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Getting Started as Project Manager

Available to: Project Manager, Owner

This guide is for users with the Project Manager role. PMs are the operational center of Hardhat Flow — they own bids, coordinate jobs, and manage field teams.

The Project Manager role is where most of the day-to-day activity in Hardhat Flow happens. Project Managers own the bid pipeline, drive jobs through execution, and connect the office to the field. If you are a PM, you are responsible for every project from the first bid draft to the moment the work is marked complete.

What You Manage

As a Project Manager, your primary workspace is Bids and Jobs.

You create and own bids. A bid starts as a New Bid and you advance it through the pipeline:

  1. Create the bid with scope, pricing, and client details
  2. Advance it to Bid Awaiting PO when the client is ready to proceed
  3. The Owner reviews and approves (or rejects) — you cannot approve your own bids
  4. When approved, a Job is created automatically — no manual step needed
  5. Generate a PDF of the bid for client delivery at any point

You cannot approve, reject, or cancel bids.

These actions belong to the Owner. Your role is to prepare the bid and move it to Awaiting PO. The Owner makes the final call.

Once a bid is approved, you manage the resulting job:

  1. Assign a Supervisor and one or more Badge Workers to the job
  2. Advance the job to In Progress when field work begins
  3. Post updates as the project progresses
  4. Mark the job Completed / Needs Invoice when work is finished
  5. The Accounting team takes over from here to create the invoice

You cannot create invoices.

Invoice creation belongs to Accounting and Owners. Your job ends when you mark the work complete.

What Jobs You Can See

Your job visibility is scoped to work you are directly involved with:

  • Jobs where you are the assigned Project Manager
  • Jobs managed by Supervisors you have assigned on other jobs

You do not see all jobs across the company. If you need visibility into a job outside your scope, contact the Owner.

Workflow: Bid to Job Complete

Here is the end-to-end workflow for a typical project:

  1. Go to Bids → New Bid
  2. Fill in the client, scope of work, pricing, and any relevant notes
  3. Save as New Bid — you can continue editing at this stage
  1. Review the bid carefully — once advanced to Awaiting PO, editing is more restricted
  2. Click Advance to Awaiting PO
  3. Notify the Owner that the bid is ready for review
  1. The Owner approves the bid
  2. Hardhat Flow automatically creates a job linked to the bid
  3. You receive an SMS notification
  4. Open the job — it will be in Ready to Start status
  1. Open the new job
  2. Assign a Supervisor — one per job
  3. Assign one or more Badge Workers
  4. Assigned team members receive SMS notifications
  1. Advance the job to In Progress when work begins
  2. Monitor updates posted by the Supervisor and Badge Workers
  3. Post your own updates as needed
  4. Flag the job as Blocked or Priority if issues arise
  5. Advance to Completed / Needs Invoice when work is done
  1. Mark the job Completed / Needs Invoice
  2. Accounting will create the invoice and handle billing from here
  3. You will see the job status update as invoicing progresses

Flagging Issues

If a job hits a problem that needs attention, use the Blocked or Priority flags:

Blocked flag

Use this when a job cannot progress — waiting for materials, permits, client decisions. Flags the job and sends SMS to you and the Owner.

Priority flag

Use this when a job needs to jump the queue or receive urgent attention. Sends SMS to you and the Owner, and marks the job visually in all list views.

Document Editor

As a Project Manager you can customize bid document content before downloading the PDF.

Document Access
Bid documents Edit, save, reset, download PDF
Invoice documents Download PDF only (cannot edit)

To open the bid editor, navigate to a bid detail page and click Edit Bid Proposal. Use the toolbar to tailor the proposal language, add sections, or insert placeholder tokens that keep client names and totals live.

See Document Editor for full details.

Key Pages

Page What you do here
Bids Create, edit, and manage the bid pipeline
Jobs Assign workers, update status, post updates
Activity Feed Full history of any bid or job
Dashboard Overview of your active bids and jobs