How to Schedule a Project in Microsoft Project 2003

1. How to Schedule A Project in
MS Project 2003
Bill Cole

2. Overview
Scheduling is a primary activity of project management.
PMI calls scheduling: Time Management.
Schedule is NOT a one time activity during a project!
Think of scheduling properly with MS Project is like learning
how to properly use a power saw for a carpenter.

3. What can MS Project Do?
• Create a schedule
• Communicate the scope
• Communicate roles for the team
• Communicate expectations
• Communicate the status
• Tool for project changes

4. What MS Project Can Not Do
• Creates estimates
• Provide the tasks necessary to complete the project
• Point out faulty dependencies between tasks
• Pop up a box when key tasks are missing
• Manage the project

5. Existing vs Scratch Plan
Should One Use an Existing Plan or Set Up a Plan from
Scratch?
Advantages of Existing Plan
• May not have to touch 100% of tasks
Disadvantages of Existing Plan
• May have to touch 90% of tasks anyway
• The auto scheduling feature may be impacted by something
the prevous plan owner did and you can't seem to find it
• End up spending as much as, or more time doctoring up an
existing plan.

6. Existing vs Scratch Plan
Advantages of Scratch
• Clean set of tasks
• Clean project information
• Less time finding and fixing gotchas from a former schedule
• Lets MS Project do its job: create the schedule
Disadvantages of Scratch
• Enter all tasks

7. Schedule in MS Project 2003
1. Set Up MS Project
2. Enter Tasks
3. Enter Estimates
4. Enter task dependencies
5. Enter constraints, deadlines and task calendars
6. Enter resources
7. Assign resources
8. Optimize the schedule
See "Dynamic Scheduling with MS Project 2003 by Eric Uyttewaal, PMP

8. Set up MS Project
1. Describe your project
1.File Properties
2.Project Information
2. Set MS Project Options:
1.Date Format
2.Hours per day
3.Set default task type
4.Calculate automatically
3. Manual Resource Leveling
4. Set Project Calendar

9. Enter Tasks
• Several Types of Tasks
o Summary Tasks
o Detail Tasks
o Milestones
• How much detail?
o Match status periods
o 1% to 10% Rule
o 40 to 80 hours
• What are tasks used for?
o Task assignment
o Communication
o Status
o Dependency and criticality to the overall schedule

10. Enter Estimates
• What are estimates?
• What's a method for estimating?
o Experience
o SWAG
o Size based
• Types of tasks and relationship to estimating:
o Fixed Duration(Training session or paint drying)
o Fixed Work (Building a home)
o Fixed Unit (1 woman and 9 months)

11. Enter task dependencies
• What are dependencies?
• Why use dependencies?
• Types of Dependencies
o Finish-to-start (FS)
o Start-to-start (SS)
o Finish-to-finish (FF)
o Start-to-finish (SF)

12. Enter constraints, deadlines and task
calendars
• What is a constraint?
• What is a deadline?
• What is a task calendar?

13. Enter resources
Types of resources:
• Human
• Facility
• Machine
• Material
Types of resource availability:
• Part-time
• Full Time
• Overtime
• Compressed work week

14. Assign Resources
Assignment associates one task with one or more resources.
Assignment types:
• Fixed Duration
• Fixed Units
• Fixed Work

15. Optimize the Schedule
Two basic types of optimization
• Time
• Time and cost
Both types utilize the Critical Path.

16. Optimize for Time
Steps to Optimize Time
• Hightlight Critical Path
• Sort tasks on Duration
• Find longest Duration
• Make a change on the longest duration
• Consider impact
• Repeat

17. Optimize for Time and Cost
Steps to Optimize for Time and Cost
• Optimize for Time first.
• Sort tasks based on cost
• Find the most expensive task
• Make a change on the most expensive task
• Consider impact
• Repeat