Need assistance setting up MS Project with schedules that are already started and already behind.

Jeff,

You can also accomplish this with the split task function. There is a button on the toolbar next to link and unlink that allows you to split a task into pieces and move the pieces further out without adding to the continuous duration of the task.

For example take a 15 day task and break it into three 5 day chunks. Each of those pieces can then be spread out further accross the schedule as needed.

Bob brings up an important point about distinguishing between work and duration.  If you have thees three 5 day pieces and you placed them say on Oct 1-5, November 1-5 and December 1-5, there is only 15 days of work but the duration will show as roughly 65 days. As duration is the time elapsed from start to finish of a task.

Splitting the task however will make sure that the work assigned to the resource which can be viewed in the resource usage view is accurate for each task

Thanks to both of you for commenting.
I have attached my initial project.
If you take the very first line item, this was a task that was assigned and started back in 2007. I put the start date in as the date he actually started it. I put the finish date as when I expect to have it finished.  The  Est duration is a text column that I put there because that's how many days it should take. As you can see, it shows duration as 259 days or something like this. I am still a little unclear on how to break this into segments but that sounds like something I would like to do. He has worked on this periodically over the year, only putting a few days of work into it.
Some notes:
All of this stuff is imported from an excel spreadsheet and hopefully will also be updated that way. (I get the report in excel which has the dates, updated progress %, etc.
I don't think any of the tasks can really be linked or grouped as all of these are individual and the workers budget their times as necessary. Sometimes we might have a task that is dependent on another but that's rare. It's usually which engineer is yelling the loudest, that's the one we work on :)
I understand what you're saying about breaking each task into sections, but this would be a nightmare for me to upkeep.. or maybe not.. I'll have to think about it. Actually my boss would like to see three sections "setup", "test", "paperwork" for each task, but now that's alot of work for me.
I will be updating this list every few days so I don't want to re-import, retype, etc...
Also, we would like the option to sort by Resource, Project #, and requestor.

The version we're using is 2003 standard I believe.
summary of the task titles:
Resource: This is each technicians name and he is assigned a TR # for each test he needs to run
TR: The actual Test Request number assigned to this task in the test database.
Project: This is important as each test is part of some project, they aren't necessarilly run at the same time, but "charged out" to a particular project.
Test Type: Just our description of what the test is doing
Tool Type: I think that's self explanatory.
Manufacture: same (we test our tools and our competitors)
Requestor: The engineer who requested the test.
Est Dur: My estimate in days, for now a text column but this needs to be implemented in the schedule
Start: My estimate of when the test will start or the actual start date.
FInish: My estimate of when the test will finish. (Note that FInish - Start never equals my Est Dur).
% Comp: My entry based on user info
Priority: My number given to the technician to prioritise his tasks.

I realize thisi is alot more info, and I appreciate very much all the advice!

Jeff

Forgot to attach the file.
It tells me it's not allowed?

Ok I've changed the extension on the file inside the zip to .txt so make sure and change it back to .mpp before opening it. Not sure why EE doesn't accept .mpp files.

I wanted to add one more thing, please destroy this file after you've looked at it. It does contain some information that is not for public viewing.

Thanks

Hello Jeff,

I have downloaded your project file and will purge it from my system per your request.

Please contact an Experts Exchange moderator to see about getting your project file purged from the web site.

In your last post you mentioned that you had imported stuff from Excel.  There is a huge difference between using Project to manage tasks and using Project as a display device for data maintained in some other system.

It is certainly possible to manage independent test activities as individual tasks within a single project plan using Microsoft Project.  If importing data from Excel is a one time activity and your intent is to maintain (add new tasks, update task schedules) your test activities within a project plan, I'll be happy to contribute.

Is this what you have in mind?

Bob Segrest, PMP
MCITP, Microsoft Project Blackbelt

Hi Bob and thanks again for the response.
If you talk to my boss, he thinks we can set something up to automatically do everything in Excel, export to Project each time as a display. But then he contradicts himself and says he wants to track workers load, etc.. features of project.
It is my belief that we need to keep it in project, and I manually type in the dates, % complete, etc. from the Excel spreadsheet to the Project program. At least this is what I'd like to try first.
So to answer your question, I would like to keep everything in project, so any help is greatly appreciated.

Jeff

Hi Jeff,

Good answer...

You have probably observed by this point that most office applications don't do scheduling, resource availability and capacity management.  Most people perceive these as fairly simple things until they actually try to do them.  The fact is they are not easy and Project does them well.

I would like to offer two recommendations right out of the gate.  

First, invest in an upgrade to Microsoft Office Project 2007.  At a minimum, this will provide you with a multi-level undo and is well worth the cost.  All you need is the standard version.  You can download a 60 day trial copy using the following URL:

http://us1.trymicrosoftoffice.com/product.aspx?re_ms=oo&family=projectpro&culture=en-US

Second, pick up a copy of the book "Dynamic Scheduling With Microsoft Office Project 2007", ISBN: 9781932159845.  It is, in my opinion, the very best book available on this topic.  Its also an easy read.

Let me take a closer look at your existing plan.  I want to play with a couple ideas and will follow up with you in a couple days.

Bob Segrest, PMP
MCITP, Microsoft Project Blackbelt

Hi Jeff,

A couple more questions...

How do you use the information in the Priority column?

Is a priority of 1 more important than priority 12?

Bob Segrest, PMP
MCITP, Microsoft Project Blackbelt

Hi Jeff,

A couple of additional thoughts...

When you add a new TR to the project you should also set the Deadline for the TR to equal the Finish Date you sent the requestor.  This will place a small green arrow on the Gantt chart line for this TR to give you a visual indicator of where you are supposed to finish the task.  Project will also start telling you when your schedule slips and a deadline is missed.

If a deadline is missed because the requestor has change the test requirements, this could be considered a change in scope.  Where this is the case, I would add a note to the task to document the change, set a new deadline date and communicate the change to the requestor.

You will notice on the TR Tracking view that each TR line is represented with two bars on the Gantt chart.  The lower gray bar is the Baseline or original schedule.  The upper blue or red bar is the current schedule.

Project does not automatically save baseline data when you add a new task (TR) to the project.  So, when you add a new TR you need to save the baseline information for the new task.  Note that you don't want to save the baseline for the whole project because this will overwrite the 'original' schedule information for all of the other tasks as well.  Instead, select the new task (TR) by clicking the task ID (the task number in the left most column) and then open the Tools | Tracking | Set Baseline dialog.  Be sure to set the For Selected Tasks option and then click the OK button to set the baseline.

Its probably worth mentioning that almost all of the techniques I have mentioned are detailed in the "Dynamic Scheduling" book that I mentioned in an earlier post.

Bob Segrest, PMP
MCITP, Microsoft Project Blackbelt

Wow thanks for the help Bob!
I'm going to download the file and look it over, but it sounds like you've hit all the right areas, and it sounds like you know exactly what we're looking for.
1) The priority was something I added just to give my guys an idea of what they should be working on. When an engineer enters a request (Lotus Notes), he puts a priority but every engineer puts a 1 lol so I have to adjust this. There will be several 1's , etc. It's just a guide for the worker and for me to schedule. Lower number is higher priority.
2) Do I need Project 2007 to run your example?
3) I will look for this book.
4) Thanks for the advice. My boss thinks everything can be done directly and automatically from Lotus Notes, which exports a big fat Excel file which I still need to sort and remove LOTS of columns not shown in the project, etc.. he lives in a dream sometimes lol.
5) I think, even though it's manual entry, I can get it to a point where it's just an update once per week or so.

I'll let you know how it goes. Thanks again for the advice and the work! I wish I could give more than 500 points!

Jeff

Hi Jeff,

I'm always happy to help people use Project better.  Using Project as a display mechanism for other applications isn't an area I choose to support...

No, you don't have to use Project 2007.  After installing service pack 3 (SP3), Project 2003 can open a Project 2007 file without any great problem.  The only down side is that you would loose any 2007 specific data, and in this case we are not using any.  Here is an article that discusses this point in a bit more detail:

http://pmconnection.spaces.live.com/blog/cns!501C1C457A6A99CA!524.entry?wa=wsignin1.0

You can find the book on Amazon at:

http://www.amazon.com/Dynamic-Scheduling-Microsoft-Office-Project/dp/1932159878/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1223820988&sr=8-1

I'll look forward to your next question.

Bob Segrest, PMP
MCITP, Microsoft Project Blackbelt

One problem is that I can't control the version of Office that we run here at work. I'm stuck with Office 2003.

wonderful!
Just a couple of questions.
How do I set the project status date? Does it automatically move to todays date?
HOw do I create new views?
Looks like I might be stuck with Project 2003 as I think I have SP3 already, but I'll find out more this week.
I've got alot of reading to do lol..

Thanks again for your help Bob!

I am wondering if I might start grouping these by Technician, since he has to perform these tests in some order.

Hi Jeff,

Let me know if you can't open the file.  It shouldn't be a problem, but I will post a 2003 version if needed.

You can certainly resort a view any way you want.  Play with Project | Sort | Sort By...

There is something called Group in Project. But I don't think its what you are looking for.

Bob Segrest, PMP
MCITP, Microsoft Project Blackbelt

Everything was fine until I started entering new data and/or modifying dates. I just have trouble understanding the % work thing. If I try to make one person spend %22 of his time on a task, I get error messages saying it can't be done blah blah..
Anyway.. sorry to whine.. I haven't purchased the book yet so hopefully that will come soon.

Jeff

Hi Jeff,

You need to be a bit more specific...

What data did you enter and in what order?  

What does the error message say?

Bob Segrest, PMP
MCITP, Microsoft Project Blackbelt

Hi Bob,
Sorry for this, I'll try to be more clear.
I will attach my Excel sheet that I get my information from and also my project so you can see what's happening.
In the Excel sheet I've bolded the columns that I will bring into Project. (I receive the data in Excel so I want to manually enter it into Project).
The "Desired" column in Excel is what I am using for the "Request" date in Project because that's when the engineer would like his test to be completed.
The "Start" column in Excel matches the "Start" column in Project. It's an estimate of when I think I'll start
The "Estimated" column in Excel matches the "Finish" column in Project. It's the estimated completion date.
The rest of the columns pretty much line up.

I want to maintain this all in Project but I want to get the correct dates in.
If you look at the first task,  they wanted it on the 19th of September, we won't start it until the 20th of November, and expect to finish by the 27th of November, even though it will only take 3 days of work, it will be stretched out over the week due to his other tasks.
Not sure if this makes sense.

When I started with your first project it worked great until I started changing dates, then I messed it up.
I've attached both my modified project and the excel spreadsheet.

Should I open a new question so that you can get points? This might get hairy.

Thanks again.
Jeff



Jeff

Hi Jeff,

Starting another question would be better form and appreciated.

I have downloaded your sample and will take a look in the morning.

Bob