Survey: How to Plan-Track-Report "Project Specific Overhead"?
Rich LeggeProject Manager| Haemonetics Software SolutionsWoodstock, Il, United States
I am not sure if the term "overhead" is accurate or not, so let me tell you what I mean in this specific question. Overhead in this question consists of things like status reporting, communication, resource management, risk/issue management, and research/analysis. In this question I am only concerned with those activities directly attributable to a specific project, not things like department/company meetings or training. My survey question is this: "What method(s) do your prefer to planning-tracking-report such activities?" We are currently kicking around two options. One is to simply record such time to the current project phase/activity in progress - if there are multiple current phases then recording time to any of them will do. The other option is to create a "bucket" where effort/hours to such activities can be recorded/reported. I am interested to hear from others on their experiences and the pros and cons realized. Saving Changes...
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Michael WellesManaging Director| EdWel Project and Risk Management TrainingChicago, Il, United States
Hi Rich,
Generally, I like to use the term LOE or Level of Effort. By definition, these are activities that do not produce a discrete output or deliverable. In answer to your question, I like the bucket approach best. For the most part, scheduling tools (like Microsoft Project) do not really support the tracking of these LOE activities. The bucket overcomes the clumsiness.
Jim UptonSr. Project Manager| ConsultantRedding, Ct, United States
I've always had a task in my plans for "Project Management" that covers these types of tasks. You could potentially break that out to a more granular level and have subtasks of Status Reporting, Plan Updates, Stakeholder Management, etc. but I've never gone to that level. It comes down to a cost/benefit; if you have a real need to understand exactly where the time goes then you should track it to that level. I've never had that need so one bucket is good for my purposes.
Hi,
If I understood correctly (sorry for my english) the proposal of Michael could be implemented on MS Project assigning resource to hammock tasks.
If you open hammock properties, you can assign resource.
Take care the UNIT % ! It will influence the total effort of activities.
For ex. see the file that I attach.
You can see that assigning 10% of PM Office activities....you need of 0,6 man/day over that task (t1, t2, t3).
Also in Resource Usage you can see h1 assignation.
I hope that help you to manage this issue.
Bye,
db
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