Import Projects

Article Contents

1. Overview
2. Steps to Import Your Projects
3. Fields That Can Be Imported
4. Default Branch and Department
5. Project Numbers
6. Archived Projects
7. Project Captain
8. Billing Entity Name
9. Duplicate Projects

Overview

Hiro supports importing project information from other platforms to get you up and running quickly. After importing your project information, you can then also import timesheets and invoices associated with those projects, enabling an accurate starting position for project WIP balances.

Steps to Import Your Projects

Import Contacts and Users First

Before importing projects, we recommend that you first import your contact and user information. This ensures that your project data will correctly match the contacts and users already in Hiro. For example:

• the "Billing Entity" must correspond to an existing Address Book contact in Hiro;
• the "Project Captain" (i.e., project manager) must correspond to an existing user in Hiro.

For more guidance, refer to this article on importing users, and this article on importing contacts.

Prepare Your Spreadsheet

1. Export your project information from your current platform in Excel (*.xlsx) or CSV format:

   • Ensure that the first row contains headings (e.g., Project Name, Start Date, Project Captain). The order of these headings doesn’t matter, and the header names don't need to exactly match specific terms. However, each header should clearly describe the data in its column, as you will map these columns to Hiro fields later in the import process. For a complete list of supported data fields, refer to the Fields That Can Be Imported section.

   • Each row from row 2 onward should represent a unique project. Don’t include any unrelated or unstructured data in the spreadsheet.

Upload Your Spreadsheet

1. In Hiro, navigate to the Settings module, and select Import Projects. You must be a Hiro Global Administrator to access this page.

2. Select your spreadsheet file, then click the "Upload and Analyse" button.

3. Hiro will read the headings in your spreadsheet and suggest matches for each column. You can adjust these matches using the dropdown menus if necessary.

   Example: Hiro may interpret column "D" in your spreadsheet as "Suburb," and you can confirm or change this mapping if needed.

4. Once you’ve matched all your headings, click the "Import Projects" button to complete the upload.

Fields That Can Be Imported

The following Hiro Fields represent the fields you can match to the column headings in your import spreadsheet. Some of these fields are mandatory to ensure your projects are set up correctly, while others are optional and can be included if the information is available. Importing as much data as possible is recommended to enhance your experience with Hiro.

To successfully import your project data:

• Match each Hiro Fields to a column heading in your spreadsheet using the dropdown menus provided during the import process.

• Mandatory fields must be matched for the import to proceed.

• Optional fields can be left unmatched if you do not have corresponding information.

Default Branch and Department

During import, Hiro will prompt you to select a default branch and department. Every job in Hiro must be linked to at least one branch and department. If you don’t map a column in your spreadsheet to these fields, Hiro will use the default branch/department you select.

If a branch or department specified in your spreadsheet doesn’t already exist in Hiro, Hiro will create new ones. You can edit these newly created branches/departments later in the Settings module  - within Branches and Departments.

Project Numbers

Each project—whether it’s an enquiry or a job—needs a unique project number to help distinguish it. You can learn more about the difference between enquiries and jobs in this article.

Here’s how project numbers work in Hiro:

• Jobs are assigned simple, unique numbers (integers only, no letters).
• Enquiries also have unique numbers, but they start with an "E" (e.g., E1831).

Duplicate numbers are allowed between enquiries and jobs since each type follows its own numbering system. For example, E1831 (an enquiry) and 1831 (a job) are treated as completely separate in Hiro.

You can:

1. Assign Your Own Project Numbers:
   In your spreadsheet, include a column for project numbers that follows Hiro’s standard numbering format (integers for jobs, "E" followed by an integer for enquiries). This option is for when you want to use Hiro’s default naming conventions rather than creating completely custom project numbers.
   
   Note that you don’t need to start at digit 1; project numbers can begin at any point. For instance, you might include the year in the numbering, such as 25001, 25002 for projects starting in 2025.
   
   
2. Let Hiro Assign Project Numbers Automatically:
   If you don’t include project numbers in your spreadsheet, Hiro will automatically assign a unique number to each project, based on the order they appear in your spreadsheet.
   
   
3. Assign Custom Project Numbers:
   Choose project numbers that don’t follow Hiro’s standard numbering, for example: ABC123. Custom project numbers completely replace Hiro’s default numbering for jobs and enquiries. Learn more about custom project numbers in this article.

Archived Projects

You can import projects with an archived status. Archived projects can’t have new invoices or timesheets added, except during the import.

To import a project as archived, map the “Date Archived” field to a column in your spreadsheet, and populate that column with the closure date for each project. If you don’t know the exact date, you can use today’s date.

You can easily reactivate archived projects later using Hiro’s reactivation tools on the Projects page.

Project Captain

Project captains are the people in your organisation who are assigned responsibility for managing and delivering projects. You can learn more about what project captains are in Hiro in this article.

Each project you import must have a valid project captain, which corresponds to the name of a user who already exists in Hiro. The user account associated with that person does not need to be active. For example, you could import historical project information including the name of the person who ran that project but has since left your organisation. A valid user account for that person will need to be created but can be marked as inactive. Inactive accounts do not attract subscription charges.

We suggest using the Import Users page before importing projects to bring your staff directory into Hiro, which will enable you to import users with their status already marked as inactive by way of setting their termination date.

Billing Entity Name

A valid billing entity must be assigned to every project in Hiro, which is used when raising invoices. You can mark any contact in the Address Book as a billing entity on a project.

By default, you will be blocked from importing projects where the name of the billing entity in your spreadsheet is not found in the Address Book. You can disable this block by setting the "Billing entities" option to "Create blank contacts".

⚠️ However, we suggest that you import your billing entity information before you import your projects using the Import Contacts feature. This ensures that your contacts are brought into Hiro along with all of their associated data like address, telephone number and email address/es.

If you proceed with the "Create blank contacts" option, all data fields for contacts created will be blank other than contact name, and you will need to manually update the information for those newly created contacts in the Address Book.

Duplicate Projects

By default, Hiro will block the import if it detects duplicate project numbers (for either jobs or enquiries) in your spreadsheet or existing projects. This helps ensure accuracy.

If you know your spreadsheet contains duplicates, you can skip this check by selecting the "Skip rows with duplicate project numbers" option. Duplicate rows will be ignored during the import.