Professional services automation (PSA) is software designed to assist professional firms with project management and resource management. PSA software is likely to be useful for any service-based business that charges for their time.
Many professional services automation (PSA) systems include features to manage the entire client lifecycle from lead management early on in the relationship, through to client projects, to billing, invoicing and collection. An important element of PSA is managing staff timeāespecially for billable staff. Professional services automation software should include time-tracking, utilisation or workload analysis, and scheduling.
Similar categories
Many systems call themselves "Project management tools" or "Professional services automation" software, often using the terms interchangeably. We categorise "Project management" and PSA in different ways, depending on their features (although some systems will be listed in both categories):
- Task managementāorganising internal work, like marketing campaigns or software development. Imagine To Do lists and Kanban boards.
- Job managementālike task management, but for organising jobs for customersāso must include billing
- Project managementāorganising (internal or customer) projects, including tracking project time and cost. So picture Gantt charts and scheduling.
- Professional services automation (PSA)ālike project management, but for client engagementsāso must include client billing
