Using the Inspire Planner External Project Portal

    Last Modified On: June 3, 2025

     

    Inspire Planner makes it easy to work with people outside your organization by allowing you to add them as Project Collaborators.

     

    When you share a project with an external contact, they’ll receive an email with a link to access the project through the Inspire Planner External Portal. From there, they can view project details and update tasks assigned to them—making it simple to keep everyone informed and aligned.

     

    When an external contact updates a task—such as changing the status, logging actual effort, or adding a description—Inspire Planner automatically posts the update to the task’s Chatter feed. The Project Manager is tagged in the post to ensure they’re notified of any changes in real time.

     

    If preferred, Project Managers also have the option to turn off these Chatter notifications.

    Chatter

    This help article explains how Project Managers can share a project with external contacts and how those contacts can access the project and update their assigned tasks using the Inspire Planner External Project Portal.

     

    Please Note:

    • To enable the Inspire Planner External Project Portal, please see Admin Guide - Enable the Inspire Planner External Project Portal.
       
    • Chatter Notifications for External Contact Task Updates will be available starting with the June 2025 Major Release, scheduled for deployment to production environments on June 23, 2025.
       
    • Only waterfall Projects can be shared externally in the Inspire Planner External Project Portal. Agile and Task List Project types are not supported.
       
    • Projects in the external project portal can only be shared with Salesforce contacts and not Salesforce users.

     

     

    For Project Managers - Share the Project with an External Collaborator

    To allow an external contact to view a project and their assigned tasks, they must first be added as a Project Collaborator on that project.


    To learn how, please see Share a Project (Project Collaborators)

     

    Once a contact has been added as a Project Collaborator, they’ll receive an email notification letting them know a project has been shared with them.

     

    The email includes the Project Name as a clickable link. When the contact clicks the link, they’ll be taken directly to the Inspire Planner External Project Portal to access the project.

     

    For Project Managers - Chatter Notifications for External Portal Updates

    When an external contact updates a task—such as changing the status, logging actual effort, or adding a description—Inspire Planner automatically posts the update to the task’s Chatter feed. The Project Manager is tagged in the post to ensure they’re notified of any changes in real time (see example below).

     

     

    If preferred, Project Managers also have the option to turn off these Chatter notifications. To do so, simply go to the Details tab.

     


     

    Set 'Disable Project Direct Messages' to TRUE and click on Save to save your changes.

     

    • When 'Disable Project Direct Messages' = FALSE - The task updates made by the contact from the portal are posted in the Task Chatter Feed and the Project Manager is automatically tagged.

     

    • When 'Disable Project Direct Messages' = TRUE - The task updates made by the contact from the portal are posted in the Task Chatter Feed. However, the Project Manager is not tagged.

     

    If you do not see the 'Disable Project Direct Messages' field in the project details, ask your Salesforce System Administrator to review the Admin Guide - Chatter Notifications for External Contact Task Updates

     

     


    The following sections in this article are presented from the contact’s point of view.

     

    For External Collaborators (Contact) - Register in the Portal

    The first time you access the Inspire Planner External Project Portal, you’ll be prompted to register.

     

    Your email address will be used as your default username. Simply create a password and click Register to complete the process.

     

     

    For External Collaborators (Contact) - Logging In to the Portal

    Once registered, you can then use the same email address and password to log in to the portal.

     

    Helpful Tip:When logging in, select "Remember me". This will store the login email and password on the page and will make it easier to sign in the next time.

     

     

    For External Collaborators (Contacts) - View Projects

    Once logged in, you will see a list of Projects that have been shared with you. Click on a Project name to view the Project.

     

     

    If the entire project has been shared with you, you’ll be able to view the full project schedule, including the Gantt chart. If not, you’ll only see the tasks that have been assigned to you.



    Please note:

    The following features/columns are not available/visible in the external project portal:

    • Actual Start Date & Actual Finish Date
    • Baseline Fields 
    • Budgeted Cost & Actual Cost
    • Checklist Items 
    • Constraint Type & Constraint Date
    • Critical 
    • Days Left
    • Multi-role 
    • Project and Project Task Chatter posts, including files/links shared in the Chatter feed.
    • Ready to Start
    • Successors
    • Task Level
    • Time Tracking Only
    • Total Allocated Effort
    • Total Slack
    • WBS
    • Any custom field that has been added to the project Gantt

     

    The Planned Effort and Actual Effort columns are visible by default. However, these fields can be hidden if preferred. To hide these fields, please see Admin Guide - Hide Effort Columns in the Inspire Planner External Portal.


    For External Collaborators (Contacts) - Update Your Assigned Tasks

    If you have project tasks assigned to you, you can update their status, log actual effort, and add a brief description.

     

    To view and update your assigned tasks, click the “List My Salesforce Tasks” icon located in the project toolbar on the left.



     

    A window will open displaying the specific Salesforce tasks assigned to you. From there, you can update the following details:

    • Status
    • Actual Effort - enter the total time spent working on the task in decimal format (for example, if it took 1 hour and 15 minutes, then enter as 1.25)
    • Description 

     

    Please note that the Due Date and Planned Effort are defined by the Project Manager and cannot be modified.

     

    When you’re done, just close the window. Your updates will automatically sync with the project in Inspire Planner.

     

     

    For External Collaborators (Contacts) - Project Toolbar

    The Project Toolbar on the left side of the screen provides icons for navigating and performing various actions within the project. Some icons may appear grayed out—these represent actions that are only available to Project Managers.

     

    Please note:

    If External File Sharing is enabled for a Project, then the View All Project Attachments (Folder Icon) will be available in the project toolbar. For more information, please see External Project Portal - Share Project Files.

     

     

    For External Collaborators (Contacts) - Gantt Toolbar

    The Gantt Toolbar, located in the top right corner, contains icons that allow you to navigate and perform different actions within the Gantt Chart.

     

     

    For External Collaborators (Contacts) - Logging Out

    To log out of the Portal, you can simply close your browser or click the Log Out button located in the top right corner of the page.

     


    Tags

    Project CollaborationInspire Planner External Portal

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