1. An easy process to track a portfolio of projects that have been setup in one MS Project. i.e. predecessors and successors within the portfolio
2. Does MS Project enable an executive level summary that can be downloaded for presentation purposes
I am well versed in predecessors (FS) and successors (SS) in one project but tracking in MS Project can get complicated when layering in a Portfolio of projects.
Thx in advance. Saving Changes...
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Darren KosaPlanning & Controls ContractorHampshire, United Kingdom
Hi Paul,
I’m assuming you want as something that’s easily reproducible and have as little overhead as possible?
It does depend on what version of MS Project you are using, as there was functionality introduced in the later versions that could help.
You can design and set up a custom dashboard. By flagging or tagging the dependencies you want to track, you can then utilise the features from the report tab.
You might even be able to amend a couple of the existing dashboards to show an Exec Summary and Dependency Tracker.
The Timeline feature is also a good communication tool.
Kudos to Darren for pointing out the Report tab and the features it provides.
Paul, in response item #1 as well as your concern about "complicated when layering in a Portfolio of projects", I would suggest considering this as an alternative and see if this is a trade off worth the manual work: by adding a separate Project document only for projects - where each project is a line item / task in this file, let's call this the Portfolio file. The individual Project MPPs would be managed by the PMs, and the Portfolio MPP would managed by the Portfolio Manager/PMO. Depending on what all data is important to you on the Portfolio MPP, you would need to set those fields up and have a recurring process to update them (the PM or PPM could do these updates). Obviously there are manual steps / double-work, but I think it would help keep the Portfolio view much cleaner and at a high-level. This is almost similar to having Excel manage your Portfolio view, but the advantage with Project is the Report tab that is already tailored to PPM related aspects. Once you create the Dashboard view you want, you could copy a screenshot to PowerPoint Saving Changes...
