Where to Begin
SmartSuite's user-friendly and robust platform provides the versatility to construct personalized solutions and streamline work processes. This article serves as a top-level overview of the key structure and features of SmartSuite, accompanied by links to access further documentation for each aspect.
SmartSuite Structure:
Workspaces
Workspaces hold a collection of Solutions - those colorful blocks on your home page. You can have multiple workspaces each with its own plan type.
Solutions
A Solution is a collection of data in SmartSuite, designed to contain all the information related to a business process or workflow. Solutions appear on your Homepage in the form of square icons with a title and an emoji/icon. Solutions are a part of a Workspace, and you can share/copy Solutions from one Workspace to another.
Navigating Solutions: Just click on the Solution icon (displayed on the home page) to open a solution. You can also click the three dots displayed in the icon's upper-right corner for additional options.
Tables
Tables in SmartSuite hold information about one type of item; for example, projects, tasks, campaigns, and products. Each Solution needs at least one Table. Tables appear as their own tab in a Solution.
Navigating Tables: Click on the name of the Table in the toolbar to open a table. You can also click on the Table Icon displayed to the left of the Table names to see a list of all Tables in the Solution.
Records
A Record is an individual item in a Table. Records are the basic unit of data that are pulled into various Views and Dashboards. Each Record can include data in multiple Fields.
Opening Records: You can display all of a record's details by clicking on the expand icon displayed to the left of its Title. Pro Tip: You can open a selected record's detail view by pressing the space bar.
Fields
Records hold a set of values called fields (or columns). Fields store specific and detailed information related to your workflow and provide the ability to sort, manage, and analyze it efficiently. They are the columns in your App, each representing a different variable for a record.
Modifying Fields: Access a Field's properties by clicking on the three dot icon displayed when you hover over the field.
SmartSuite offers over 40 field types to capture any form of information while enhancing and validating your data.
Views
Views allow you to view the same information from different perspectives, unique to each App in your Solution. With views, you can choose to display only specific fields or records and make other customizations to manage the information in that view. This enables team members to have a comprehensive understanding of the data, whether they are using Grid View or other view types such as Form View, Kanban View, Calendar View, Card View, Map View, Chart View, Timeline View, or Dashboards.
Onboarding Your Team
Members
Members are what SmartSuite calls individual users of a particular SmartSuite workspace. Upon their invitation, members are assigned a role - either Account Administrator, Solution Creator, General Access, or Guest.
Permissions
SmartSuite members can have defined permissions determining their editing and viewing access to a Solution, App, or Field. These granular permissions play a crucial role in successful team collaboration, allowing you to control who can modify the information in your bases.
Member Profile
Member Profiles are tied to individual users. Your Member Profile is linked to one or more SmartSuite Workspaces that represent an individual subscription to SmartSuite, each with its own environment.
If you are the Admin of the account, your Member profile dropdown gives you easy access to manage your Workspace settings and billing information, as well as inviting new or managing existing Members and Teams.
Billing
Your SmartSuite Plan determines the set of features and workspace limits you have. We offer three paid plan levels to meet the needs of various teams and organizations: Team, Professional, and Enterprise.
SmartSuite Quickstart
Start with a Template
You can always choose to create brand new Solutions from scratch, but we offer a full Solution Library of pre-built templates that make it easy to jump start your processes.
We recommend starting with a template. Simply click + on the home page and choose Start with a Template to open the Solution Library. Search or browse solutions by Category, and click into any template to see a live, interactive preview of the solution.
Just click "Use Template" when you hover over a template card and the solution will instantly be added to your Workspace.
Customize Your Template
SmartSuite is built on a first principle belief: No two businesses are exactly alike. That's why we make it easy to quickly tailor templates to fit your needs.
As a Workspace Administrator or Solution Manager, you can easily Add or Modify Fields in an app.
Consider the Hiring template, which has a number of unique values in the Status field. Perhaps you want to flag a job Applicant as someone to consider for a future position. From the Edit Record view, click the Status field "..." menu and select Modify Field Settings. From there, you can add a new status value for "Consider for Future Positions" and track candidates for future roles.
Add Your Data, Members & Teams
Create new records by clicking the ➕New Record button in the upper right within any app. You can also import data from a CSV or Excel file to jump-start your workflows.
Fill out your Member Profile to tell your team members a little about you, your bio, interests, skills, hobbies, social media handles and more.
Invite Team Members to join SmartSuite - just add their email addresses and indication their role.
Creating Teams in SmartSuite and add Members you've invited to one or many teams. Teams make it easy to manage Permissions to solutions and power workflows with Automations.
Create Views
Now that you've added data and team members to your Workspace, you're ready to start building views.
Every App has a common View dropdown in the upper left for Public and Private reports. Every View is based on a View Type - Form View, Kanban View, Calendar View, Card View, Map View, Chart View, Timeline View, or Dashboards.
All Views share a common Report Toolbar that allows you to select Fields to Display in a View, Sort, Group, Filter, and more.
Assign Work
SmartSuite makes it easy to assign work to members. Everyone can see who owns what, providing more transparency and relevance to your daily work. Use the Assigned To field to assign records to a team member. The person assigned will receive a notification letting them know they have a new task to tackle.
Collaborate with Your Team
With SmartSuite, you can collaborate directly where the work is.
The Notification Center in SmartSuite is the primary location for checking updates and work items. Members receive notifications for various reasons such as @mentions, record updates, profile updates, password changes, and assignments. Notifications appear in real-time, grouped in tabs like All, Unread, @mentioned, and Assigned to Me.
My Work
My Work is your personal command center, a top-level view of all your tasks across the system with important information like due dates and priorities displayed in a concise format. Sort tasks by date, priority or solution to focus on the things that you need to get done.
Automate & Integrate
Automations
Automations let you eliminate repetitive tasks from your work, offering a reliable and consistent way to streamline your processes.
Integrations
Explore ways to integrate with external systems and data.
Learn more about integrations >
SmartSuite API
The REST API provides an easy way to integrate your SmartSuite Solutions with any external system.
Next Up > Moving to SmartSuite
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