Delays in Schedule

[acss]

I am new to Project but essentially i am recording steps taken to distribute
a access db.The problem is i have to depend on the IT departments to create
web folders at different countries and i do not know how to record their
delays due to their schedule or thier reliance on other departments to
perform tasks out of their control. How does one record in the gannt chart
these delays and weekly emails?

 

[John]

I am new to Project but essentially i am recording steps taken to distribute
a access db.The problem is i have to depend on the IT departments to create
web folders at different countries and i do not know how to record their
delays due to their schedule or thier reliance on other departments to
perform tasks out of their control. How does one record in the gannt chart
these delays and weekly emails?

acss,
The best you can do is to input your best estimate of the delay and then
update it when better information is available. Trying to "schedule"
unknowns is probably the hardest part of developing a plan. Of course,
it becomes even more difficult if there are one or more deadlines that
must be met. In that case you will need to get a firm commitment from
the performers before you have any chance of making the plan work.
Without that "buy-in", you cannot develop a viable plan.

John
Project MVP

 

[acss]

Since this need part of the project is an unknown, should i place an estimate
date in the gannt chart and places notes with weekly updates within the task
to indentify progress? There have been
milestones such as IT discovery of few users not on active directory to use
the future web folders. Would notes and marker milestones provide management
a better view of progress since a couple of months have elapsed? Sorry for
all the questions.

Thanks

 

[John]

Since this need part of the project is an unknown, should i place an estimate
date in the gannt chart and places notes with weekly updates within the task
to indentify progress? There have been
milestones such as IT discovery of few users not on active directory to use
the future web folders. Would notes and marker milestones provide management
a better view of progress since a couple of months have elapsed? Sorry for
all the questions.

Thanks

acss,
It depends on whether you simply want to track status or want to develop
an actual schedule. If you only want to track status, you might be
better off using a spreadsheet and not use Project at all. If you really
do want to develop a schedule, you will need to enter estimates for the
delays in one of two ways. You can set up a separate "delay" task for
each operational step and then enter the estimated delay into the
Duration field of each delay task. Or, you can use a lag successor on
each operational step to the next step similar to the following
(assuming the delay between operational step 10 and 11 is 20 days)
10FS+20d

Hope this helps.
John
Project MVP