MS Project

Table of contents

 Introduction  Define Resource

 Design of MS Project  Resource scheduling
 3 steps to project
 Resource overallocation
management  Tracking project
 Customization
 Printing reports
 Steps in Planning
 Working with multiple
projects
 Editing tasks  Importing/exporting of
 Task scheduling data
 Critical path method  Formatting views
 Pert analysis  Customizing tables,views
and forms
Introduction to Project management

 What is a project?
 Features of project
 What is project management?
 Project management software(PMS)
What is a Project?
Project can be defined as a
 set of tasks or activities
 with a defined start and end date
 designed to achieve a unique short term goal
 and constrained by time, cost and scope and
quality

Co
e
Tim

Resource st

Scope and Quality

Features of Project

 Projects are temporary

 Project objectives are specific and measurable
 Projects are constrained by time, cost and scope
and quality.
Project management

 is a process of
 planning
 tracking
 and controlling project
MS Project helps you to

 Develop a better plan

 Makes calculated projections easy and more
reliable
 Detect inconsistencies and problems in the plan
 Communicate the plan to others
 Track progress and detect potential difficulties
Design of MS Project
Views in MS Project
 Gantt chart view
 Calendar view
 Network diagram view
 Task Usage view
 Resource sheet view
 Resource usage view
 Resource graph view
 Tracking Gantt
 MS Project Window Project
Guide
Title Bar
Menu Bar
Standard
Toolbar

Task
pane

Status
bar
 Gantt chart view

Gantt chart
Timescale
Gantt chart
table
 Calendar view

Non working
day

Normal Tasks

Milestone
 Network diagram view Non Critical
Normal task

Critical
Summary Critical
task milestone

Critical
Normal
task
 Task Usage view

Timescale
Resource

Assigned
Task
 Resource sheet view

Overallocated
resource
 Resource Usage view

Resource Timescale

Assigned
Task
 Resource graph view

Percent
Overallocation

Resource
3 steps to project management

 Planning project
 Tracking project
 Closing project
Customizing MS Project

 Customizing toolbars and menu

 Changing the date format
 Changing the currency format
 Adjusting the Gantt chart view
 Formatting the timescale
 Customizing Project environment
 Click on Tools menu
 Click on Options button
 Select View tab button
 Select the date time format
from date format dropdown
list
 Change $ symbol to Rs. in
Symbol text field
 Select the Show outline
number check box
 Steps in Planning
 Enter Project information
 Define a calendar for your project
 Create a list of major tasks, sub tasks and
milestones (Using WBS)
 Edit tasks, indent tasks, link tasks, add constraints
to tasks
 Create resource list and assign resources to tasks
 Remove resource overallocation
 Optimize duration, cost and quality
 Distribute the plan to other members in the project
for review.
 Create a final plan
Project information

 There are 2 types of Project:

 Forward scheduled projects
 This projects have a fixed start date
 Backward scheduled Projects
 This projects have a fixed finish date

 Entering project information includes:

 Define start date/end date of project
 Set Priority of a Project
 Steps to enter Project Information

 Click on Project menu

 Select schedule from start
date from schedule from
dropdown list
 Enter Start date of the
project in Start date field
 Set the priority for the
project

Note: Priority range is 0-1000

 Creating calendar

 Project creates the schedule based on the

calendar defined in the project
 Types of calendar
 Standard
 24 hours
 Night shift
 Objective: Creating a calendar for the project:
 To create a calendar you need to:
 Set the calendar working time
 Add holidays to the calendar
 Change hours/day, hours/week, default start time,
default end time etc
 Creating a calendar
 Click on Tools menu
 Click on Change working time
button
 Select Standard calendar from
the drop down list
 Select the working days in the
week from the calendar box.
 Select the nondefault working
option
 Enter the working time in the
From and To fields
 Select the day which is an
holiday from calendar box
 Select non working time option
 Click on Options button
 Setting Calendar options
 Set the week start day.
 Set the fiscal year start
 Set the default start time
 Se the default end time
 Set the hours/day
 Set the hours/week
 Set the days/month
Editing tasks

 What is WBS?
 Introduction to fields in task table view
 Types of task
 Summary tasks, Subtasks and milestones
 Inserting, copying, moving, deleting tasks
 Inserting notes and hyperlinks to tasks
 Indenting tasks
Work Breakdown Structure (WBS)

Design Of Car

Design of Brakes Design of Engine Design of body

Chemical design Mechanical design

 Fields in Gantt chart table

Fields Description
Task ID Unique Task number
Task Indicator Indicates additional information of task
Task Name Describes information about the task or
action
Duration Total duration of the task in minutes,
hours, days, weeks, months,
Start date Start date of the task
Finish date End date of the task
Predecessor Task which determines start or finish of
successor task
Resource Name The resource/s assigned to the task
Types Of tasks
 Summary Task: The major phase of the project
or a group name to collection of similar tasks is
known as summary task
 Sub Task (Normal): Task to which resource is
assigned is a sub task
 Milestone: Milestone is a decision point, check
point or a major phase completion indicator in
project. Milestone is a task which do not have
resource assigned and has a 0 day duration.
Editing Tasks
 Select a cell in the task name field of Gantt chart
table to enter task.
 Press tab key to move to the next field
 Duration is entered in months, weeks, days, hours
or minutes.
 E.g. 1 mo, 2 w, 3 d, 4 h, 45 m
 Note: Let project enter the start date and end date
for your project
 Insert task: Click on Insert menu  Click on insert
task
 Delete task: Select the entire row/s to delete 
Press delete key
Indenting and linking tasks
 Indenting (Outlining) tasks:
 Select the sub tasks you want to indent. Click on demote
button on the Standard toolbar.
 After performing this operation you can observe that the task
above the indented tasks appears to be bold.
 Linking Tasks:
 Select the tasks you want to link. E.g. task1 and task2 are to be
linked. Select the 2 tasks.
 Click on link button on the Standard toolbar
 Unlinking tasks:
 Select the tasks you want to unlink.
 Click on unlink button on the Standard toolbar.
 Note: Always indent the tasks before linking. Do not link
summary task to subtask or another summary task.
Task scheduling
 Predecessors and successors
 Predecessor is a task whose completion (wholly or
partly) determines the start of the successor
 Successor is a task which is dependent on the
completion (wholly or partly) of the predecessor.
 There are 4 types of relationship (links) or dependencies
between Predecessor an successor. They are as
follows:
 Task Dependencies
 Finish to start
 Finish to finish
 Start to start
 Start to finish
 Task dependencies
Task Description Relationship
Dependency Diagram
Finish to Start The finish of the predecessor A
determines the start of the B
successor
Finish to Finish The finish of the predecessor A
determines the finish of the B
successor
Start to Start The Start of the predecessor A
determines the Start of the B
successor
Start to Finish The Start of the predecessor A
determines the Finish of the
B
successor
Task Constraints
 Flexible constraints
 As soon as possible (ASAP)
 As late as possible (ALAP)
 Start no earlier then (SNET)
 Finish no earlier then (FNET)
 Inflexible constraints
 Start no later then (SNET)
 Finish no later then (FNLT)
 Must start on (MSO)
 Must finish on (MFO)
 Task Constraints

There are 2 types of constraints: 1) Flexible 2) Inflexible

Flexible constraints are date constraints on tasks which allows to increase
the end date of the project
Inflexible constraints are date constraints which does not allow to
increase the end date of the project.

 Flexible constraints  Inflexible constraints

 As soon as possible (ASAP)  Start no later then (SNLT)

 As late as possible (ALAP)  Finish no later then (FNLT)

 Start no earlier then (SNET)  Must start on (MSO)

 Finish no earlier then (FNET)  Must finish on (MFO)

 Critical Path Method (CPM)
 What are critical tasks?
 The tasks on the longest sequence in a project whose
delay expands the project schedule are called critical
tasks
 What are non-critical task?
 The tasks whose delay does not delay the project end date
are called non-critical tasks.
 What is a Critical Path?
 The series of tasks that must be completed on time for the
project to be satisfactorily completed
 What is a CPM?
 Critical Path Method is a technique of scheduling tasks in
a project
 PERT Analysis
 What is PERT?
 Project Evaluation and Review Technique; a variant of CPM
where the task duration time is assigned a probability of
completion
 Optimistic duration
 Pessimistic duration
 Expected duration
Resources

 What is a Resource?
 Types of resources
 Work and Material Resource
 Difference between Work resource and Material
resource
 Creating a resource sheet
 Resources
 Definition: A resource is an entity which performs effort or
work on the task.
 There are 2 types of resources
 Work Resource e.g. Man, Equipments and facilities
 Material Resource e.g. Cement, Petrol, Diesel, paper etc

Work Resource (WR) Material Resource (MR)

WR is reusable. It can be
assigned to several tasks.
It requires a calendar
Resource Cost = (Cost of
resource/hr) * (work hours)
MR is non reusable. Once
consumed it cannot be used
in other tasks.
It does not require a
calendar
Resource cost = (Cost/ unit
of the Material resource) *
(no. of units consumed.)
 Fields in Resource Sheet Table
Fields Description
Resource Id Unique Id assigned to a resource.

Resource Indicator Symbols indicates Resource overallocation or notes indicator.

Type Describes the type of Resource i.e. Work /Material.

Material Label A label given to the material resource e.g. Petrol is a material resource and its label is
liters.

Initials Abbreviation of resource name e.g. Engineers, Initial -Eng

Group Group name or department name of the resource e.g Resource A, B are belonging to
Finance dept.

Max. Units Describes max no. of units that a task can be assigned

Std. Rate The cost of work/material Resource

Overtime cost The cost of the Work resource if he works more than the max. hrs/day scheduled for the
resource
Cost/use One time Cost of the resource. E.g Deposit on renting a Vehicle

Accrued At Prorated – Cost calculated with work

Start- Cost calculated as soon as the work starts
End –Cost is calculated at the end
Resource scheduling

 Work formula
 Work= Duration * Units
 Assigning resources to tasks
 Task types
 Fixed units effort driven
 Fixed units without effort driven
 Fixed duration effort driven
 Fixed duration without effort driven
 Fixed work
 Task types and work formula calculations

Initial Change Fixed Units Fixed Work Fixed Duration

Result Result Result

+Duration +Work -Units -Units

+Units -Duration -Duration +Work

+Work +Duration +Duration +Units

Formulas: D*U=W D*U=W D*U=W

Resource Overallocation

 What is resource overallocation?

 Example of resource overallocation
 Identifying resource overallocation
 Viewing and filtering overallocation
 Strategies to remove resource overallocation
 Resource Overallocation
 A resource is overallocated when it is assigned to
work more hours during a given time period than it
has available for work on the project.
 Identifying Resource overallocation
 The resource sheet, Resource Usage, and Resource
allocation views all highlight overallocated resource names
by using red text.
 Strategies for eliminating Resource overallocations
 Increase the availability of the resource during the time
period in question.
 Reduce the total work assigned to the resource in that time
period.
 Tracking
 Save a baseline
 Select a tracking method and prepare a custom view for
tracking
 Incorporate actual progress information into the project
 Check the status of tasks
 Modify the project in light of tracking information
 Track issues related to the project
 Request periodic text-based assessments of general
status from key resources
 Publish new and changed assignments to Project Server
 Tracking View % Duration
Complete

Act. Start
date

Act. Finish
date