The Jobmand workflow

Quick overview

Jobmand keeps one record per thing that happens in a job, and each record points at the one before it:

• A Lead is someone you might work for. When you win them, you convert the lead into a Customer, and optionally into an opportunity (a project in the sales Pipeline).
• An Estimate prices the work for that customer. Once they sign it, it becomes an Invoice.
• A Contract makes the deal formal. Jobmand bills it automatically with an invoice, and both parties sign it online.
• A Project is the job itself. Everything operational hangs off it: tasks, files, the punch list, change orders and the customer portal.
• Employees clock in on tasks. Approved hours become employee payments, and the same hours show up as labour cost on the project.
• Money in is invoices and payments; money out is employee payments and expenses.

This guide is for admins who set up the company and want to understand which screen leads to which. Each stage links to the module guide that covers the screen in depth.

The big picture

Read it top to bottom. The blue column is the main path of a job. Solid arrows are things a person clicks; dashed arrows are things Jobmand does on its own when that click happens.

• Solid arrow: something you click
• Dashed arrow: Jobmand does it automatically
• Main path of a job
• Money (in from the customer, out to employees)
• Change orders
• Optional, or created by another step

Two hops are deliberately manual: an accepted estimate does not create a contract, and a contract does not create a project. You create each one and pick the customer (and the project) on the form. Everything else on the dashed arrows happens without you.

Where to find it

The stages live in four sidebar groups. In the order a job moves through them:

CRM                       (Plus plan)
├── Leads                 ← stage 1
├── Pipeline              ← opportunities
└── Follow-ups

Operations
├── Customers             ← stage 2
├── Employees             ← hourly rates
├── Projects              ← stage 5
├── Contracts             ← stage 4
├── Change Orders
├── Timeline / Scheduler / Routes & Destinations

Financial
├── Estimates             ← stage 3
├── Invoices
├── Payments              ← money in and out
├── Timesheet payment     ← stage 8
└── Jobsite QR Codes      (when QR clock-in is on)

Workspace
├── To-Dos                ← stage 6
└── Timesheets            ← stage 7

Only Admins see the Operations, Financial and CRM groups. Employees see the Workspace group, and they do stages 6 and 7 mostly from the mobile app. See Roles and Plans.

1. Lead — someone you might work for

CRM → Leads. A lead is a prospect: a name, a phone number, where they came from, and what they might be worth. It is not a customer yet, so nothing else in Jobmand can point at it.

Work the lead through its statuses: New → Contacted → Qualified, or Disqualified if it goes nowhere. Log calls, emails and site visits as Follow-ups so the history travels with the deal.

To move on: click Convert. The dialog asks two things:

• Create new customer (on by default) — a Customer is created from the lead's name, email and phone. Untick it to link the lead to a customer you already have.
• Also create opportunity / project — a Project is created too, at the Qualification stage of the Pipeline, with the estimated value as its budget and the expected close date.

What Jobmand does for you: the lead becomes Converted and read-only; any files you attached to the lead move to the new project's Files tab; the conversion date and user are recorded.

Details: Leads and Converting a lead in the CRM guide.

You don't need a lead to start. Walk-in or repeat business can start at stage 2 with Customers → Add Customer. The CRM is for prospects you are still chasing.

2. Customer — the record everything hangs off

Operations → Customers. Every estimate, contract, project and invoice names a customer. Get the name, billing email and address right here, because the documents you send later copy them.

To move on: nothing special. From now on you create the next records yourself and pick this customer on each form: New Estimate, New Contract or Create Project.

The customer record is also where you switch on the Portal (the Portal tab: Enable Access or Generate Portal Link). You can do that at any point; see Customer portal below.

Details: Customers and Portal access.

Opportunity & Pipeline

If you ticked "also create opportunity" when converting the lead, the CRM → Pipeline board shows it as a card. An opportunity is not a separate record: it is the Project, seen from the sales side. Drag it through Qualification → Needs analysis → Proposal → Negotiation → Closed won / Closed lost. When a CRM quote on it is accepted, Jobmand moves it to Closed won for you.

Because it already is a project, once you win it you carry straight on at stage 5 with the same record. Details: Pipeline and Stages.

3. Estimate — price the work

Financial → Estimates. An estimate is a priced list of products and services for one customer (and optionally one project). Its status tells you where the sale stands: Draft → Sent → Accepted.

1. New Estimate — pick the customer, add lines from Products & Services, set tax.
2. Send to Customer — Jobmand emails a signing link. When the customer signs online, the estimate turns Accepted and you get the signed PDF.
3. Convert to Invoice — the accepted estimate becomes an invoice (same lines, same customer, status Draft). It disappears from Estimates and appears under Invoices.

To move on: an accepted estimate does not create a contract or a project. If the job needs a contract, go to stage 4 and create it by hand; if it doesn't, convert the estimate to an invoice and create the project at stage 5.

Details: Estimates, Sending for signature, Statuses. Cabinetry jobs can be priced with the Estimator instead.

Estimate or contract? Small jobs: estimate → invoice, no contract. Bigger jobs: estimate to win the work, then a contract for the terms and the schedule of payments. You can also skip the estimate and go straight to a contract.

4. Contract — make it formal

Operations → Contracts. A contract names a customer, an amount, start and end dates, and optionally the project it belongs to. Its text comes from a contract template, which you can edit before sending.

1. New Contract — customer, optional project (picking a project fills in the customer), amount, dates, template. Contract numbers are assigned automatically.
2. Send for signature (Document & Signature panel) — the customer gets a signing link; the contract moves from Draft to Pending approval.
3. Countersign — once the customer has signed, you sign on behalf of the company. With both signatures the contract is fully signed and Jobmand sets it Active by itself (as long as its end date is still in the future).

What Jobmand does for you:

• Creating the contract creates a Draft invoice for the full amount, due on the start date. Contracts are only ever paid through invoices, so this is how the money side starts.
• Changing the amount re-prices that invoice. Renew Contract extends the end date and bills the new period with a second invoice.
• Cancelling or terminating a contract disables any open signing link. Editing a signed document voids the signatures, so use a change order for amendments.

To move on: the contract does not create the project. Either pick an existing project on the contract form, or create the project at stage 5 and attach the contract later from the project's Contracts tab.

Details: Contracts, Sending for signature, Countersigning, Invoices & payments on a contract, Auto-renew.

5. Project — the job itself

Operations → Projects. The project is the operational hub. It exists either because you clicked Create Project, or because the lead conversion created it as an opportunity.

On the form: customer, name, type (by hour or closed budget), budget, start and end dates, and the crew you Assign. Once it exists, the detail page has the tabs the rest of this guide walks through:

To move on: add tasks. Details: Creating a project, The project detail, Contracts tab, Financials.

6. Tasks — break the job down

Project → Tasks tab, or Workspace → To-Dos for all projects at once. A task always belongs to a project. Give it an assignee, dates, instructions and photos, and the materials it needs. Employees see their tasks on the mobile app.

Statuses: Pending → In progress → Completed. Tasks are also what the Timeline and Scheduler draw.

To move on: the crew clocks in on the task. Details: Tasks tab, To-Dos, Creating a task.

Employees & hourly rate

Operations → Employees. The people who will clock in need an employee record with an Hourly Rate. That single number drives two things later: what Timesheet payment pays them, and what the project counts as labour cost. Left at zero, their hours cost nothing anywhere in Jobmand. Assign them to the project so it appears in their app.

Details: Employees and Pay fields.

7. Clock in & timesheets — hours on the job

Employees start a shift in one of two ways:

• Clock In (mobile Clock screen or Workspace → Timesheets) — pick the project and the task, then Clock Out when done.
• Scan the jobsite QR code printed from the project's QR tab. One scan clocks in, the next scan clocks out. Jobmand books those hours to a task called "Jobsite work" that it creates on the project, and uses the first scan's location to learn where the site is.

Each shift becomes a timesheet row in Pending. An admin reviews it (photo, location, distance from the site, any "manual clock-out after QR" flag) and Approves or Rejects it, singly or in bulk.

What Jobmand does for you: approval is what makes hours real. Only approved hours count toward the employee's earnings, show as labour cost on the project, and can be paid.

Details: Clocking in, Jobsite QR codes, Timesheets, Approving hours.

8. Employee payment — pay the hours

Financial → Timesheet payment. The grid lists every timesheet that is approved but not yet paid, nothing else.

1. Filter to the pay period.
2. Select the rows to include (one employee, or the whole crew).
3. Click Generate Selected Payment.

What Jobmand does for you: one payment per employee, totalling their selected hours × their hourly rate. Those timesheets flip to Paid. The payment is recorded as money out in Financial → Payments, next to your other outgoing payments (expenses, rent, subcontractors). In the mobile app's My Hours, the employee sees Total Earned, Paid Out and To Receive move accordingly.

Jobmand refuses to generate a payment for an employee whose hourly rate is zero, so fix the rate in Employees first.

Details: Paying approved hours and Payments.

Around the project

The stages above are the main path. These hang off it and can happen at any time once the project exists.

Change orders — the customer asks for more (or less)

Operations → Change Orders, or the Change Orders action on a project row. A change order belongs to a project and, usually, to its contract. It carries a cost impact, a schedule impact (days added, new completion date) and the tasks it affects.

Statuses: Draft → Submitted → Under review → Pending pricing → Approved → Completed, or Rejected back to Draft. The customer can approve from the portal if you allow it.

What Jobmand does for you on Approved:

• the contract amount goes up by the approved amount;
• a new invoice is created for that amount (only when it is positive: reductions don't bill);
• the project budget goes up by the same amount, and the project's end date becomes the new completion date if you set one;
• the crew is notified on their phones.

Details: Change orders, Status workflow, What approval changes, Customer approval.

Invoices & payments — money in

Financial → Invoices. An invoice reaches the list in four ways: an estimate you converted, a contract you created (or renewed), a change order that was approved, or New Invoice by hand. Contract-born invoices carry a "Contract invoice" badge and also appear under the contract's Invoices & payments panel.

Send to Customer emails it. Then the status follows the money and you never set it by hand: Draft → Sent → Partial → Paid. Use Record Payment for each amount received (or mark the whole balance paid). Every payment lands in Financial → Payments as money in, the same list where employee payments show as money out.

Details: Invoices, Recording a payment, Partial payments, Payments.

Punch list — close the loose ends

Project → Punch list tab. A quick list of small items ("touch up paint in the hallway") with an assignee and a due date. Assigning an item sends a push notification to that employee; ticking the box records who closed it and when. It is separate from tasks on purpose: nothing here is clocked against.

Details: Punch list tab.

Files — one copy, every stage

Files attached to the lead move to the project when the lead is converted. From then on the project's Files tab holds drawings, permits and photos; contracts and change orders can attach their own documents, and the customer can upload from the portal. Tick Shared with customer on a file to make it visible there.

Details: Files tab, Files in the portal.

Customer portal — the customer's window

Switched on per customer (stage 2) and tuned per project (the Portal tab). The customer signs in on the web or the customer mobile app and sees, depending on what you enable: the project overview and schedule, shared files and photos, notes, financials, change orders they can approve and contracts they can sign. Their approvals and signatures trigger exactly the same automatic effects described above.

Details: Sharing a project, Change orders in the portal, Contracts in the portal.

Scheduling — when and where

Operations → Timeline draws projects and tasks by date; the Scheduler plans people by day; Routes & Destinations sends a crew to several stops in one trip. None of them create records of their own: they arrange the projects, tasks and employees you already have.

Details: Timeline, Scheduler, Routes.

Common workflows

FAQ & Troubleshooting

Do I have to start with a lead?

No. The CRM is for prospects. For known customers start at Customers, Estimates or Projects directly.

Estimate, contract or both?

An estimate prices the job and turns into the invoice. A contract sets terms, dates and signatures and is billed on its own. Small jobs: estimate only. Larger jobs: usually both. If you use both, don't also convert the estimate to an invoice, or you will bill the job twice.

Why did an invoice appear that I didn't create?

Creating or renewing a contract, or approving a change order with a positive amount, creates one automatically. It carries a "Contract invoice" badge and shows under the contract's Invoices & payments panel.

Contract first or project first?

Either. A contract can name a project when created, or you can create the project later and attach the contract from the project's Contracts tab. Neither one creates the other.

Where does the employee's pay show up?

Timesheet payment creates an outgoing payment per employee under Financial → Payments, and the paid timesheets show as Paid under Timesheets. The employee sees it in My Hours on the mobile app. Nothing goes to the customer.

The hours don't show as cost on the project

Either the timesheet is still Pending (only approved hours count) or the employee's hourly rate is zero. Fix the rate under Employees; the cost updates.

Can the customer approve a change order or sign a contract themselves?

Yes, from the customer portal, if you enabled portal access for the customer and allowed customer approval on the change order. Their approval has the same effects as yours.

Where did my lead's files go?

If the conversion created a project, they moved to that project's Files tab. They are still listed on the converted lead: one copy, two places.

Need help?

For training, access, or feature requests, contact your Jobmand admin. For bug reports include the screen name, what you clicked, what you expected, and what happened instead — with a screenshot if possible.