How do you keep on top of all of your businesses projects? Are you using a combination of word documents excel spreadsheets and PowerPoint presentations? Or are you using more specialised project management software?
Microsoft has been playing the project management software game for several years. Microsoft Project is designed to assist project managers in developing their schedules, assigning resources to tasks, tracking progress, managing budgets and analysing workloads.
Getting Started with Microsoft Project
Project is available as both an on premise and cloud based solution. We would highly recommend going with the cloud based option, so that users can access it from anywhere and you will receive the latest security updates.
Cloud based Microsoft project has three plans available. These are:
- Project Plan 1
- Project Plan 3
- Project Plan 5
So what are the differences in the three plans?
| Plan 1 | Plan 3 | Plan 5 | |
| Price | ✔ | ✔ | ✔ |
|
Project Home Starting in a centralized view, create new projects easily, quickly access important, top-of-mind projects, or open projects most recently worked on. | ✔ | ✔ | ✔ |
|
Board view Visually track project tasks for better workflow and status, using out-of-box and custom task boards. | ✔ | ✔ | ✔ |
|
Timeline (Gantt) view Track and understand dates, assignments and the relationships of project tasks in visual timeline view. | ✔ | ✔ | ✔ |
|
Collaboration and communication Work together on projects, using Microsoft Teams. | ✔ | ✔ | ✔ |
|
Coauthoring Work together with stakeholders and team members to edit and update task lists, project schedules, and more simultaneously. | ✔ | ✔ | ✔ |
|
Project planning and scheduling Includes familiar scheduling tools to assign project tasks to team members and use different views like Grid, Board, and Timeline (Gantt chart) to oversee the schedule. | ✔ | ✔ | ✔ |
|
Reporting Use pre-built reports to track progress on your projects, resources, programs, and portfolios. | ✔ | ✔ | |
|
Roadmap Build visual, interactive roadmaps by aggregating different project types across your organization for visibility. | Read only | ✔ | ✔ |
|
Timesheet submission Capture project and non project time spent on payroll, invoicing, and other business tasks. | ✔ | ✔ | |
|
Resource management Define the project team, request resources for the project, and assign project tasks to those resources. | ü | ü | |
|
Desktop client Use fully installed, up-to-date Project desktop app. One license covers up to five PCs per person. | ✔
Up to 5 PCs | ✔
Up to 5 PCs | |
|
Portfolio selection and optimization Model different portfolio scenarios to determine the best path by weighing project proposals against strategic business drivers. | ✔ | ||
|
Demand management Capture and evaluate project ideas from anywhere in the organization through a standardized process. | ✔ | ||
|
Enterprise resource planning and management View and compare how resources are used across projects to optimize assignments. | ✔ |
Creating a New Project
To create a new project, navigate to office.com and look for the Microsoft project icon. his test if it is the first time you are using Project, and no one else in your organisation has used it before, you will need to speak to your Microsoft 365 admin to set up relevant activations.
Businesses familiar with Microsoft Planner will recognise a number of features in Microsoft Project. The first thing you need to do is create a new task. Give the task a name, assign it to a member of staff add durations and any other relevant information that will help.
You can view all assigned tasks either by list view (grid), by board – which looks very similar to Microsoft Planner or as a timeline. The timeline gives you a Gantt view of all assigned tasks, when they are due and their progress.
Want to find out more about Microsoft Project? Get in touch with ACUTEC today and see how your business can benefit.
