RE: [OT] Project Management - Project 2003?

["White, Peter" <peter.white@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Ho Yin
=20
Project2003 is still the simplest of the 'serious' project management
programmes, but as with all of them is a PITA to use sometimes, and full of
subtle nuances that you really need to know about before embarking on
creating a big project plan.  The more recent versions of Project have
spli=
t
off some of the collaboration elements into a separate bundle (still
included in the Action Pack), which if you can be arsed will integrate with
SharePoint, Exchange etc etc.  In theory it could all be very slick, but
it's a lot of effort, and just as much effort getting people to use it,
unless you have amazingly motivated staff who just love looking at gantt
charts.
=20
Resource pooling, in concept, is a relatively simple thing, and can be done
using a straight network share and Project Standard edition.  I have to say
though unless you work in a very disciplined environment, where nothing
unexpected ever happens, you'll end up with a full time job constantly
retweaking the plan, not that anyone, other than you, will take much notice
of it.
=20
I've been using Project for 10 years, and still use it now, but at really
quite a simple level, even for multi-million pan-EMEA =A3 projects.  As
lon=
g
as client see you're in control, and have a gantt chart (even if they don't
understand it), they're generally happy.  The exception can be the civil
service, but even they are getting less anal about project planning.
=20
Project isn't really like Word or Excel, you can't really just muddle
through and learn it (well, you can, but you'll miss 50% of the useful
functionality) - I have details of a good trainer if it would help, a 2 day
course with him is well worth the money (and day 1 can be the basic stuff
for other stuff, with day 2 for the more complex stuff).
=20
HTH
=20
Pete

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From: Ho yin Ng [mailto:yahoogroups@xxxxxxx]=20
Sent: 09 May 2005 23:27
To: ukha_d@xxxxxxx
Subject: [ukha_d] [OT] Project Management - Project 2003?


I know a lot of you are project managers of some sorts .



I have recently moved up the ranks in my workplace .. and now I am
overseeing projects and managing them (gawd knows why they choose me).



I am trying to get to grips with Microsoft Project 2003 do you all use this
piece of software to organise and resource your projects?



I am trying to set it up so that I can display all my jobs in a single
project file . no point having each single job in a separate file as I need
to pool resources between them.



Can anyone give me some hints on how to do this? Can I set up categories
like you can with tasks in Outlook? Cannot seem to find out how to do this!



Unless someone can suggest a better program to use?



Basically I need to keep track of tasks - schedule them, estimate the time
it will take to do them, resource and finally view and track completed
items.



It is one of those things .. need a good program .. need to learn how to
us=
e
it .. but need to have it working .. NOW! No time to learn as always .. :-(



Thanks,



Ho yin



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