[Maybe OT] What kind of project Management system should we use

[Anders Eriksson]

Hello,

We are a small company(14 persons) that develop Customer Specifik Marking
Machines.

Every machine is a project that consists of Mechanical, Electrical and
Software Development. The Mechanical and electrical parts are done by
sub-contractors.

We may work on multiple projects in parallell (at the same time).
The project may be anything from a couple of hours work up to years.

Given these premisses, what kind of Project Management systems should we
select?

I have looked at MS Project and for one Project it looks alright, but we
have many projects that uses the same resources and we need to get an view
of all the projects...

Any suggestions?

// Anders

 

[Mike Glen]

Hi Anders,

Welcome to this Microsoft Project newsgroup

Microsoft Project allows you to create a Master project by inserting
projects and sharing them with a resource pool. It thus should be able to
handle your requirement with flying colours! However, I would question the
practicality of adding a project as short as a few hours as it would
probably be impossible to monitor it in such a short time, although Project
will allow you to.

FAQs, companion products and other useful Project information can be seen at
this web address: http://project.mvps.org/faqs.htm

Hope this helps - please let us know how you get on

Mike Glen
MS Project MVP
See http://tinyurl.com/2xbhc for my free Project Tutorials

 

[salgud]

Hello,

We are a small company(14 persons) that develop Customer Specifik Marking
Machines.

Every machine is a project that consists of Mechanical, Electrical and
Software Development. The Mechanical and electrical parts are done by
sub-contractors.

We may work on multiple projects in parallell (at the same time).
The project may be anything from a couple of hours work up to years.

Given these premisses, what kind of Project Management systems should we
select?

I have looked at MS Project and for one Project it looks alright, but we
have many projects that uses the same resources and we need to get an view
of all the projects...

Any suggestions?

// Anders

Are you asking about a PM system, or which software you should use? There
is a big difference. Project Management software is a misnomer, no such
thing exists, in spite of what the marketing people would like you to
believe. MS Project is scheduling software, a tool to help you create your
project schedule. The Project Management Institute defines 10 major
sub-disciplines of PM, one of which is scheduling. No software deals with
all 10 areas.

MS Project Professional deals more effectively with enterprise wide project
scheduling than does MS Project Standard and would probably fill your needs
for scheduling software.

As for a "Project Management System", you probably need to hire a
consultant to set up a Project Office, if you're serious about Project
Management and want to see projects on time and within budget with some
consistency. Otherwise, to paraphrase Lewis in "Project Planning,
Scheduling and Control", "Giving an organization sophisticated scheduling
software when they have no knowledge of Project Management merely enables
them to document their failures accurately".

I hope this helps in your world.

 

[Gary L. Chefetz]

Anders:

May I suggest that you at least look at implementing Microsoft Office
Project Server. This will give you the funtionality you seek.

 

[Dave]

Hello,

We are a small company(14 persons) that develop Customer Specifik Marking
Machines.

Every machine is a project that consists of Mechanical, Electrical and
Software Development. The Mechanical and electrical parts are done by
sub-contractors.

We may work on multiple projects in parallell (at the same time).
The project may be anything from a couple of hours work up to years.

Given these premisses, what kind of Project Management systems should we
select?

I have looked at MS Project and for one Project it looks alright, but we
have many projects that uses the same resources and we need to get an view
of all the projects...

Any suggestions?

// Anders

Microsoft Project can be used for tracking most project types. For the
size of organisation you describe you probably only have a small number
of project managers. Consequently, I would suggest that you use the
application with a resource pool rather than in the server implementation.

However you will need to have a closer look at precisely how you want to
manage and schedule the work before deciding whether or not to use the
application.

You can download a trial version of the application if you want.