Projects FAQ

Projects is an app that allows you to plan, manage, execute, and report your work across your team and organization. The Projects app provides a fully automated working papers solution intended for audit management, compliance management, operational risk management, and risk and control monitoring.

For more information, see Getting started with Projects .

Workflows define the components available in a project. When choosing a workflow, you should consider:

• the type of project you want to create
• whether the project is simple or complex

Project types define the structure of a project, including the terminology used in the project. The default terms used in the Projects app are dependent upon the project type that you select.

For more information, see Workflows and project types.

Different professional groups use different words to describe the same concept. For example, one group may call a "test" a "procedure”, and another group may call a "finding" an "observation”.

You can customize the terminology used in project types, modify the existing project types available in the Projects app, or create new project types.

For more information, see Customizing terms, fields, and notifications.

Yes. You can re-use projects or create a custom project template by rolling forward projects.

For more information, see Rollforward projects.

You can bulk upload content to the Projects app if you need to:

• avoid time-consuming manual data entry
• migrate data from another system
• use additional websites to populate data

For more information, see Bulk uploading or importing content.

Frameworks allow you to maintain a structured set of information that you can use to build projects.

For more information, see Overview of Frameworks.

Yes. You can create assessment drivers based on a metric in Results to automate risk and control assessments and notify key stakeholders when changes occur.

For more information, see Automating operational risk and control assessments.

You can use Compliance Maps to associate industry standards and regulations with your control framework.

Compliance Maps is a compliance management feature and content system that provides a central location for:

• identifying applicable regulations and standards
• harmonizing a list of requirements across all applicable regulations and standards
• mapping controls in frameworks to requirements
• aggregating testing results and issues to track and report on compliance status in real-time

For more information, see Overview of Compliance Maps.

You can use Mission Control to view controls across all projects, gain insight into control design, effectiveness, and performance, and easily update control information in a single, central location.

Mission Control is an app that presents control information from Projects in a simplified and centralized view.

For more information, see Overview of Mission Control.

Yes. Users assigned the Contributor Manager, Contributor Tester, or Contributor User role on a project can collaborate with teams using the Contributor Dashboard.

For more information, see Contributor roles in Projects.

• To record details about control design, you can use the Walkthroughs page.
• To capture testing results, you can use the Testing page.

  For more information, see Executing procedures and testing controls.

You can record gaps or deficiencies in controls as you identify them.

For more information, see Recording issues.

You can add actions to issues using the Follow-up & Remediation subtab on the Issues Details page, and assign actions to stakeholders in order to identify follow-up measures for remediating a particular business area. You can also set up reminders for yourself to retest issues or track hours spent on retesting by self-assigning actions.

For more information, see Recording actions.

You can back up your reports and facilitate an efficient review process using Citation Mode.

For more information, see Citing evidence.

You can request documentation from business owners or other stakeholders by adding the request in the Projects app and assigning it to the relevant responder. The responder receives an email notification with a link to access the request, and has the option to add an attachment and / post a comment.

For more information, see Requesting documentation.

You can use to-dos as a collaboration tool between teammates and reviewers. You can also self-assign to-dos to set up reminders for yourself.

If you assign a to-do to a person, the person is notified via email. The to-do item is then added to your to-do list as well as the to-do list of the assignee.

For more information, see Assigning to-dos.

Once you have documented all relevant information on a page, you can sign off on your work, and assign another person on your team to review your work.

For more information, see Reviewing work and signing-off.

Yes. You can use Offline Projects to continue to work with the Projects app in an offline environment.

For more information, see Using Offline Projects .

Yes, you can use Diligent HighBond for iOS or Android to capture evidence. You can take a photo, record audio and video, and scan documents as you are collecting information. Scanned documents can be generated and downloaded as PDFs using the camera on the iPad.

For more information, see Diligent HighBond for iOS or Android.

You can use the Scheduler, an interactive Gantt chart that provides a convenient way to create projects, and manage project timelines and dates.

For more information, see Scheduling projects.

You can use the Scheduler to gain oversight over your team's work commitments and availability, and ensure that teams are not over-committed or under-resourced ahead of time.

For more information, see Scheduling resources.

You can review the information available on the Projects home page to track all projects in the Diligent One instance, and view detailed project progress information from the Progress project management tab.

For more information, see Tracking project progress.

Audit, SOX, Compliance, and professional service organizations often need to track time spent on the project and outside of the project for reporting purposes. The most efficient way to record time and manage timesheets is by using the Timesheets app.

For more information, see Overview of Timesheets.

Yes. To save a project to your local computer or network outside of the Projects app, you can backup and export your project. You can use the Backup/Export feature to share your project results with other team members, external auditors, and regulators.

For more information, see Backing up and exporting projects.

Yes. You can archive your project when it is complete, or when you have finalized the settings for a project you want to use as a project template. When you want to retrieve or view specific project items, you can unarchive the project.

For more information, see Archiving and unarchiving projects.

You can download reports to easily extract information from the Projects app, review project progress and sign-offs, and send information to external stakeholders.

There are different types of reports you can download:

• Pre-built reports Default one-click reports that evolve automatically as the project progresses.
• Custom issues reports Customizable reports that allow you to report on issues across all projects in the Diligent One instance.
• Impact reports A subscription-based service that allows you to define a one-click report template, tailored to your needs.

For more information, see Downloading pre-built and custom reports.

You must have a subscription plan and a supported browser to access the Projects app.

For more information, see System requirements.

Before using the Projects app, a System Admin must add users to Launchpad, and assign users the appropriate access in the Projects app.

For more information, see Projects app permissions.

There are a variety of optional settings you can configure at anytime:

• customizing terms that display in the Projectsapp
• customizing report colors and logos
• modifying project settings
• setting up entity tagging

For more information, see Projects app settings.