SPM Teamspace Recommendations and Limitations

[Scott Wallace1]

( Please see updated recommendations for all Data Segmentation options at this new Vancouver release, SPM Article called Data Segmentation. )

SPM Teamspace

Recommendations and Limitations Dated: Q3 2023

ServiceNow Docs - Teamspaces

1. Teamspace Rome
2. Teamspace Quebec
3. Teamspace Paris
4. Teamspace Orlando

A teamspace appears as an application in the instance application navigator. The teamspace includes module links that come from the Project Portfolio Management applications, such as the Project, Idea, Demand, Program and Portfolio applications. Use teamspaces to provide functional and data separation of these applications between different teams in your organization. The following is an example teamspace for a marketing team: 

Teamspace Limitations / Considerations

1. There is a limit of 5 team spaces, and there are no plans to expand in future. This is plug-in limited.
2. As a baseline, teamspace can be used where the required business processes are uniquely different that they require specific configurations to separate the unique business unit business processes and data for idea / demand / project / portfolio / program.
3. If the requirement is not so strict as to require Teamspace separated configurations and data, we recommend the use of ACL’s and business rules to meet the business unit requirements. This is considered a configuration workaround and is a common practice to avoid the complexity and limitations of Teamspaces.
4. Most use cases can be accommodated with ACL’s and query business rules. The only time we recommend the use of Teamspaces would be when there is a need for completely different configurations to meet mandated business requirements.
5. Teamspace is not an absolute separation of all PPM entities. There are still commonly shared tables/views, such as cost plans, benefit plans, resource plans, timecards, reporting, org entities, etc. This makes using some of the OOTB reporting more challenging in a Teamspace environment.
6. Teamspace adds complexity and overhead to the management of business processes and all the related configurations. Carefully consider the implications of adding overhead to the business processes and support complexity.
7. Note: some of the new SPM Store apps are not fully supported in Teamspaces.

Tables created by Teamspace plugin:

1. Idea
2. Demand
3. Demand Task
4. Project
5. Project Task
6. Project Template
7. Project Template Task
8. Portfolio
9. Portfolio Goal
10. Portfolio Risk
11. Portfolio Issue
12. Portfolio Project
13. Program
14. Program Task
15. Stakeholder Register

Roles to support Teamspace

1. prefix_demand_manager             Managers of the demand features for the teamspace.
2. prefix_demand_user      Users of the demand features for the teamspace.
3. prefix_project_manager               Managers of the project features for the teamspace.
4. prefix_project_portfolio_user    Users of the project portfolios for the teamspace.
5. prefix_project_user        Users of the project features for the teamspace.
6. prefix_program_manager            Managers of the program features for the teamspace.
7. prefix_portfolio_manager            Managers of the portfolio features for the teamspace. 

Tables not support in Teamspace:

1. Resource Plans
2. Cost Plans
3. Benefit Plans
4. Expense Lines
5. Baselines
6. RIDAC
7. Requirements
8. Time Management
9. Timecard
10. Timesheet
11. Organization entities
    1. Company
    2. Business Units
    3. Department
    4. Group
    5. Users
12. Business Planner
    1. Enterprise Strategy
    2. Business Unit Strategy
    3. Goals
13. Financial
    1. Fiscal Calendar
    2. Cost Types

Chart - Tables Supported

The tables and roles that are installed with project teamspaces are prefixed with an abbreviation based on the name of teamspace.

Separated Functions and Data
Tables Extended	Security Role Created	New Application Menu with
·       Idea (idea) ·       Demand ·       Demand Task ·       Project ·       Project Task ·       Project Status ·       Project Template ·       Project Template Task ·       Program ·       Program Task ·       Portfolio ·       Portfolio Project ·       Portfolio Goal ·       Portfolio Risk ·       Portfolio Issue ·       Stakeholder Register (Includes all fields, business rules, notifications, workflows, associated with above list)	·       pps_admin ·       Demand_user ·       Demand_manager ·       Project_user ·       Project_manager ·       Program_manager ·       Portfolio_manager ·    Project_Portfolio_user	·       Demand ·       Portfolio ·       Program ·       Project ·       Settings and Preferences

Chart - Tables Not Supported

Shared Functions and Data
Not Separated (Common tables and forms)	Other Core Shared Data
·       Resource Plans ·       Resource Management (Workbenches) ·       Cost Plans ·       Benefit Plans ·       Expense Lines ·       Baselines ·       RIDAC ·       Requirements ·       Timecards ·       Timesheets	Organization Data ·       Companies ·       Business Units ·       Departments ·       Groups ·       User Business Planning ·       Enterprise Strategy ·       Business Unit Strategy ·       Enterprise Goals Financial ·       Fiscal Calendar ·       Cost Types

 END

[Martin Kohler]

Thank you, @Scott Wallace for this helpfule article. You mentioned the Data Separation capability as an alternative to Teamspaces. I was not able to find anything about it. Are you aware of any updates on it or a timeline by when it will be released? Thanks in advance!

[Arnab19]

Hi Martin,

The Data Separation app has been released in Innovation Lab and is being tested by a few customers. We are looking forward to a V2 of the Innovation Lab release later this year incorporating some of the feedback from the testing cycle. We are aiming for a GA release for this feature in early 2023. 

Regards,

Arnab

[swe5]

Hi Martin,

maybe this will help you:

https://docs.servicenow.com/bundle/sandiego-it-business-management/page/product/project-portfolio-suite-with-financials/concept/domain-separation-project-portfolio-financials.html

[Martin Kohler]

Thank you, but domain separation is a different concept and not related to teamspaces.

[Uncle Rob]

1)  Is there any way to rename anything in a teamspace?  I tried both creating new, and enabling one of the plguins and set the prefixes the way I hoped.  Nothing happened.  Well, worse than nothing.  The tables dropped.

2)  When is Data Separation planning on coming out?

3)  With Data Separation will there be improvements to View management?  Managing views is as bad as chewing broken glass, and half the reason we need the teamspaces is for different experiences.  THe most common is "Ohmigod we just want to track simple projects", and thus we typically need a form that's SUPER simplified with most of the related lists nuked.

[Martin Kohler]

Hi,

regarding 1) Not sure what you mean by "rename". We recently had to "clone" an existing teamspace and move records around which was more painful than expected but eventually worked.

Kind regards,

Martin

[Uncle Rob]

I'm just going to go ahead and say it.  There's no way Data Separation will stand in for Team Spaces.  

Team Spaces does TWO things extraordinarily well.
1)  Separate data between silo'd PMOs.
2)  Create separate experiences across idea, demand, project for silo'd PMOs.

Doesn't look like Data Separation is going to help on #2 so this is going to be a hard sell to people who had to use Team Spaces.

Don't feel listened to on this one.

[phil_bool_unifi]

It feels to me like Data Separation is a fantastic tool for concealing/restricting visibility of specific programs, portfolios or projects that can't be shared with all project/demand managers due to sensitivity.  It doesn't seem to allow for the fact that an organisation might be working in a fundamentally different way in some areas to others.  Teamspaces still seem to be essential in this context.

Has anyone got any advice on getting the best out of the PMO Dashboard in the context of Teamspaces?  I'm working with a customer that has PA licensing, so we can add a breakdown to the records to capture sys_class_name (and therefore teamspace) but not all widgets will support the custom breakdown.  I ideally want to have separate instances of the PMO dashboard with the required filters applied at the outset.  Has anyone achieved this?

[Ryan S]

Great article. Wondering if it can be updated to speak to the Teamspaces being distinct from the default PPM "space" so it looks like you can actually have 6 separate entities.

[Uncle Rob]

@Ryan S - From what I've heard they strongly recommend against TeamSpaces, opting instead for Data Separation and such.  So hard to know how to use these modules anymore.

[MindyC468543642]

I need help please.   We created a Team Space to separate out a department from our IT department.   

If we make changes to forms and templates in Team Space 2 will it affect Team Space 1?

[Uncle Rob]

@MindyC468543642 - No.  That's the point of Team Spaces.

[Kartik23]

Hi Everyone,

I am from the product management team in SPM, ServiceNow and I am working towards an initiative called Enterprise-Wide Deployment. We are trying to tackle the use case of making SPM workspaces configurable so that multiple teams with varying requirements can be accommodated on the same instance. If anyone of you is interested to learn more or become part of our feedback and update list, please reach out to me (kartiknitin.dasani@servicenow.com). I would be happy to know the kind of use cases that you are dealing with.

Regards,

Kartik

[PaulaaO]

Hi @Scott Wallace1  and @Kartik23  - quick question from me.

We are looking to use Teamspaces and I have noticed that whenever I generate a Cost Plan from a Resource Assignment, only the Unit cost field gets populated and Total Planned Cost is 0 and there is no roll up at the project level either. Is there any specific config that needs to be done to enable that?

Thank you

[Kartik23]

Hi @PaulaaO , this may be an issue. Can you please raise a support request so that it can be properly investigated?