Cadre partnered with a client in the home health industry to address a critical gap in operational visibility. As the organization scaled its consulting and technology engagements across the post-acute care sector, leadership found itself making resourcing, prioritization, and client reporting decisions without a consolidated, real-time view of the work in flight. The project portfolio environment that supported their operations was capable of much more than it was currently delivering.
Challenge
Project and resource information was distributed across disconnected sheets, individual project plans, and ad hoc reporting artifacts. Project financials lived inside a complex ERP system that leadership was actively looking to move away from, requiring executives to rely on cumbersome ERP dashboards to assemble a financial view of the portfolio. The result was a disconnect between where the work was being executed and where the metrics needed to evaluate that work lived.
Internal project teams and external clients were also receiving reporting in inconsistent formats, which created friction in both directions and made it difficult to scale client engagements without proportionally scaling administrative effort.
Strategy and Solution
Cadre partnered with the Operations team to reimagine Smartsheet as a strategic operating layer for the business, not just a project tracking tool. The engagement began with close collaboration with leadership to define the optics that mattered most: project health, risk exposure, profitability, and resource utilization across the active portfolio.
From there, Cadre designed and built a Program and Portfolio Dashboard in Smartsheet that consolidated all active engagements into a single executive view, surfacing the metrics leadership needed to make confident decisions in real time rather than waiting on assembled reporting cycles. By leveraging Smartsheet's portfolio functionality, the dashboard pulled project metrics directly from where work was being executed, giving leadership live visibility into financials and project health without depending on the ERP's reporting layer. This dashboard became the operational nerve center for the business.
In parallel, Cadre developed dedicated External and Internal Client Dashboards, giving project teams a consistent tool for internal monitoring while giving external clients a polished, real-time window into the work being delivered on their behalf. The dashboards were designed to meet differentiated reporting expectations without requiring duplicate effort from the delivery teams.
To make the new environment scalable, Cadre also developed a set of streamlined Smartsheet project templates that allowed Project Managers to stand up new engagements quickly and consistently as they moved from approval to staffing. Combined with Standard Operating Procedures and remote training sessions for end users, the environment was designed to be sustained and extended by the client's own team long after the engagement concluded.
Impact and Results
- Program and Portfolio Dashboard built in Smartsheet, consolidating all active engagements into a single executive view with live financial and project health metrics
- ERP dependency for portfolio reporting eliminated — leadership gained real-time financial visibility directly within Smartsheet
- Dedicated Internal and External Client Dashboards developed, replacing inconsistent ad hoc reporting with a consistent, trusted view for both delivery teams and clients
- Standardized Smartsheet project templates created, enabling Project Managers to stand up new engagements quickly without reintroducing setup variability
- SOPs and remote training delivered, positioning the Operations team to own and extend the environment independently
- Resourcing, prioritization, and client delivery decisions grounded in current information rather than stale, assembled reporting cycles
Going Forward
With the new portfolio environment in place, the client has the operational foundation to continue maturing how it manages its portfolio, its resources, and its client relationships. Dashboards, templates, and documentation are positioned to evolve as the business evolves, and the Operations team has the structure and training to take ownership of that continued refinement.
A connected operating platform is not just an efficiency gain. It is the condition under which leadership can think clearly, act confidently, and scale without losing the visibility that makes good decisions possible.