EPM Team

Back to the Basics: Rolling Up % Complete and Elapsed Duration

% Complete and Actual Duration are two of those fields that everyone uses, but few people actually understand the background calculations.  Most of my students seem to assume that Actual Duration is the elapsed duration between the start of a task and the finish of a task.  Well it is – most of the time.  Sometimes it isn’t.  Similarly, a lot of people I’ve worked with assume that % Complete is...

Posted by Andrew Lavinsky on Wednesday, 7 Apr 2010 01:08.

1 Comment | Categories: Project Professional 2007

Using Intelligent WBS Codes in Microsoft Project

This is a question that’s come up multiple times with folks I’ve worked with, and is something I consider best practice.  The last time someone asked me about this, I figured I’d just blog it up with screenshots and send him the URL.  So Daniel, this post is for you…. For years Project has had a function which remarkably few people know about, and even fewer people use – that is the intelligen...

Posted by Andrew Lavinsky on Wednesday, 3 Mar 2010 07:57.

0 Comments | Categories: Project Professional 2007, MOPS 2007

Tips and Tricks: Saving an MPP File to Access

A lot of folks ask in the newsgroups how to save a Project file to Access.  This may be done for a number of reasons: Connecting to a reporting structure. (See an old article by Neville Turbit on project reporting in Access) Connecting to a SharePoint front end.  (Richard Fennell’s take on Access Services in SharePoint 2010, a video demo of Access Services 2010) Interacting with homegrow...

Posted by Andrew Lavinsky on Wednesday, 3 Feb 2010 07:02.

1 Comment | Categories: Project Professional 2007, Project Professional 2010

ProjectPro: Setting Buffers (Part 2: Cost Buffers)

Following up on a previous post on setting schedule buffers, I figured it was about time to revisit the topic of buffers, this time with cost.  This post will discuss best practices in setting cost buffers using the budget resource feature in Microsoft Project 2007. First off, why should we set buffers on a project?  Simply put, buffers make projects more predictable and allow better planning ...

Posted by Andrew Lavinsky on Wednesday, 14 Oct 2009 11:23.

0 Comments | Categories: Best Practices, Project Professional 2007, Project Management

Project Server Blogroll

Updating my blog list after the EPM Conference a couple of weeks ago.  Figured I'd share with the crowd.  Note that this is not scientific, and some of these may be dead links.  Some of these blogs haven't been updated in a while, but still have good information posted.  Some of these blogs aren't really Project or Project Server focused, but still mention it from time to time. RSS feeds ...

Posted by Andrew Lavinsky on Wednesday, 7 Oct 2009 11:28.

0 Comments | Categories: Project Professional 2007, Project Server 2010, Deployment, Best Practices, Project Management

EPM Implementations as an Exercise in Metaplanning

For years, the PMI has teased me with mentions of a Schedule Management Plan in the PMBOK.  It obviously existed, and even was listed as an input to one of the Time Management processes, but it never got called out as its own separate artifact with its own planning process.  Obviously, this implied some sort of bias against the scheduler caste.  Didn’t Risk, HR, Communications, Quality and Proc...

Posted by Andrew Lavinsky on Wednesday, 23 Sep 2009 08:10.

2 Comments | Categories: Best Practices, MOPS 2007, Project Management, Project Portfolio Server 2007, Project Server 2010, Project Professional 2007

ProjCon – Day 1/3, My First Rodeo

Yes, ladies and germs, today was actually my first rodeo.  A major milestone perhaps. Today was Day 1 of the actual conference formal, Day 3 of the overall festivities including the top secret Ignite presentations which will get unveiled tomorrow mid-morning or so, PST.  On this day, we saw Tad Haas, Doug McCutcheon and EPM Joe take to Microsoft branded horses (!) and do their best Three Amigo...

Posted by Andrew Lavinsky on Wednesday, 16 Sep 2009 07:56.

0 Comments | Categories: Project Conference 2009, Project Professional 2007

Some Cool Third Party Project Tools

One of the great benefits of attending the Project Conference is the ability to network with the larger Microsoft Project implementing community.  After the reception, a group of us headed out into the quiet night of downtown Phoenix for dinner.  (Peter will be posting the video of the discussion later if he can actually figure out how to use the Flip.) We ended up chatting with Vadim Bogdanov...

Posted by Andrew Lavinsky on Tuesday, 15 Sep 2009 08:48.

1 Comment | Categories: MOPS 2007, Project Conference 2009, Project Professional 2007

Looking to Catch Up at the Project Conference Next Week?

Follow us on this blog or on Twitter: @alavinsky @tcastronovo...

Posted by Andrew Lavinsky on Friday, 11 Sep 2009 08:23.

0 Comments | Categories: Project Server 2010, MOPS 2007, Project Professional 2007

Change Management Catalysts – How Hard is Too Hard…?

Vaughan Merlyn has a great post on his IT Organization Circa 2017 blog on how hard a consulting company should push its clients in adopting organizational change.  On the converse side, it also discusses what a client should expect from a consulting company that implements tools supporting organizational change.   http://vaughanmerlyn.com/2009/08/24/how-hard-should-management-consultants-push...

Posted by Andrew Lavinsky on Monday, 24 Aug 2009 12:50.

0 Comments | Categories: Best Practices, Project Management, MOPS 2007, SharePoint, Project Portfolio Server 2007, Project Professional 2007, Project Server 2010