Clarizen

Pros

ease of use
scalable
Social
Service and Support
customizations
Updates
Adaptability
Financial Management

Cons

Cost
Agile framework needs attention
Reporting Graphs are limited in selection
limited amount of Graphs per report
Scheduling options are limited to 24 reports , 1 per hour

Pros

1. Unlimited email-only users. Resources that infrequently or rarely work on projects can report progress via email without consuming an expensive license.
2. Email and/or API integration with work order systems. Clarizen doesn't charge an expensive license to integrate it with other systems.
3. A modern-looking user interface with an emphasis on social media-like collaboration.
4. Lots of options for charts and graphs for reporting.
5. Can import spreadsheets and MS Project workplans.
6. Lots of training and support webinars every week.
7. Pre-recorded online training via the Clarizen University.

Cons

1. Support seems slow to respond to support requests.
2. There is currently a bug they haven't fixed yet that requires you to keep resetting column widths in reports and dashboards. They don't stick.
3. Their online self-help knowledge base seems new and thin.
4. They don't have a feature I used in other project management software to identify the last (most recent) note, comment, etc. on an item. This can be worked around via user training or some custom workflow programming but it would be nice if they built it in as others have.

Pros

1. Easy to use and set up
2. Can integrate with CRM and accounting software
3. Open APIs
4. Large number of customizable features, including scheduling, costing, time cards, projects/tasks, etc.
5. Robust reporting

Cons

1. Syncing from/to Salesforce can be buggy sometimes
2. System can be slow or nonresponsive, especially when trying to view large amount of data
3. Expensive

Pros

Project management tool is comparable to MS Project. Users that are looking for a subscription PM product rather than purchasing MS Project may benefit from this software, but I am not sure if all PM features are available out-of-the-box at cheaper subscription levels.

Cons

Although the PM tool is comparable to MS Project, it also comes with a level of complication also comparable to MS Project. Full functionality of PM (i.e. including resource management) requires buy-in by all departments/users in the company, and this is difficult to acheive in large or diverse organizations.

Our company implemeted this software with the goal of bringing project management together with time reporting, expense reporting, and invoice processing. The purpose of implementing Clarizen was to have a centralized system where we could report project status by including all relevant metrics on the project in a list or detailed view, e.g. planned time vs. actual time, planned cost vs. actual cost, and project manager comments/narrative on goal vs. result. This purpose was never realized. Clarizen underestimated the work effort to develop customizations, which resulted in the time module never being completed, the expense/invoice modules were cumbersome to use, the related approval workflows had many problems, and support from Clarizen management was almost non-existent.

We are now taking a different approach. No longer do we believe that one system can handle all our needs, and so we have adopted different systems with some integration between them to try to bring together all project-related data.

Pros

Clarizen enabled our team to effectively manage the numerous projects we had while surfacing the insights we needed to make business decisions.

Cons

Like any software that is aimed at solving complex business problems, Clarizen had so many features that it became overwhelming to our team during implementation. When a business has to undergo major changes to their operations, it needs the transition to be as easy as possible. This is more of a critique for most large software solutions as opposed to just Clarizen.