This Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) document provides answers to common questions specific to Lab Planning.

General Information & System Access

1.    Where will training materials be posted?
       All materials will be posted to our Training Materials Site. 
2.    What is the difference in role access between Project Monitor and Contract Support?
       Both are assignment Roles with edit and view access. The capabilities are the same; the only difference is the role title itself, to distinguish the business role.   
3.    How are new users added, and which roles have permissions for that?
       Registration will start in PM Bridge. All roles should be requested in PM Bridge. However, specific project team assignments (e.g., "DOE Team" or "Recipient Team") should be made within Lab Planning. 
4.    Do current access privileges for labs and others continue automatically?
       No, lab users will need to Register for accounts through PM Bridge. 
5.    Is a contractor limited in what they can edit?
       Contractors who register with the Project Management Contractor Support Role will be able to edit lab projects for the offices they are aligned with. 
6.    Can lab support staff (excluding LRMs or PIs) be given accounts with edit access?
       Yes, these lab staff members can register as a Business Contact for their lab in PM Bridge. Once registered, the Tech Office can assign the individual as a Lab Operations POC for their office in Lab Planning. 


Roles, Responsibilities, and Permissions

1.    Explain the difference between the Account Administratorand Business POC roles.  An Account Administrator can approve accounts for the lab. This individual should be in a position at the lab that has insight into which lab users would need system access. A Business POC would be an individual who assists on administrative components of a project or with managing projects with EERE offices. A technical POC would be an individual who would serve as a Principal Investigator on a project. Users can have one or many roles.
2.    What is the criteria for each role? An Account Administrator can approve accounts for the lab. This individual should be in a position at the lab that has insight into which lab users would need system access. A Business POC would be an individual who assists on administrative components of a project or with managing projects with EERE offices. A Technical POC would be an individual who would serve as a Principal Investigator on a project. Users can have one or many roles.
3.    How does the access/viewability differ? As a Technical POC, the user would be able to view/edit projects that they have been associated with as a Principal Investigator. A Business POC can be selected by an EERE Office to also be a Lab Relationship Manager or a Lab Operations POC. Once provided these roles the user would be able to view/edit all projects between the Lab and EERE office.
4.    Who assigns people as PIs to each project? How does one become a "Project Editor"?  Either the Tech Office or a Lab user can assign a PI. The Project Editor role is an EERE Tech Office user role for an individual in the office who may need access to the project.
5.    Can there be multiple Technical POC for one project? At this time, only one Principal Investigator (Technical POC) can be identified on a project.
6.    Can you be assigned to more than one role? Users can have one or many roles.
7.    How many PIs can be listed on a project? At this time, only one Principal Investigator (Technical POC) can be identified on a project.
8.    Would a Business POC be able to support Technical POCs with management and editing of their project? Who has edit rights? Yes, a Business POC could assist. At this time the best way to accomplish this is to ensure that user has been identified as the "Lab Operations POC" between the office and lab. Then the Business POC can assist on any of the projects.
9.    Do all users need end dates for their role? No, that is an optional field and is not required.
10.    Can a project team member be added to a recipient to support a PI? Only saw option to select PI. Yes, another team member could assist. At this time the best way to accomplish this is to ensure that user has been identified as the "Lab Operations POC" between the office and lab. Then the Business POC can assist on any of the projects. The ability to add additional lab users to a project will be added in the future.                                        

11.    How do you add a PI? How do you add a new PI that is not in the system? The PI can be added when the project is created or on the "Recipient Details" page of the project.
12.    Do all PIs need to be registered for them to be selectable in the tool for the project? Or will they be migrated from the old tool? All PIs that were associated with existing projects have been migrated. However, the PI must be a user in the system to have access to the project. In addition, to add a PI to a new project, the PI must be a user in the system.
      


Lab Planning Projects 

1.    Can we have multiple tasks in one agreement in PM Bridge like we could in the AOP tool?                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                         Tasks have been migrated from the AOP tool into the Lab Planning feature. You will be able to enter/edit/remove tasks in the Lab Planning feature. However, tasks are not currently available in PM Bridge. 
2.    How does PM Bridge handle projects where more than one lab is participating on a project task and activities? Each AOP project is created individually between an office and a single lab. A method to link those projects together when multiple labs are working together is being developed but is not currently available. 
3.    Are lab PIs able to input new AOPs for review/approval by HQ folks? While labs can create a project, only EERE staff can submit a project for approval. 
4.    Is there a batch upload process available or does every AOP need to be entered manually through the GUI? There is currently not a batch upload process. Each AOP Project needs to be manually entered. 
5.    If an office has several projects with the same Laboratory, should all of them be combined under one AOP? Each AOP project will continue to be created individually. 
6.    Tasks seem to show all tasks over the entire AOP duration. Can this be filtered down to those with end dates within a selectable time period? This is a suggestion that will be added to the backlog as a future enhancement. 
7.    How is a new lab PI added (is it HQ or lab responsibility)? First, Lab users need to register for the Technical POC role in PM Bridge. Then, a DOE user (or other project DOE/Recipient team member) should assign that Lab User to the project by adding the lab user as a Principal Investigator on the "Recipient Team" page. The Lab Principal Investigator can be added or updated by either an EERE HQ user or a Lab user. 
8.    How does the signature page portion of the final director/LRM approvals work? This is in reference to the Full FY AOP. This functionality is not available in the system today. The system is planning to have the ability to document these approvals so that approvals can be captured offline and the individual in your office, who is your office administrator, would be able to document the approval for those in the system. 
9.    When do you expect the Full FY AOP approval process to be available? Offices are currently able to plan and approve individual AOP projects in Lab Planning, including multi-year AOP projects. The final Full FY AOP Approval process will be available in the system to support EERE deadlines for having all Full FY AOPs approved. 


Project Status & Data Migration

1.    For projects that have been imported from the AOP Tool, how was the "status" determined? All of ours either say "Planning at Lab" or "Planning at HQ." The lab planning tool now features multi-year projects. By default, the home page will display the most recent version of a project. If you had multiple versions in multiple states, you could possibly see "planning at lab," "planning at HQ," "mode at lab," "HQ mod approved," and "approved." When projects were imported from the AOP tool, only projects active in FY25 were imported. If there was no active version of a project in FY25, it was not migrated. 
2.    When only FY25 active projects were imported, does this refer only to the detailed AOP information (task, milestone, etc.)? Are older AOP projects without those details still in the old version of PM Bridge? Correct, the Lab Planning feature has the full project information for FY25 active projects. All existing lab projects that were available in PM Bridge are still available in PM Bridge.  
3.    If we don't see projects we were able to view in the SharePoint, do we need to request access to the specific office(s)? If so, what's the process to do this? If you are a Technical POC, you should automatically see any projects that you are identified with as a PI. If not, please contact our help desk to support. However, if you are not a PI, then yes - the office needs to associate you as either the Lab Relationship Manager or a Lab Operations POC to view the projects. Our help desk can also support here if needed.


Financials & Reporting

1.    For NOFO awards, what is the difference between Prime and Sub? Are either of those "FFRDCs" from budgets or Technical Assistance? The Work Category "NOFO-Prime" is applicable to a lab project that was awarded by NOFO where the Lab is a prime recipient. "NOFO-Sub" is applicable where the NOFO was awarded to a non-lab entity, but the lab is a sub to that prime. 
2.    Under Work Categories, is there an option for CRADAs? This will be looked into to determine whether CRADA should be added as a Work Category or if there is another way to identify a CRADA. 
3.    Given there are no financial details in PM Bridge yet (such as carryover, new BA, planned uncosted, B&R codes), is the plan for FY26 lab planning to work off a parallel Word Doc version of AOPs outside of PM Bridge that do have those details? Is there some way to have such documents associated with PM Bridge entries? While detailed financial data will be added in the future, Lab Planning does currently allow users to document the FY26 Planned Budget, which can be used for negotiations between the Tech Office and Lab. 
4.    Will Financial Data in PM Bridge capture encumbered balances/commitments that a single lab project makes to subcontractors and recognize as “costed” – even if there hasn’t been a drawdown as recognized by CPS? Yes, this is a future item that is planned to be included. 
5.    Can the lab "report" process enable us to request quarterly project reports from the labs? If so, what kind of information can we require or expect in such a report? The current Reporting Requirements functionality is the same as the original AOP SharePoint functionality. These reporting requirements have typically been managed by each office. There is a future effort to determine how to best collect reports from Lab users in PM Bridge in a more standardized manner.                           

6.     What is the purpose of the Report Requirement page? Is this how we are indicating QPR reporting? The reporting requirement page is the same page that was available in the AOP SharePoint tool. This page allows the ability to identify any required reporting throughout the life of the project.


User Experience & System Functionality

1.    Is there a checklist where it can be seen if there are pending items that need to be completed/have been completed? The left-hand navigation wizard on each project identifies when required fields have been completed in order to submit the project for approval.  
2.    Is Modality guidance available within the Tool as a hover? Not yet, but we will work to make sure this is also highlighted in training materials.
3.    For travel, we typically note international vs. domestic travel. Based on the location, will that determination be flagged? At this time, you will still have the ability to manually identify domestic vs. international travel.