The big case
How a manager running several projects at once can stop piecing the picture together by hand
When projects run in parallel and the people in roles keep changing, a manager spends a week launching each project and hours finding out who is doing what and what the calls decided. I build a system in Notion and n8n that takes this work over step by step: projects unfold from a template, tasks find their owners, meetings turn into decisions and tasks, and the summary arrives on its own.
40 h → 15 min
to launch a project of 400–700 tasks
1 → 3+
projects at once instead of one a quarter
100+
people work in the system — each with their own tasks and access
≈$7,400
documented savings a year — as of March 2026
≈$28
a month for the whole infrastructure
Measured at the client
The problem
A typical picture: several projects at once, hundreds of tasks in each, a distributed team, some of it contractors. Every new project is assembled from old lists, tasks are handed out by hand, access is granted one person at a time.
Decisions are made on calls but stay in recordings nobody rewatches. To know how things are going, the manager goes round the team or keeps an assistant who collects statuses and writes minutes.
So the company’s ceiling is not the market or the team, but how many projects the manager can keep in their head.
A manager’s day: before and after
Before
A week per launch + hours every day
- Person≈40 h
Assemble a new project from old lists
- Person
Hand out tasks and grant everyone access
- Person
Go round the team collecting statuses
- Person
Rewatch call recordings, write minutes
- Person
Compile a report across all projects
Only whoever asked everyone has the full picture — and it is out of date by evening.
After
The manager’s time goes to decisions
- Person≈15 min
Press a button and enter the start date
- Person
Say who owns what with one record per role
- System
Tasks, access and a personal plan appear for everyone
- AI
Calls are broken down into decisions, promises and blockers
- System
On Monday a summary across all projects arrives
What the system is made of
Chain 1 · Project launch
A new project launches in 15 minutes — with tasks, owners and a personal plan for everyone
A project launches in 15 minutes, every task has an owner, every person has their own plan.
The whole chain →- 1TemplateA button creates the project with sub-projects and every task — deadlines are counted from the start date.
- 2AssignmentsOne “role → person” record assigns them to every task of that role in the project — 100–200 tasks at once.
- 3AccessA person sees the pages they need at once, and access is removed when the project ends.
- 4DashboardA “Mine” page: only my tasks and my meetings across all projects, in one view.
- 5Morning digestEvery morning today’s tasks arrive in Telegram — in the person’s local time.
Chain 2 · Meetings
Decisions from every call in one weekly summary for the manager: what was decided, what became tasks, what is stuck
Every meeting lands in Notion with participants and a recording, and decisions from calls are checked against tasks and reach the manager as a summary.
The whole chain →- 1ScheduleRecurring meetings appear in Notion six months ahead — from one table of rules.
- 2CalendarMeetings from Google Calendar land in a Notion database, next to tasks and projects.
- 3ParticipantsMeeting participants fill in on their own — as real Notion accounts, matched by email.
- 4RecordingThe call’s recording, transcript and summary find their meeting in Notion on their own.
- 5BreakdownAI pulls out decisions, commitments and blockers and checks whether they became tasks.
What holds it together
Standalone solutions that keep the system reliable.
A broken automation is caught before the launch, not reported by clients
The system checks itself every day and reports a breakage before clients notice it.
One event moves — the schedule is rebuilt in 5 minutes, not 2–3 hours
The project schedule unfolds from a reference and rebuilds when something moves — in 5 minutes instead of 2–3 hours.
Your whole Notion on one map: which databases exist and what connects to what
A map of every database and link — so the system stays understandable as it grows.
How we work
- 1
Process review
Before any build: where the team loses time, what repeats, what depends on one person. The result is a map of bottlenecks and a savings estimate.
- 2
The first link
We start with whatever pays off fastest — usually project launch from a template or meetings in Notion. Every link works on its own.
- 3
The next links
Then the system grows along the chain: each new link builds on the previous one, and you can see where it will attach.
- 4
Support
The system grows with the company: new roles, new project types, new automations — as the team needs them.
Who it fits
Any company with a remote team and more than one project. For example:
Agencies and studios
client projects from one template, with a team assembled anew for each
Product teams
releases and launches with the same steps and different owners
Chains and franchises
opening a location means hundreds of identical tasks with new people in the roles
Event organisers
several projects at once, the same roles, different people
Online schools
every cohort launch repeats the previous one, tutors change
Production
shoots, seasons, episodes — a repeatable process with contractors
Consulting and implementation
onboarding each client follows the same work plan
HR and onboarding
a new hire means a checklist of tasks across departments
Common questions
Do we have to adopt everything at once?
No. The system is built link by link: first what removes the most manual work, then the next. Every link is useful on its own.
What if we do not work in Notion?
Here Notion is the shared space for tasks, meetings and people. If the team is not in it yet, the move is part of the first stage: roles, templates and personal dashboards make it easier for people to start.
How much does the infrastructure cost?
At the client — about $28 a month: n8n runs on their own server. Data and logic stay with you, not in someone else’s cloud automation service.
Where does this run?
In full — at a client under NDA: 100+ people, several projects at once. Individual links run in my templates and at other clients.