Ecolibra: keeping 75 projects on track with GanttPRO
“We are using it daily. It helps people follow their tasks every day, while we’re able to keep everything predictable and under control in case of any changes.”
A story about how an environmental engineering company runs over 75 initiatives simultaneously with GanttPRO.
Company overview
Company: Ecolibra
Role interviewed: Valéria Monteiro (Project Manager), Felipe Guimarães Silveira (Operations Coordinator)
Project types: multi-stage, long-cycle environmental engineering projects
External pressures: government licensing and regulations, strict timelines, changes in requirements, deadlines, and client-side changes
Tool history: Excel
Problems hinted at: loss of visibility at scale, Excel couldn’t support workload, coordination and proper reporting, licensing-driven uncertainty,
Summary
Company Background
What does your company focus on?
Ecolibra is an engineering company that delivers environmental and licensing-related projects across various sectors such as industry, energy, real estate, construction, and others. Estimated as over 200 types of studies and sustainability solutions, every initiative is treated individually, while the team is gradually working on implementing templates to make processes faster and easier to control.
“We are using it daily. It helps people follow their tasks every day, while we’re able to keep everything predictable and under control in case of any changes.”
“We are using it daily. It helps people follow their tasks every day, while we’re able to keep everything predictable and under control in case of any changes.”
Struggle
How did your approach look before GanttPRO?
One of Ecolibra’s main challenges is government licensing timelines, regulations, and changing requirements, which all together create strong external pressure and strict workflow constraints. Despite long project cycles, most initiatives require clear start and finish dates, making a waterfall structure the natural baseline.
Before GanttPRO, the team used Excel spreadsheets. Eventually, as the number of projects grew and work became progressively complex, it became impossible to manage its components.
“We needed to have a tool that helps to coordinate the people and predict the budget. We need to know what’s happening.”
After testing many alternatives, they chose GanttPRO because it brought structure, was easy to access in the browser, and was robust enough for the level of analytics they needed. Additionally, Filipe was already familiar with GanttPRO previously while working on his MBA project management studies.
Solution
For Valeria, monitoring all tasks together is the routine step for tracking workstreams and quickly checking the stage. The List view combines tasks across all projects and gives an overview without micromanagement.
“I need speed because I’m monitoring tasks across multiple groups. I rely on my task list and filters by assignee and status to keep a clear view of what’s happening and where changes should be made.”Regular reporting to executive leadership is one of the main responsibilities for Valeria, which is achieved with the help of GanttPRO’s export. Instead of exporting projects one by one, the data is being presented in a single unit form, supported by Power BI to display status and team’s KPIs.
As Ecolibra’s workflow varies from small engagements to large and high-budget streams, a structure should be implemented on each level. This is where Portfolio benefits the most: with grouping projects and combining data across multiple initiatives for a bigger-picture view.
Time and resources are Ecolibra’s strong priorities and each should be treated carefully. Assigning people the tasks and recording hours spent, while tracking operational costs like transport, food, hotels, and other professional expenses, are two separate layers in GanttPRO for maximum clarity and analysis.
Impact
What does your work look like now with GanttPRO?
Today, 3 years of using GanttPRO has benefited the team in a few ways: the Portfolio feature is providing one aligned view across all project members, tasks are being reviewed in one place, preventing carryovers from previous weeks, the List view gives Valeria control across all initiatives, and regular reports – clear status for leadership. All these components bring together structure and predictability, which are the keys to a successful delivery.