Examples of planning packages

[DavidR]

In the R&D environment I work in, we find ourselves having to schedule a lot
of the work as “planning packagesâ€. Although I have an idea of how to do
this in MS Project I was wondering if anyone has any tips and examples they
could share. I would really appreciate a sample file. Thanks in advance.

 

[Jim Aksel]

Planning package tasks are no different than regular tasks as far as Project
is concerned. It is generally accepted that Planning Package tasks are at a
higher level, lack detail, and usuall lack resource assignment information.

So, you may have a high level task "Invent Widget" that serves as a detail
task, but is essentially a planning package. Sometimes we designate Planning
Packages as PP in either the Task Name or a text field.

You can assign guestimates of Cost and Work to the task by keying those
values into appropriate columns.

As more detail becomes available, decrement the values at the "Invent
Widget" level and add them to the further delineated detail. That way
"invent wideget" becomes a summary task, but sums to the old values
--
If this post was helpful, please consider rating it.

Jim Aksel, MVP

Check out my blog for more information:
http://www.msprojectblog.com