more simply by clicking select to reopen the drop down menu and selecting the relevant category.

Multiple Categories

Categories can also be given a colour, making it easier to visualise the volume of work for each category. To do this, go to the track settings. From here you can edit your categories: clicking on the grey squares will open a selection of colours. Simply choose the colour you want and click save.

Category Colours

Parent and Child Categories

Categories can can also be grouped so related categories form their own drop down, you may for example want a drop down for Priority, one for Location and one for Type. To create a drop down click “Add Parent Category”, give it a name and click “Create Parent Category”. This will add the parent category to the top of your list and let you start adding child categories to it.

Outcomes

When resolving a track item you are asked to define the outcome of that work, by default the track is configured with four outcomes; Complete, Incomplete; Duplicate and Declined. These can be customised as you need via the settings area of the track. Customising outcomes works in the same way as Status and Category customisation

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Deleting & Archiving


Deletion
– Admins of a Track can choose to delete it, doing so will remove the track, all track items and all discussions, documents, notes, tasks and anything else the track contained so this should only be used when you are certain that deleting information is required.

Archiving – We also offer the ability to Archive the Track, this will remove it from your list of active tracks but it can still be accessed via the “Archived” button on the Track listing page, contents of the Track will still be searchable from the main search bar.


Need further help? Get in touch...

Message us via pam, email us at support@pam-it.com or call 01273 041 042.
  • Sam Peters
  • Roy Crombleholme
  • Stuart Johnson