Odoo Project: Key Features, Real-World Use, and Setup in Australia

Odoo Project is Odoo’s built-in project management module that brings tasks, time tracking, and invoicing together in one connected system, eliminating the fragmented tools many Australian SMEs still rely on. In a market where disconnected apps cause teams to lose up to 7 hours each week through manual re-entry and inconsistencies in job data (MYOB, 2022), a unified workflow matters. Odoo Project provides structured task control, Fair Work–aligned timesheets, and ATO-ready billing flows inside a single platform.

This guide combines official Odoo documentation with Havi Technology’s implementation experience across Australia and New Zealand. You’ll find a deep dive into key features, a practical setup guide, integration patterns, a real-world success story from Alumi Group, and clear answers to the most common questions we receive from project-based businesses.

What Is Odoo Project?

Odoo Project is the project management module within the Odoo ERP suite that centralises tasks, timesheets, collaboration, and invoicing in one integrated system. It connects task activity directly with sales orders, timesheets, project costs, and ATO-compliant billing, ensuring work is always managed with real operational and financial context.

Built on Odoo’s modular architecture, the Project app works seamlessly with Sales, Timesheets, Manufacturing, Field Service, and Accounting, giving Australian SMEs a single source of truth instead of fragmented tools.

Odoo Project is commonly used by Australian teams in professional services, consulting, manufacturing projects, field service operations, and internal process improvement. Its value comes from offering both structured task control and real-time operational visibility.

Key capabilities include:

• Task management and multi-project coordination
• Fair Work–aligned timesheets
• Integrated invoicing and analytics account for profitability
• Real-time collaboration and activity tracking

Together, these features give Australian businesses a unified and audit-ready approach to managing projects.

Core Features of Odoo Project (Deep-Dive)

1. Project Planning & Task Management

Odoo Project is built around a structured planning approach structured, easy-to-follow planning framework that gives teams clear visibility and control, making it well-suited for Australian SMEs managing cross-department projects. Each project can be customised with stages, property fields, tags, and priority levels, while tasks can be created manually or automatically through email aliases, web forms, or batch imports. This flexibility helps service, consulting, and manufacturing teams organise complex work without depending on disconnected tools.

Visual Views for Clarity and Control

Odoo provides multiple views so teams can plan and execute work in the format that best suits their role:

• Kanban view to track progress visually with drag-and-drop cards, filterable by assignee, deadline, or stage.
• Gantt view for timeline-based planning, showing dependencies, planned vs actual hours, and resource forecasts.
• Calendar view to monitor deadlines and reschedule tasks using drag-and-drop.
• List view for batch editing, importing/exporting tasks, and analysing work at scale.
• Large screen view optimised for team discussions with scrollable Chatter activity.

For dispersed Australian workforces, these views reduce miscommunication and support consistent delivery across multiple departments.

Task Structuring for Complex Workflows

Tasks can be broken down into multi-level subtasks, governed with dependencies, configured to repeat as recurring tasks, and extended through custom property fields. This supports structured workflows for engineering projects, manufacturing orders, or consulting deliverables that require detailed sequencing. Users can document requirements using the rich text editor, assign responsibilities, and add followers for transparency.

Multi-Project Coordination

Teams managing several client jobs or internal initiatives can operate across projects without losing visibility. Features like My Tasks, private task pipelines, cross-project filters, and multi-project searches make it easy to track responsibilities and maintain clarity, even when workload spans divisions or locations.

Milestones & Project Status Updates

Odoo provides milestones to mark key progress points that must be reached within a project, helping teams track major deliverables with clarity. Milestones offer structured checkpoints for phases such as design completion, client approval, or manufacturing readiness.

Teams can also generate Project Updates, Odoo’s built-in status reporting tool, which summarises progress, budget performance, and profitability in just a few clicks. These updates provide stakeholders with clear visibility and support better decision-making during reviews.

2. Workflow Automation & Smart Controls

Odoo reduces repetitive administration through automation tools that streamline updates, assignments, and task handling, crucial for time-poor Australian SMEs.

Automation Rules

Automated actions can trigger when a task changes stage, at a scheduled frequency, or when specific criteria are met. These rules can:

• Assign or reassign tasks
• Create/update records
• Send emails or SMS notifications
• Schedule activities

This keeps work moving without manual follow-ups.

Fast Editing with Shortcuts & Batch Actions

Teams can configure new tasks quickly using text shortcuts in the Kanban view, set priorities, assign users, and add tags instantly. Bulk operations in the List view, such as exporting tasks, archiving, deleting, or sharing, allow teams to manage large workloads efficiently.

3. Communication & Collaboration

To prevent fragmented communication, Odoo centralises interactions directly within each task, ensuring all project stakeholders work with the same information.

Real-Time Collaboration Inside Tasks

Using Odoo’s native HTML editor, multiple colleagues can collaborate in real time on the same task content. The Chatter activity log records calls, emails, meetings, reminders, and work notes, while users can tag colleagues, add reactions, attach media, and message clients, all in one place.

Integrated Notifications & Client Portal

Email integration ensures that client replies are automatically attached to tasks for full visibility. Teams can use email and SMS templates for updates and alerts, while external users can access tasks via the customer portal to monitor progress or provide feedback. This supports structured, auditable communication across internal and external teams.

4. Reporting, Profitability & Insights

Effective project delivery requires real-time insight into cost, time, and performance. Odoo’s reporting tools provide data transparency across every active project.

Real-Time Project Reporting

Managers can generate project status reports, track budgeted vs actual hours, and monitor performance indicators through project updates. Time tracking compares planned and effective hours to forecast workload more accurately, while budget management tools enable teams to compare expected versus actual revenues and costs.

Advanced Analytics Tools

For deeper analysis, Odoo offers:

• Burndown charts to assess progress and ensure projects remain on track
• Graph views to analyse performance by assignee, stage, project, or tag
• Pivot tables for statistical analysis of tasks
• Dashboards to consolidate metrics and share custom filters with teams

For Australian businesses, these insights support compliance with Fair Work record-keeping expectations and provide strong audit trails for project profitability and resource utilisation.

Complete Setup Guide: How to Configure Odoo Project for Australian Businesses

Setting up the Odoo Project requires configuring five core components: project structure, task logic, time tracking, invoicing integration, and reporting. These layers work together to ensure operational clarity, audit-ready timesheets, and accurate client billing. The steps below mirror official Odoo documentation and reflect Havi’s implementation experience with Australian SMEs.

1. Project Management Setup

Begin by establishing a structured project workspace that defines how work will flow across the team.

• Create the project and set custom stages (e.g., Draft → In Progress → QA → Completed).
• Assign a project manager and configure permission levels for internal users and external clients.
• Apply tags, colour codes, and naming conventions to organise work clearly.
• Add followers so key users receive updates through the activity stream.

Together, these settings provide a centralised structure for planning, collaboration, and billing.

2. Task Management

Tasks represent the actionable units of work inside each project and should be configured with clear requirements and dependencies.

• Use the rich text editor to add requirements, attachments, checklists, or links.
• Break down complex deliverables using subtasks.
• Enforce sequencing with task dependencies to avoid misaligned work.
• Automate routine activity using recurring tasks or task templates.
• Enable “My Tasks” so each team member can view responsibilities across multiple projects.

This structure helps teams manage complex workloads while maintaining traceability across every task.

3. Time Management

Integrate Timesheets to ensure accurate, transparent time tracking across all billable and non-billable work.

• Users can log time in real-time (timers) or retrospectively.
• Managers should approve timesheets to maintain consistency and audit accuracy.
• Hours recorded against tasks create transparent cost and effort records.

In Australia, this setup supports Fair Work-compliant timesheet record-keeping, ensuring traceability during audits or client reviews.

4. Invoicing Integration

Link Projects with Invoicing and Accounting to automate billing using Odoo’s integrated billing models.

- Choose the billing model:

• Fixed price
• Hourly (time and materials)
• Milestone-based

- Convert validated timesheets directly into draft invoices.

- Initiate invoicing when tasks or phases reach completion using Odoo’s built-in billing actions linked to timesheets and sales order policies.

- Use analytic accounts to maintain ATO-ready audit trails and proper cost allocation.

This replaces manual spreadsheets with an end-to-end billing workflow that reduces error and accelerates cash flow.

5. Reporting & Analytics

Use Odoo’s reporting tools to monitor delivery performance, budget health, and profitability.

• Generate project status reports for budget and schedule visibility.
• Use burndown charts to measure task completion against the plan.
• Analyse workload or cost distribution via pivot tables and graph views.
• Build custom dashboards that track KPIs like utilisation, margin variance, or risk indicators.
• Share dashboards with team leaders for consistent, real-time monitoring.

These insights help teams make informed decisions and maintain strong financial governance across projects.

Integrations: How Odoo Project Connects with Your Full Business Stack

Odoo Project delivers its strongest value when connected to other Odoo applications or external tools. These integrations eliminate manual handovers, enable real-time operational continuity, and ensure sales, delivery, and finance teams all work from the same data. For Australian SMEs, this reduces duplicated entries, prevents billing errors, and strengthens audit trails across the full customer lifecycle.

By linking project tasks with sales, timesheets, inventory, and accounting, Odoo Project supports a unified, end-to-end workflow rather than isolated tools.

1. Odoo-Native Integrations (First-Party Workflows)

Odoo’s ecosystem is designed so projects flow seamlessly across business functions:

Sales → Project → Timesheets → Invoicing

Confirming a sales order can automatically create a structured project and tasks. As work progresses, time entries feed directly into invoicing, enabling automated billing for fixed, hourly, or milestone-based projects through analytic accounts.

Helpdesk → Project escalation

Support tickets that evolve into defined work can be converted into project tasks, preserving communication history and ensuring no deliverables are lost.

Field Service → Project tasks for onsite jobs

Site visits become structured project tasks, complete with technician notes, materials used, and customer signatures.

Manufacturing (MRP) → Project-based production tasks

For production workflows, project tasks can represent manufacturing steps, linking operational progress with planning and scheduling.

Accounting → Project profitability via analytic accounts

Timesheets, expenses, and invoices map to analytic accounts, giving finance teams a real-time view of project costs, margins, and work-in-progress.

Together, these workflows support automated handovers, consistent delivery, and lifecycle traceability across teams.

2. Third-Party Integrations (Common External Tools)

Odoo Project also integrates with widely used business applications, allowing teams to retain familiar tools while centralising operational work inside Odoo.

Outlook / Google Workspace

Sync emails, log communication automatically to tasks, and manage scheduling across calendars.

Xero / MYOB

For businesses not using Odoo Accounting, invoices and payments can synchronise to external ledgers while project delivery continues in Odoo.

Microsoft Teams / Slack

Enhance team collaboration by linking conversations, updates, and notifications to project activity.

SharePoint / Google Drive

Connect external document repositories while using Odoo as the operational hub for task execution.

Power BI and other BI tools

Export project data for deeper financial or operational analytics.

These integrations assure decision-makers that Odoo Project adapts to existing stacks while improving workflow consistency, data clarity, and financial traceability.

Real-World Example: How Alumi Group Improved Efficiency by 40%

Alumi Group Ltd, a New Zealand–based window and door manufacturer, sought a system that could eliminate manual bottlenecks and provide a unified workflow across sales, production, warehousing, and finance. With warehouses in Auckland and China, and hundreds of SKUs per job, the team needed a platform that could handle complexity while enabling remote accessibility during and after COVID-19. Odoo’s integrated modules provided an end-to-end operational backbone, linking sales, production, timesheets, and invoicing into one environment.

The Challenge: Manual Bottlenecks

Before adopting Odoo, Alumi relied on scattered legacy systems and spreadsheets that required a single team member to manually gather and process production documents. This slowed operations, increased the risk of human error, and complicated coordination between sales, warehouse, and finance teams. Their high-volume product mix, more than 100 SKUs per production order and over 400 units, made visibility and alignment difficult.

Key issues:

• Disconnected tools and manual document handling
• Slow, error-prone coordination
• High SKU volumes complicating production planning
• Limited real-time visibility across teams

The Solution: Integrated Odoo Workflows

Alumi implemented an out-of-the-box Odoo suite that connected CRM, eCommerce, Sales, Project, Inventory, Manufacturing, Timesheets, and Invoicing, creating a single, coherent workflow where every team accessed up-to-date project information.

How Odoo transformed operations:

• Sales → Project → Inventory → Production: Project briefs are auto-shared across sales, production, and finance for consistent handover.
• Auto-generated BOMs and POs: Customer service automated BOMs and POs using data pulled from CRM and eCommerce.
• Warehouse alignment: Inventory teams arranged stock moves with changes reflected instantly across the system.
• Timesheet-linked manufacturing: Production tracked hours directly in Odoo Manufacturing, feeding into accurate budget oversight.
• Real-time communication: All teams accessed the same project framework, eliminating duplication and guesswork.

This was achieved without heavy custom code, relying instead on Odoo’s modular capabilities and a small integration using XML-RPC.

The Result: 40% Faster Production & End-to-End Traceability

The unified workflow improved production order efficiency by 40%, giving Alumi real-time traceability from sales through to manufacturing completion. Coordination across departments strengthened, updates became instant, and customer communication improved.

Measured outcomes:

• 40% improvement in production order efficiency
• Transparent, real-time data flow across CRM, Sales, Project, Inventory, and Manufacturing
• Stronger customer relationships through accurate updates
• Better cost control through timesheet-driven manufacturing

As Co-founder Yuan Gao emphasised:

“Odoo makes complex business processes simple. If you want results in a quick turnaround time, Odoo will not disappoint.”

FAQs About Odoo Project

1. Is Odoo Project Management free in Odoo Community?

Yes, Odoo Project is available in the free Community edition for basic task tracking, simple workflows, and internal coordination. However, the Odoo Enterprise edition unlocks features such as automated actions, full reporting, customer portal access, email/SMS templates, and deeper integrations needed for scaling. For Australian SMEs managing billable work, Fair Work–aligned timesheets, or ATO-compliant invoicing, Enterprise is generally recommended.

2. What’s the difference between a project, task, subtask and milestone?

In Odoo, a project is the overarching container for a job, contract, or internal initiative. A task represents an actionable unit of work. Subtasks break a complex task into smaller, assignable items with independent sequencing. Milestones define major checkpoints often linked to billing, delivery, or reporting. Together, these structures help Australian service, consulting, and manufacturing teams plan work with clarity and granular responsibility.

3. Can Odoo Project integrate with tools like Xero, Outlook, and custom apps?

Yes. Odoo Project integrates through connectors, APIs, and custom development. Email can sync via Outlook or Google Workspace, and financial workflows can connect to systems like Xero or MYOB. Havi’s Odoo Xero Integration and Odoo MYOB Integration guides show how billing, timesheets, and project data flow seamlessly across systems without duplication.

4. Can Odoo replace Trello / Jira for project management?

Yes, Odoo can replace Trello or Jira for many teams, depending on project needs. It offers Kanban boards, subtasks, dependencies, milestones, and reporting similar to standalone tools, while adding ERP-level links to sales, timesheets, inventory, and invoicing. Teams needing specialised agile or development workflows may still prefer Jira.

Conclusion: Is Odoo Project Right for Your Business?

Odoo Project is a strong fit for Australian SMEs that need structured workflows, audit-ready time tracking, and connected delivery processes. The Productivity Commission reports that businesses with integrated digital systems experience significantly higher output per hour compared to those relying on disconnected tools, reinforcing the value of end-to-end platforms in operational performance.

Odoo Project aligns directly with this integrated model by unifying tasks, time tracking, delivery, and invoicing within one environment, reducing friction and improving decision-making across teams. Real outcomes reflect this: Alumi Group achieved a 40% improvement in production order efficiency using standard Odoo modules, demonstrating how connected workflows translate into measurable operational gains.

When paired with modules like Timesheets, Sales, and Invoicing, Odoo Project strengthens financial visibility and maintains ATO-ready records without extra reconciliation work.

If you're exploring whether Odoo Project suits your operations, you can request a personalised Odoo demo tailored for Australian businesses to see how the platform supports real project workflows end-to-end.