Smartsheet

What differentiates Smartsheet from other similar products?

The ease of use and its fmiliarty for users who come from using excel to manage projects.

What is your favorite aspect of this product?

High level visibilty to project and project notes from a GANTT chart and spreadsheet perspective.

What do you dislike most about this product?

no real defined lane-ways for sdlc progress to see a high level view when reviewing with a team.

What recommendations would you give to someone considering this product?

make sure it fits needs of PM as it may not be detailed enough and if it is being used for product or development or services.

What differentiates Smartsheet from other similar products?

Smartsheet is good for teams who want the familiarity and ease of use of spreadsheets, with a dash of extra project management muscle. This works well for tight timeline projects and projects with massive amounts of data.

What is your favorite aspect of this product?

Our Dashboards, reporting and Automation features are in place to help achieve this and also to reduce manual and repetitive reporting.

What do you dislike most about this product?

Interface takes a while to get comfortable with as it can seem complex at first when trying to configure automations or configure in depth reporting, takes training.

What recommendations would you give to someone considering this product?

The templates were invaluable, and definitely spent a bit of time learning the automation part, once this was set up its a powerful tool for managing several projects at the same time.

What differentiates Smartsheet from other similar products?

The area where Smartsheet stands out is flexibility. The platform can support a wide variety of use causes without forcing teams into one specific methodology. Some organizations use it for project tracking and resource planning, while others use it for marketing operations, approval workflows, portfolio management, product launches, or process automation. And one of the biggest differentiators is the spreadsheet-style interface.

What is your favorite aspect of this product?

The underrated aspect is automation. It’s not flashy, but it removes a lot of repetitive work–things like status reminders, approval routing, or dependency updates. Over time, those small efficiencies add up and free teams to focus more on actual execution rather than coordination overhead. And I also really value the reporting and dashboard layer.

What do you dislike most about this product?

The challenge is that the spreadsheet-first model, while great for adoption, can also become a limitation for more modern, visual ways of working. And at a small team level, it feels simple enough–almost like an upgraded spreadsheet. But as more sheets, reports, dashboards, and automation rules get added, the structure can become harder to keep clean and consistent.

What recommendations would you give to someone considering this product?

The important recommendation is to invest time in designing a consistent structure early on. Things like naming conventions, sheet layouts, automation rules, and reporting standards matter a lot in smarter. And I would also strongly suggest starting small rather than trying to design a fully enterprise-wide system from day one. One of Smartsheet’s strength is that it can scale, but that scalability can become overwhelming if you try to build too much complexity upfront.