I'm looking for a comparison of various scheduling & tracking metods. i.e., milestone charts, sprints/timebox development, Gantt Charts, Earned Value Management; compared and contrasted in terms of overhead, control, applicability, etc...
Has anyone guidelines as to which method to use when?
Thanks in advance, Finn Saving Changes...
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Mark Price PerryBusiness Driven PMO Evangelist| BOT InternationalOrlando, Fl, United States
Hi Finn, good post and topic. Many organizations chose to adopt scheduling and tracking methods suitable to project type and size. For example a project management process may have different workflows for different project types and sizes. For mega projects, a complete and comprehensive PM process can be followed. The organization may need a PPM system to manage schedules, costs, resources, etc. Likely, the schedules will be in Gantt Charts and the performance metrics provided will likely use Earned Value Management (EVM) techniques, rather than the traditional spend comparison approach. For most organizations, you really don't want a project manager concluding that six months into a one year project, with half of the budget spent, the project is right on track! Also, while EVM is useful for large projects and mega projects, for smaller projects the time period may, arguably, be to short for effective use of EVM techniques. Hence, the team can live with the traditional spend comparison. Even Gantt Charts may be overkill. And then for Scrum style projects, the effort may very well be managed via a task list. There are a number of excellent PM process solutions that provide guidelines and templates for this as well as useful free resources out there. You might try a google search on "evm guidelines", "project guidelines", or "sdlc guidelines". I look forward to learning and hearing from others. Thanks for the post. Cheers. -- Mark Perry, VP of Customer Care, BOT International Saving Changes...
Joanna WallProject Manager| BarkleyOverland Park, Ks, United States
Along this vein, I am interested in comments for schedule and resource tracking across multiple types of projects. Our PMO group manages everything from web site development to direct mail to tv and radio spots. Across those projects, we share all types of resources from our software developers to our creative designers and everything in between. Some projects take months, others are just a few weeks. We are struggling to get a grip on resource availability across these projects and resources. Any suggestions on processes or tools for handling this? Saving Changes...
Joanne, Has your PMO investigated MSProject Central? I have no experience of it but hear it may be the Microsoft solution for what you are looking for.
Mark, what size do you think EVM usefully kicks in? I would have thought that for any year long project it would be useful to be able to tell that you are right on track 6 months into it?
btw I found www.mindtools.com had some practical advice/comparison of scheduling tools to suit project size. However this is at an overview level, if anyone has any other information, either more detailed or from a different angle I'd appreciate it. Saving Changes...
Mark Price PerryBusiness Driven PMO Evangelist| BOT InternationalOrlando, Fl, United States
Hi Finn, regarding size of project and when EVM kicks in, I agree with you. There are some that suggest EVM should be used as the project performance metric for projects of all sizes, even a month. But most suggest EVM should be used for more complicated and longer term projects such as six months to a year, or longer. EVM provides tremendous value in those areas and is often a contractual or regulatory requirement, but I can't say that I have seen anyone use EVM in those one month Agile Scrum sprints..! Cheers..! Saving Changes...
Mark Price PerryBusiness Driven PMO Evangelist| BOT InternationalOrlando, Fl, United States
Hi Joanna, in addition to wanting to get a grip on resource availability, do you have any other key requirements such as time and expense recording or preferences for in-house vs hosted or ASP..? Also, how many total users need to access the system and how complex are your projects? That would help in spotting a few tool alternatives for you. And I tend to agree with Finn, it is well worth looking at Microsoft Project Server as it provides good general purpose project management and resource management functionality. But there are a number of very good alternatives to Project Server, most of them are sponsors or listed in Gantthead..! Saving Changes...
Joanna WallProject Manager| BarkleyOverland Park, Ks, United States
Mark and Fin - We actually have MS Project Server installed. We implemented it last year when we were focused more on application development and web site projects. Now that we've combined into one PMO (18 members), we have a much broader range of project "types." I am a fan of Project Server. It takes effort to get a plan entered and maintained, but I don't think there is any way to avoid that. It can support many of the issues we encounter. One downfall is that I don't think the web access component is Mac compliant, and we have a contingency of users (non-PMs) that only have Macs. We want the tool to also provide the ability for project resources to see their task and comment on issues, risks, status, etc. Project Complexity - I would rank our web apps as the highest complexity. Most of the others have a fairly standard list of activities. The difficulty comes in the constant change in timelines and juggling resource availability for very short projects (a few days or a week) with longer projects. Most projects are for external clients, so we have to jump to meet their timelines.
Part of our struggle is simple the paradigms and methods of working that we have been using in our past "worlds." We're trying to find a solution that will accommodate all of us, but none of us really want to change! (Like no one has heard that before. :-) Saving Changes...
I posted this similiar thread about capacity planning, would appreciate if anyone has any capacity planning and/or project planning tools that I can use to manage billable consultants. If you've got links/downloads or freeware tools or anything its appreciated.
I'm more interested in a capacity planning perspective where you can forecast the number of consultants doing the job for the month/quarter or six months. This involves a group of 20 consultants working in the same office within the company
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Hey josh. There are a lot of great tools out there. Unfortunately, I've noticed that so many companies, large and small, purchase an application, and then find out that it isn't what they thought. This isn't the case with an application that I came into contact with about a year ago. It's called AtTask. Check them out at attask.com. They will give you a free demo over the phone, and answer all your questions, and their latest version has capacity planning. They do all that other stuff too, like milestone charts, gantt charts, resource, document, and time management. Give them a call and try a free demo. Everyone I've told about them has loved them. They are very reasonably priced too. Check out this review. http://project-management-software-review.toptenreviews.com/ They have more features and are better-priced than MS project and eproject. They should be first on this list. Anyway, I hope this helps. I know it has helped me. Saving Changes...
