[2007] Timesheet Manager & Assignment Owner

[Robert X]

Hello,

What is the use of the two following fields in the Assignments Attributes
section of the Edit Ressource page in PWA 2007:
- Timesheet Manager
- Default Assignment Owner
Thanks for your help

Rob

 

[Robert X]

And what is the interaction between these 2 fields and this third one:
Status Manager (Task field) displayed in Project Pro?
Thanks again

 

[Robert X]

The Status Manager (task field) is not it the user who will approve or
reject the timesheet? But what about the Approval Manager that i found
somewhere else in a Microsoft document?

 

[Robert X]

Hello,
Who is the Next Approver found in My Timesheets page (PWA) among these ones:
- Timesheet Manager
- Assignment Owner
- Default Assignment Owner
- Status Manager

Thanks for clarifying

 

[Dale Howard [MVP]]

Robert X --

The Timesheet Manager is the person to whom Timesheet updates are sent for
approval. The Timesheet Manager can be the resource manager for the
selected resource or can be the resource him/herself if the organization
does not have a formal timesheet approver.

The Default Assignment Owner field specifies the person who sees tasks
assigned to the selected resource on the My Tasks page. If the resource
him/herself is responsible for updating progress on tasks, then you must
designate the resource as his/her own Default Assignment Owner. This way,
when the resource is assigned to tasks in a project and the project manager
publishes the project, the task assignments appear on the resource's My
Tasks page.

In some organization's, the resource him/herself does not report progress on
the tasks using the My Tasks page, and instead, someone like a team leader
reports the progress on behalf of the resource. In a scenario like this,
set the team leader as the Default Assignment Owner for each of his/her
resources, and then their assignments will appear on the team leader's My
Tasks page.

Also, on a sour note, if you create enterprise resources by checking out the
Enterprise Resource Pool in Project Professional 2007 and then adding the
resources, Project Server 2007 DOES NOT populate either the Timesheet
Manager field or the Default Assignment Owner field automatically. Thus,
this oversight forces you to edit each of the resources from the Resource
Center page to enter this information. Hope this helps.

 

[Dale Howard [MVP]]

Robert X --

The Status Manager controls who receives task updates from the team members
assigned to each task. If you have a scenario where two managers will
co-manage a project together, and one manages the first two phases while the
other manages the last two phases, then here is how to set up the project to
enable this:

1. Manager A creates the project, saves it, and publishes it. Project
Server 2007 designates Manager A as the Status Manager for every task.
2. Manager B opens the project, inserts the Status Manager field in any
Task view, and sets him/herself as the Status Manager on each task in the
last two phases.
3. Manager B saves and publishes the project. Project Server 2007 now
designates Manager B as the Status Manager for the last two phases.

When a team member submits a task update in Phase I or Phase II, the system
sends the update to Manager A. When a team member submits a task update on
Phase III or Phase IV, the system sends the update to Manager B.

WARNING: When you open an enterprise project, and insert the Status Manager
field, you CANNOT use either the Fill Handle or Edit - Fill - Down to copy
values from one task into successive tasks. This is a reported bug, and an
annoying one. The best way to handle this is to copy the manager's name
from one task and then to paste it individually into each successive task.
Hope this helps.

 

[Robert X]

Hi all,
The Approval Manager is in the Assignment Details page.
That's all for time management ? Who does what?

So the summary of time-checkers is:

- Timesheet Manager
- Assignment Owner
- Default Assignment Owner
- Status Manager
- Approval Manager
- Next Approver

Thanks for clarifying

 

[Dale Howard [MVP]]

Robert X --

Anyone who has the Approve Timesheets permission. Unless you change the
default permissions in the system, Project Server gives the Approve
Timesheets permission to members of the Resource Managers, Portfolio
Managers, and Administrators groups. Hope this helps.

 

[Robert X]

Thanks a lot Dale,
Six different persons or roles to check times, that was too much for my
understanding. Hopefully you clarified theses processes for me!
Thanks again!

Robert

 

[Dale Howard [MVP]]

Robert X --

You are more than welcome, my friend!

 

[Michael Brown]

Dale,

I do understand the differences in these 3 - my question relates
specifically to the status manager as you've described here. Our resource
managers typically use a template to create an initial plan for the project
lead(s). When the lead opens the plan, he or she can change the status
manager field to themselves. Is it possible, however, for the lead to
reassign the status manager when they are creating the plan itself? We
thought that if we had a project manager (role) added to the team - through
"build team", that this would allow us to select that resource's name in the
drop down list box of the status manager field, but it appears that's not the
case (?). Right now it seems that the resource him or herself must open the
plan in order to assign him or herself that role. Any thoughts?

 

[Dale Howard [MVP]]

Michael --

Excellent question, my friend. Your assumption about the Status Manager
field is incorrect. Consider this example:

1. PM1 creates the project from a template, saves it, and publishes it.
The system sets PM1 as the Status Manager for every task in the project.
2. PM2 opens the project. In the Status Manager field, the system shows
PM1 and PM2 as available choices. PM2 sets the Status Manager field to
himself/herself for the tasks in Phase II only, then saves and publishes the
project.
3. PM3 opens the project. In the Status Manager field, the system shows
PM1, PM2, and PM3 as available choices...

See how it works? The PM himself/herself must open the project to see
his/her own name in the Status Manager field list. Hope this helps.

 

[Michael Brown]

Makes complete sense. Here's the rub: we have resource managers who do our
initial scoping, using some function point analysis type Excel spreadsheet
models. The resource managers are responsible for assigning out the team,
including the project lead. Our business process currently has the resource
manager (instead of the lead), creating the initial plan, and populating the
plan with the estimates coming out of the Excel model. The hope was to allow
the resource manager to populate the status manager field with the name of
the lead, so when that lead opened up the plan for the first time, his or her
name was already populated in the field. Instead, when the lead opens up the
plan, he or she must replace the RESOURCE manager's name with his or her own
name -- and given the "fill down" doesn't behave so nicely, it's a little
time consuming