how long will take me to complete Project self-learning?

[a_tobe]

Hi all,

I am a quick learner and skilled in both computer and Project Management
Domain knowledge. I am new to MS Project 2003. How long will take me to
complete the self-learning? Thanks

 

[JackD]

In general my experience has been:

A few hours to get the basics. A week to learn all the features that it has.
A month to make it work the way you want. A year to be able to figure out
why it doesn't work the way you want. Two years until you figure out how to
work around that.

 

[a_tobe]

Thanks JackD! It sounds logical to me. One more following question...how long
does it take for me to become a good MS Project trainer from now?

 

[JackD]

Some people never become good at training. Some people can train people on
anything.
There is no rule. Reading and responding to questions in this newsgroup is a
help though. The more problems and solutions you are exposed to, the more
likely you are to be able to help people avoid problems and to be able to
provide them with answers when they come across a difficult problem.

 

[Steve House [MVP]]

I've been using Project for about 10 years and training for about 18 years.
I figure it's only within the last 5 years I began to truly understand the
way Project is best used to manage projects but then my BS degree includes
an economics minor to help relate the theory to the software.

If your goal is to become a trainer in MS Project, unlike other Office
applications like Word for example, learning the software inside and out is
only the starting point. You simply must understand WHY it acts the way it
does as well as understanding what it does and how it does it. As I like to
put it, you don't need to be a professional writer to understand everything
there is to know about Word but you do need to understand the discipline of
formal project manager to go beyond the bare basics with Project.

 

[a_tobe]

Thank you Steve for your insight!

Do you think there are enough MS Project trainers in the market place?
Especially for Project 2003? If I want to take courses somewhere to learn
Project formally, where can I find those trainers or courses?

If you happen to know some of trainers, how do you feel about their quality?

Thank you again.

 

[Steve House [MVP]]

As for whether there are enough or not, I really don't know. There is a
high demand for Project training but unfortunately there are a lot more
people offering Project training than there are *competent* Project
trainers. Far too many software trainers - and this applies to other
applications as well as Project training - and far too much courseware, for
that matter, present the training from the perspective of "push this button
to make that happen." You can get away with that in with Word or
Powerpoint - once you demonstrate that the big "B" on the formatting toolbar
makes selected text bold, you've pretty well covered how to make text bold -
but Project and project management is a different kettle of fish altogether
and using MSP effectively requires understanding the business context,
managment processes in general and the formal project managment processes in
specific, none of which have anything directly to do with the mechanics of
working the MSP software. As a Project instructor I feel very strongly you
have to present both the software topics and the business topics together so
that people not only know how to make something happen but are able to
clearly understand WHY they're doing it, the ramifications of the result on
their ability to control the project, and when the result is the appropriate
thing to do and when it's not. Just because it's possible to do something
doesn't mean it's the right thing to do and IMHO it's far more important to
understand the latter than it is how to do the former.

 

[a_tobe]

Thanks, Steve! That makes sense!

Do you know what is the market rate for a Project 2003 course? How much per
hour? How many hours are in total in a course?

 

[Steve House [MVP]]

The cost for a student or the pay-rate for an instructor?

 

[a_tobe]

For both, if possible. I am thinking to take some courses first to speed up
the learning process. Also, I want to know what the possibility is to work as
a trainer. Thanks Steve!

 

[Steve House [MVP]]

It really varies a great deal depending on where you're located. A bit of
time with the phone book calling the private computer training schools,
community colleges, and university adult education divisions in your area
should give you some ideas.

 

[davegb]

I agree with Steve. I'd like to add that how long it takes to
understand any scheduling software is greatly influenced by how much
experience you already have in scheduling, particularly critical path
scheduling, and in Project Management. If you already know these
things, it's just learning how to apply these concepts in a new tool.
The same idea would apply to learning Excel - if you already know math,
i.e., the order of operations, it's much faster and easier to learn
Excel.
If you want to be an expert in Project, use it to schedule a few decent
sized projects and learn not only how to schedule, but how the schedule
affects and is affected by other considerations, such as Quality, Risk,
Communications, Earned Value, etc. Just like most tools, in isolation,
it appears much simpler than it is in the "real world", where it is
interconnected with other factors.
As far as MSP trainers - most of them that I have met have absolutely
no concept of how this tool is applied. They teach "push button"
classes, as Steve said, and leave the students with no real
understanding of how to make this work on real world projects.
The best way I've found to tell if they really know how to apply MSP is
to ask if they know what "feature" must be turned off to use Project
effectively. If they don't know that, they don't know Project.

 

[JackD]

Absolutely!
The greatest skill in using project is restraint.

 

[Steve House [MVP]]

I'd like to compare notes, as it were. The feature(s) I think it is
essential to turn off to use Project effectively are: Automatically Add New
Resources & Tasks, Autolink Inserted and Moved Tasks, and Resource
Leveling - Automatic (set to manual instead). What's your vote? <g>

Steve House [MVP]

 

[JackD]

Of those three, the autolink is my choice for #1. How about fiscal year?

 

[Dale Howard [MVP]]

davegb --

I know this is going to "open a can of worms" in this forum, but I think
your comment about "If they don't know that, they don't know Project" is
just plain silly. Do you seriously think that an instructor's competency
can be determined by how they answer a single question? Come on. Give us
all a break.

 

[davegb]

The one I was thinking of was autolink. But I agree the others are also
useless.

 

[davegb]

I don't recall saying that it measured their "competance as an
instructor". I said "If they don't know that, they don't know
Projec­t".

Their competance as an instructor is dependent of a variety of things,
many of them not technical. I said that if they don't know that yet,
they haven't figured out how to use Project. If they don't know that,
they don't know how to properly link, and if they don't know how to
link, they can't use Project effectively. So when I talk to anyone who
claims to be an advanced user/teacher, I ask them that. If they don't
know the answer, I don't bother asking them anything else. It's a great
way to separate the men from the boys (with apologies to you feminists
out there). I stand by my statement.

 

[JackD]

It is an indicator of incompetence rather than of competence.
Knowing the limitations is as important as knowing what features exist.

--
-Jack ... For project information and macro examples visit
http://masamiki.com/project

..
I don't recall saying that it measured their "competance as an
instructor". I said "If they don't know that, they don't know
Projec­t".

Their competance as an instructor is dependent of a variety of things,
many of them not technical. I said that if they don't know that yet,
they haven't figured out how to use Project. If they don't know that,
they don't know how to properly link, and if they don't know how to
link, they can't use Project effectively. So when I talk to anyone who
claims to be an advanced user/teacher, I ask them that. If they don't
know the answer, I don't bother asking them anything else. It's a great
way to separate the men from the boys (with apologies to you feminists
out there). I stand by my statement.

 

[Dale Howard [MVP]]

davegb --

I stand by my original statement, as evidenced by your latest statement, "if
they don't know that yet, they haven't figured out how to use Project." You
set up an arbitrary test based on a single question, and then draw broad
conclusions about the competence of the instructor. I don't think that is
fair or prudent.

You stand by your statement. I stand by mine. Good luck, my friend.




I don't recall saying that it measured their "competance as an
instructor". I said "If they don't know that, they don't know
Projec­t".

Their competance as an instructor is dependent of a variety of things,
many of them not technical. I said that if they don't know that yet,
they haven't figured out how to use Project. If they don't know that,
they don't know how to properly link, and if they don't know how to
link, they can't use Project effectively. So when I talk to anyone who
claims to be an advanced user/teacher, I ask them that. If they don't
know the answer, I don't bother asking them anything else. It's a great
way to separate the men from the boys (with apologies to you feminists
out there). I stand by my statement.