GroundInn - Community Development

Notion WorkspaceAutomation

Mar 11

Written By Daniel Canosa

How GroundInn Built a Scalable Agency Operating System to Track Projects, Team Capacity, Clients, and Finances in 1 month

“Building these systems early has given me clarity across projects, team workload, and finances. I can keep clients aligned without endless emails and focus on growing GroundInn.”

Marta Rocamora - Founder and CEO of GroundInn

The Challenge

GroundInn is a community design and engagement strategy agency led by Marta. As the business took on more clients, work was spread across docs, emails, and ad‑hoc tools. There was no single source of truth for project status, client communications, invoices, receivables, or hiring. Marta needed a system that would:

Centralize project status and deliverables per client
See and balance employee workload at a glance
Share up‑to‑date status pages with clients to reduce email back‑and‑forths
Track invoices, payments, and who owes what
Manage prospects through a simple sales pipeline
Standardize SOPs and new‑hire onboarding

Without this, coordination costs were growing and Marta was spending more time chasing updates than guiding the business.

Our Solution

Step 1: Discovery and planning. Defined success criteria for external client visibility and internal operations. Prioritized projects, tasks, CRM, and finance.

Step 2: Core operating model. Built a company‑wide Task Manager connected to a Projects database to create a reliable backbone for planning, execution, and review.

Step 3: Standardized inputs and planning. Added an Add New Task page to enforce complete data on creation and a Scheduling page so teammates could self‑plan realistically.

Step 4: Client and contact CRM. Created Businesses and Contacts as separate but related data sources so multiple contacts can live under a single client, and all activity rolls up to the business.

Step 5: Invoices and finances hub. Implemented an Invoices database related to Businesses to monitor amounts invoiced, paid, and due per client.

Step 6: Meeting notes and context capture. Linked Meeting Notes to Contacts so every conversation is discoverable from the relevant Business page.

Step 7: External client views. Created shareable project status pages to keep clients aligned asynchronously with deliverables, due dates, and next steps.

Step 8: Onboarding, SOPs, and light automations. Documented core SOPs and standardized new‑hire onboarding. Planned Zapier automations for routine handoffs.

The results

Centralized planning reduced coordination overhead across projects and clients
Fewer status emails by sharing live client pages instead of ad‑hoc updates
Faster task intake and better on‑time delivery through standardized creation and scheduling
Clear visibility into receivables and who owes what via the invoices hub
Onboarding workflows and SOPs lowered ramp‑up time for new hires