Demo – Virtual Hierarchy to Reports

We love Smartsheet reports as they are so powerful. But one frustration we share with many people we speak to is that you lose the hierarchy or indentation when you important a sheet into a report.

After being asked about this yet again, we had a little think and thought there is a way of doing this more creatively by using a helper column and adding chevrons to mark the indentation.

Here’s the formula used for the Task Name*:

=IF([Level*]@row = 0, [Task Name]@row, IF([Level*]@row = 1, “> ” + [Task Name]@row, IF([Level*]@row = 2, “>> ” + [Task Name]@row, IF([Level*]@row = 3, “>>> ” + [Task Name]@row, IF([Level*]@row = 4, “>>>> ” + [Task Name]@row, IF([Level*]@row = 5, “>>>>> ” + [Task Name]@row, IF([Level*]@row = 6, “>>>>>> ” + [Task Name]@row)))))))​​

​​​And here’s the Level* formula: =COUNT(ANCESTORS())

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Solution Overview

What you’ll need

Core Smartsheet

Complexity

Intermediate

What’s Included

  • Task name formula
  • Level formula

Want to find out more?

Use the link below to get in touch or book a meeting with one of our team.

Rich Coles

Founder &
Managing Director

Suzie Alloway

Head of Project & Programme Management

More Resources from Prodactive

Solution Overview

A workaround to address the common problem of losing visual hierarchy in reports by creating a custom column with a formula that adds chevrons to task names, effectively simulating indentation to indicate hierarchical levels.

Useful Links

Download for free along with our guidance notes:

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Demo Asset