Managing projects in spreadsheets often works well in the beginning. But as the number of projects grows, information tends to become scattered across different files, departments, customers and teams.
Dates change in one file but not another. Different versions circulate. Task ownership becomes unclear. And creating an up-to-date overview across all projects requires more and more manual work.
Moving this information into a project management system does not have to mean rebuilding every project manually.
Starbrix Flex lets you import multiple projects, together with their tasks and key project information, from a single CSV file. This provides a practical way to consolidate existing project data and move from spreadsheet-based planning to structured project management.
Why consolidate projects from spreadsheets?
The problem with spreadsheets is not that they cannot be used for project planning. The challenge appears when several projects, teams and files need to be managed together.
Project information may be spread across departmental spreadsheets, customer-specific files and individual project plans. As the number of files grows, maintaining a reliable overview becomes increasingly difficult. Inklistrad markdown
Moving projects into Starbrix Flex brings the information into one shared system. Instead of maintaining separate spreadsheets, projects and tasks can be planned, managed and followed up using the same underlying project data.
The first step is to consolidate and prepare the existing information for import.
What can you import into Starbrix Flex?
A single CSV file can contain multiple projects and their tasks.
Each project starts with a project row. The tasks belonging to that project are placed directly below it. After the tasks comes the next project row, followed by its tasks.
This makes it possible to import many projects and their project structures in one operation.
The CSV import supports the following fields:
Fields that contain several values, such as project team members or operational areas, can contain multiple names separated by commas.
Step 1: Review your existing spreadsheets
Before importing anything, take some time to review the project information you already have.
Identify which spreadsheets contain the projects you want to move to Starbrix Flex and determine which information should be imported. If different departments or teams use different spreadsheet structures, decide how those structures should be mapped to the Starbrix CSV format.
This is also a good opportunity to clean up the data. Look for duplicate projects or tasks, inconsistent names, missing dates and different ways of identifying the same person, customer or organizational unit.
The goal is not simply to move every spreadsheet cell into Starbrix. It is to identify the project information that should become part of your common project management environment.
Step 2: Prepare and standardize the data
Once you know which projects you want to import, prepare the data so that it follows a consistent structure.
Standardize project and task names, check start and finish dates, and make sure people and customers are named consistently.
Pay particular attention to the project and task hierarchy. Starbrix uses the Level field to determine whether a row represents a project, a main task or a task further down in the structure.
Preparing and standardizing the source data before migration also makes larger imports easier to verify. The original migration approach likewise emphasized cleaning and normalizing data before moving it into Starbrix. Inklistrad markdown
Step 3: Build the CSV structure
The CSV file contains 14 columns separated by semicolons. Each row must therefore contain the required number of semicolons, even when some fields are empty.
The most important concept is the Level column:
0= project1= first task level2= task below level 1- and so on, up to level
20
A simplified CSV file could therefore look like this:
Number;Level;Project name;Description;Project manager;Project members;Other resources;Operational areas;Customer;Cooperation partners;Estimated start date;Estimated finish date;Dependency;Additional information
1;0;Website redesign;Redesign company website;John Smith;;;Marketing;ABC Ltd;;01.10.2026;31.12.2026;;
2;1;Planning;Define requirements;John Smith;Anna Jones;;;;;01.10.2026;15.10.2026;;
3;1;Design;Create new design;John Smith;Peter Brown;;;;;16.10.2026;15.11.2026;2;;
4;2;Homepage;Design homepage;;Peter Brown;;;;;16.10.2026;31.10.2026;;
5;2;Product pages;Design product pages;;Peter Brown;;;;;01.11.2026;15.11.2026;;
6;0;ERP implementation;Implement new ERP system;Susan Miller;;;IT;XYZ Ltd;;01.11.2026;31.03.2027;;
7;1;Preparation;Prepare implementation;Susan Miller;;;;;;01.11.2026;30.11.2026;;
8;1;Data migration;Migrate existing data;David Wilson;;;;;;01.12.2026;31.01.2027;7;;
Here, Website redesign is the first project. The following task rows belong to that project.
When Starbrix encounters the next Level 0 row — ERP implementation — a new project begins, and the following tasks belong to that project.
In this way, a single CSV file can contain many projects with their respective task structures.
Step 4: Include task dependencies
Existing project schedules often contain more than tasks and dates. The relationship between tasks can be equally important.
Starbrix Flex can also import task dependencies.
The ordinal number identifies each row and can be referenced from the Dependency field. At its simplest, the dependency can consist of the ordinal number of the task on which another task depends.
More detailed dependencies can also specify the dependency type and an optional lag. Starbrix supports FS, SS, FF and SF dependencies, and lag can be expressed in days or weeks.
For example, a dependency can specify that one task may start three days after another task has finished.
This allows an imported project to retain important scheduling logic rather than importing only a flat list of activities.
Step 5: Import the CSV file into Starbrix Flex
The CSV import function is available to Main users.
In Starbrix Flex, navigate to:
All projects → Projects → All → By status
Then click Import projects.
The Import projects from a CSV-file form opens. It contains instructions for the CSV structure and the fields that can be imported.
Select your CSV file using Browse and specify whether the first row of the file is a header row.
Then click Import projects from selected file.
Starbrix creates the projects and their underlying tasks according to the structure defined in the CSV file.
Step 6: Start with one or two projects
When migrating a larger number of projects, it is a good idea to begin with a small test.
Prepare a CSV file containing one or two representative projects and import those first. Choose projects that contain the kinds of information you expect to import later, such as several task levels, responsible people, dates and dependencies.
Then open the imported projects and verify that:
- the projects and tasks have been created correctly
- the task hierarchy is correct
- start and finish dates are correct
- project managers and other people are correct
- customers and operational areas are correct
- dependencies produce the expected schedule
Once you are satisfied with the result, you can prepare and import larger batches.
Step 7: Verify the imported projects
Importing the file is only one part of the migration.
Open the imported projects in Starbrix Flex and compare them with the source data. In particular, review the project structure and schedule in the Gantt view.
The same principle applied to the earlier manual migration process: project structures, dates and responsibilities should be verified before the migration is considered complete. Inklistrad markdown
If the first import reveals problems with the source data or CSV structure, correct them before importing the remaining projects.
This is why a small test import can save considerable work in a larger migration.
From spreadsheet data to active project management
The purpose of CSV import is not simply to reproduce spreadsheets inside another system.
It provides a bridge between existing project data and an active project management environment.
Once the projects have been imported into Starbrix Flex, they can be managed using the same tools as projects created directly in Starbrix. Teams can work with project schedules and tasks instead of maintaining separate spreadsheet versions.
Project information can then become part of the wider project and portfolio environment, making it easier to manage work across projects rather than treating every spreadsheet as a separate island of information.
A practical migration process
For larger migrations, the process can be kept simple:
Review → Prepare → Test → Import → Verify
First identify the projects and information worth migrating. Then clean and standardize the data and convert it to the Starbrix CSV structure.
Import one or two projects and verify the result. Once you know that the structure is correct, import the remaining projects in larger batches.
This combines the flexibility of spreadsheets during data preparation with the advantages of structured project management once the projects are in Starbrix Flex.
Instead of recreating projects one by one, existing project data can become the starting point for a shared, structured and actively managed project portfolio.
