This guide covers creating Goals, setting Targets or Budgets, using filters, and managing Goals through editing, pinning, and archiving.
What's a Goal/Budget in MinuteDock?
Goals help track your progress against a particular target amount of hours/value over a specific time frame.
Budgets track your progress towards a limit of hours/value for a given period.
You want to achieve/exceed your Goal Target but want to avoid going over your Budget.
💡Tip: Use Goals to manage weekly targets for billable hours or use Budgets to track against retainers and ensure you don't go over a budgeted allotment of hours for a given Project or Task.
What's the Difference Between Goals and Contact/Project Budgets?
MinuteDock offers two ways to create budgets:
Goals screen: Create Goals with advanced filtering options and visibility controls
Contact/Project settings: Create simple budgets directly within Contact or Project settings
ℹ️ Note: Contact/Project budgets appear only in the Contacts/Projects screens and are viewable by any User with permissions to see Projects/Contacts. Goals offer more flexible filtering and privacy controls.
Adding Goals
How to add a Goal
Navigate to Goals: Navigate to Goals in the main menu.
Add Goal: Click the Add goal button at the top right.
Name and Set Goal:
Name your Goal.
Choose to set it as a Target or Budget.
Use filters to assign it to specific Users, Contacts, Projects, or Tasks.
Choose Frequency: Select the Goal frequency.
Click Create Goal!
✅ Success! Your Goal is now active and will appear on the Goals screen with a progress bar showing how close you are to meeting your Target or going over your Budget.
Goal types
Target Goals: Ideal time to spend on a specific Contact, Project, or Task. Good to exceed.
Budget Goals: Keep within a certain total (e.g., fixed price project). Bad to exceed.
Filtering and options
Filter Options: Assign Goals to different Users, Contacts, Projects, and Tasks. These filters operate the same way as in Reports.
Monitor Time: Use the Options button to track billable/unbillable time.
💡Tip: Goals can be filtered by multiple criteria simultaneously. For example, create a Goal for "John's development work on Project ABC" by filtering for both a specific User and Project.
Managing Goals/Budgets
Pinning, editing, and archiving
Pinning Goals: Click the pin icon to pin a Goal for yourself.
Hover over pin icon and open dropdown menu to pin for everyone, or pin for some Users
Pinned Goals appear at the top of the Time screen as reminders.
Editing Goals: Click the spanner icon to change the Goal type, hours, filters, and frequency.
Archiving Goals: Click the red X icon to archive a Goal. Archived Goals remain visible but inactive.
⚠️ Important: Archiving Goals is permanent and cannot be undone. Archived Goals stop tracking new progress but remain accessible for historical reference.
Setting up Contact/Project Budgets
Creating a budget
Go to Contacts/Projects: Navigate to Contacts or Projects in the main menu.
Add/Edit Contact/Project: Find your item and click the wrench icon that appears when you hover over it.
Set Budget: Check the Set a budget option.
Select Type: Choose billable value or hours (budget by hours or by value of work).
Set Frequency: Set frequency to weekly, monthly, or one-off total amount.
Click Save.
Budget types
Billable Budgets: Use hourly rate settings to calculate the total billable amount tracked to the Contact or Project.
Hourly Budgets: Monitor billable time, suitable for retainer arrangements.
ℹ️ Note: Contact/Project budgets are simpler than Goals but offer less flexibility. They can't be filtered by Users or Tasks, and they don't offer the same privacy controls as Goals.
Viewing Budgets
At a Glance: View budgets directly in the Contacts or Projects screens.
Run Reports: Generate Reports directly from the Contact or Project by clicking on the Report icon.
Note on viewing budgets:
Project/Contact Settings: Budgets set here are viewed under Contacts or Projects. They will not appear on the Time screen.
Goals Screen: Budgets made here are viewed under Goals or My Time.
Viewing and Tracking Goals
Goal status indicators
Target Goals: Change from yellow to green when reached/exceeded.
Budget Goals: Change from orange to red when reached/exceeded.
Viewing options
Goals Screen: View My Goals, My History, and All Goals to track past and present Goals.
💡Tip: Use "My History" to review your performance against recurring Goals for previous time periods, helping you identify patterns and improve your time management.
