Work Items
The 'Work' tab of a portfolio record is where you track most activities related to that record. From documenting board approvals to conducting site visits to managing violations, you'll track nearly everything using various work items.
For example, if you needed to track invasive species proliferation on a property, you could add a new 'Issue' item. You could then map the extent of the proliferation, track communications with contractors and/or the landowner about the management of the species, and link the issue with site visits related to its management.
Alternatively, if you wanted to upload a survey to Landscape, you could create a 'Survey' work item. You could then upload the survey as a document, capture who the surveyor was, and map survey markers so that staff could reference them in the field.
All work items have a set of key details (Name, Status, Date fields etc.) and can capture additional work data. This additional data includes Communications, Documents, Expenses, Forms, Funding Disbursals, Linked Tasks, Linked Work, Notes, and Time Tracking. Many work items also allow you to capture additional Map Data.
Data for Site Visit work items can be collected with the Landscape Mobile App.
One key advantage of having these set work types is that you can then create data views of that data across all of your records. Need to see a list of all issues for all properties? Pull up an 'All Issues' view. How about a list of all acquisition documents? Just create a data view of acquisition documents. And you can add other queries to these as well that filter out by property interest, acquired on date, etc.
Work Data
Work data can be added to work to capture additional information about that work.
While work data like communications and expenses can be attached to individual work items, there are cases where you can add work data to a portfolio record in general.
Communications
Are ways of capturing communications with contacts about the work item. For example, if you want to capture an email exchange with a landowner about resolving an issue, you could enter a communication and attach a document to it.
Communications entered within work will also appear in the 'communications' tab.
To add a new communication, click on the communications button under 'Add Data'.
Person Contacted is the person or organization who was contacted (or who contacted you). This will search available contacts in Landscape. If the contact has not been entered in Landscape, then you can also create a new contact from this option as well. Note that individuals with which you have regular contact with who are related to the property can be added as 'Contacts' in the left side bar.
Date is the date of the communication.
Type is the method of communication.
Content is where you enter the content of the communication. You can enter a summary of a phone call here, or copy and paste the contents of an email.
Once added, you can attach a document to the communication.
Documents
You can attach documents directly to work for storage in Landscape. Since the document then 'lives' in the work, it serves as an excellent organization system for keeping your documents organized.
When you add a document, you can upload it or link to a separate storage location.
Did you know?
Your Landscape account comes with 100GB of storage, with more available for a small annual fee. This is more than enough for most organizations to upload all of the documents they want.
Expenses
The ability to add expenses to work allows you to tell exactly how much you've spent on certain items. For example, you may wish to track how much you spent on a survey or appraisal.
Name of Expense the name of the expense, eg. '2022 Property Survey'
Cost Category the category and item tied to the cost. These allow you to sum up your expenses per item, as well as tie the expense back to a budget item. Cost categories can be edited in Settings > Projects > Cost Categories
Quantity How many of the item there were. If hours, enter number of hours. If you paid for a single survey, the amount is one.
Unit cost is the cost per unit. In the case of the survey, this would simply be the cost of the survey.
Unit name eg. 'Count' / 'Miles' / etc.
Forms
Allow you to capture custom data fields related to the work item. You can build forms for any scenario in Settings > Forms.
The first place that most users encounter forms is when filling out their annual monitoring site visit forms. However, you could also have a form to capture an additional 'type' field with a survey, or a form that you fill out when dealing with an encroachment issue.
Funding Disbursal
You can use a funding disbursal to track when you receive money from a funding source for a particular work item. This then allows you to see how much money you've received from any given source, and where that money has been distributed.
Funding Source is the source of the funding, usually defined as broadly as possible. 'Internal Funding', 'NRCS', and 'Private Donations' are all potential funding sources, for example.
Funding Agreement lets you track additional details about a funding agreement between you and the funding source.
Amount how much money was actually disbursed.
Type allows you to specify the type of disbursal.
Disbursed on: when the money was actually disbursed.
Linked Tasks
You can create one or multiple tasks associated with the work item. Tasks generate email alerts to their owners, and allow you to track to-do items.
Linked Work
You can link together separate work items to see that they are related. Landscape will also create this connection automatically in certain cases. For example, if you create an issue from a site visit point, Landscape will link both the issue and the site visit item together.
Notes
Allow you to capture quick notes about the work item.
Time Tracking
Lets you track hours spent related to the work item. Note that you can define a person's role in their user settings. Entering hours will automatically ask you if you'd like to create an expense as well. This is normally only necessary if you're tracking the item against a budget in a project.
Map Data
Certain work items have the ability to capture additional map data as well as store photos in that map data. This map data can then be seen in different contexts, including in the mobile app. For example, you can import the shapefile of a trail as a 'human use', or capture and display photo points for a site visit with the Landscape Mobile App.
Types of Work Items:
You can customize the available sub-types of work items in Settings > List items.
Items with * can be mapped.
- Acquisition Approval - Approvals required to take an interest in a piece of land. Types of approvals may include Board Approval, Stewardship Committee Approval, Preliminary Board Approval, etc.
- Acquisition Document - Documents that represent your legal interests in properties like deeds, easements, and other related documents. Types may include Closing Statement, Conservation Easement, Deed, etc.
- Amendment* - Changes to the boundaries or language of the interest. Note that amendments can also be tracked as separate property record and joined together using groups.
- Appraisal - The value of the property interest, who performed the appraisal, and the type of appraisal performed.
- Baseline Report* - Documents the conditions of the record including photos, map data, and more. Note that baseline visits can be collected as site visit data and then copied into the baseline report work item.
- Disposition - When all or part of a property interest is lost through taking, sale, or transfer. If disposing of a part of a property, you will need to create a parcel (if it doesn't already exist) and dispose of it.
- Donation - Substantiation provided to a landowner after the donation of a fee or easement interest. Commonly an 8283 form.
- Encumbrance* - Third party interest which overlays your own. Like a driveway right-of-way or a power line easement. It could also be a conservation easement that overlays your own.
- General Work - Track any type of work that does not fit into any other category. You can create your own types in Settings > List Items > Work
- Human Use* - Structures and uses on the property like buildings, trails, hunting, or agricultural uses.
- Human Use Limit* - Specify size limitations for different types of human uses. For example, you could have an impermeable surface limit, an agricultural field limit, or a trail limit.
- Issue* - Observations that require follow-up actions, like violations, encroachments, invasive species, and pending property transfers.
- Lease* - Rental of the property or portions of the property to a third party for a particular purpose.
- Plan* - Written documents for things like land, farm, or forest management of the property.
- Purchase Agreement - Contracts you enter into with a landowner to buy some or all of the interest in their property.
- Record Division* - Process of a property being subdivided into more parcels.
- Record Merge - Two records become a single record for administrative or legal purposes.
- Resource* - Natural features of the property that you protect and/or manage.
- Site Visit* - Activities you do on the land. You can collect this data with the Landscape Mobile App.
- Species Observation* - Specific details of the observation of a single species at a point in time, including its type and location. Species lists can be imported via Settings.
- Survey* - Boundaries of the property and/or special areas within it.
- Title Work - Title commitments, insurance, and backup documents you get prior to acquiring a property interest.
- Tracked Right* - Available rights a landowner can exercise or request approval for.
- Tracked Right Activity* - Rights a landowner has exercised or requested approvals for and whether you approved or denied them.