Communicating scheduled dates

[nickc]

I am using a stand alone version of Project 2007, primarily for scheduling
and tracking progress/performance of tasks for our service contractors. I
need an effective way of communicating scheduled start dates to the various
contractors (who do not have Project), and get updates back as to the
completion dates. Thus far, I have only used the Excel pivot tables, export
option with the plan of emailing the spreadsheet. However, when I export the
table, and open in Excel, I have quite a bit of cleaning up to do, especially
with task names. There is a name for each level of summary task. So if I
have task names 5 levels deep, the pivot table has a column for each (Name 1,
Name 2, etc.). Is there a more effective way (tool) for communicating with
the contractors regarding scheduled dates, completion dates, etc. then a
Pivot table? I find a standard spreadsheet too hard to follow - just one long
list of tasks.

 

[JulieS]

Hi NickC,

Have you looked at some of the built-in reports in Project? The "To
Do" list produces a filtered list organized by week listing task
name (not summary information), duration, start date, finish date,
and resources listed. The "Who Does What When" report is a report
giving data from the Resource Usage view. You can also create
filters and print any view that show more clearly what you and your
subcontractors need.

With the installation of the pdf printer (there are many inexpensive
or free) you can produce file that your contractors can receive
through email.

I hope this helps. Let us know how you get along.

Julie
Project MVP

Visit http://project.mvps.org/ for the FAQs and additional
information about Microsoft Project

 

[nickc]

Julie:

Thank you very much for the suggestion fpr using reports. I did take a
brief look these (reports). I was hoping for a two way method of
communicating with the contractors, so I could receive a status update
electronically that I could utilize. I realize the ultimate would be
enterprise project management. I even thought I had something with the
tracking toolbar - set reminder, and using this with Outlook, tasks.
However, the set reminder button is greyed out; not sure why.

Nick

 

[JulieS]

Hi Nick,

You're very welcome for the information and thanks for the feedback.
As to the Set Reminder, I think that requires Outlook 2007 to
function as well as email addresses defined in the Resource sheet.
The downside is that once you've sent the tasks to Outlook, they
don't update if the Project schedule gets changed.

I understand your desire to have something electronic to use and
certainly if you could get the contractors to complete the
information in Excel, you could potentially import the data back in
to project. You can still save a project table as an Excel file
(File > Save As), again, consider filtering the data to give a more
targeted approach.

Julie

 

[nickc]

Thanks Julie:

I’m working with exporting to Excel, trying the filters. Unfortunately
there does not appear to be one for filtering out summary tasks. I know, I’m
starting to sound like oh poor me. On the standard (non pivot table) Excel
spreadsheet, these summaries appear along with the subtasks. I will
probably just manually indent the subtasks so the contractors can see the
difference. Once I get the spreadsheet sorted out, I'll probably have the
contractors fill in their part under completion dates and import the task
list into Project.

Nick

 

[JulieS]

Hi Nick,

To help with the formatting in Excel. In the export map add the
field Outline Level. Summary tasks will all have outline level 1,
next tasks outline level 2, etc. You can then use autofiltering in
Excel to hide selected tasks and use the indenting to help "pretty
it up". When you import data back into project, make sure you are
importing into the correct fields. If the contractors are complete
with their tasks, import the date into Actual Start and Actual
Finish -- that will automatically mark the task 100% complete.

Julie

 

[nickc]

Julie:

Just getting to back to this - thank you! I would not have noticed the
outline level field for the export map. Earlier, I was thinking I would try
the WBS field, however this in itelf would look confusing. The outline level
will work well.

Nick

 

[JulieS]

You're welcome NIck. Glad to have helped and thanks for the
feedback. Let us know how you get along.
Julie