% Work Complete 'Variance'

[Shahriar Nour Khondokar]

I have created a project plan and then set a baseline.
After that for each task that has been completed, i have entered Actual Work
value, which in turn updated the Work column (when Actual is greater or less
than baseline) and the %Work Complete column (for the whole project).

What i need is the % Work Complete calculated based on the baseline plan. In
other words I would like to know when a task is marked as 100%complete, how
much of the baseline work is complete (along with % Work Complete based on
Actual Work input, found in the '% Work Complete' column).

Is there a built in column in MS Project where this data is stored?

 

[Andrew Lavinsky]

I am not entirely sure what you're looking for, as if the task is 100% Complete,
that would imply the baseline work is complete as well - unless the the estimate
was padded and the actual came in under estimate. A couple of custom formulas
that might help are:

1) % Work Complete X Baseline Work - which tells you how much work you budgeted
to get to where you are. If you want to take it to the next level, you can
divide the result by Actual Work to develop a CPI of sorts.

2) Actual Work / Baseline Work - For completed tasks, I this would show you
a measure of how well you performed on the task, but for an incomplete task,
I don't think it would do much - and perhaps be quite misleading if anyone
looked at it.

Does that help you pin down what you're looking for?

-A

 

[Shahriar Nour Khondokar]

Sorry for the confusion.
When I say "What i need is the % Work Complete calculated based on the
baseline plan." I mean the % Work Complete for the whole project (i.e. the
value in the project summary row) calculated based on the baseline while %
Work complete based on Actual work is calculated too.

 

[Andrew Lavinsky]

Could you perhaps provide an example of how this would be utilized?

-A

 

[Shahriar Nour Khondokar]

I work in an IT company where we build websites for projects.

Each project consists of about a 100 tasks, each task is typically worth 4
to 5 hrs work.

These tasks are usually completed in their allocated time but of course
sometimes the actual work for a task exceeds the estimate. The main reason
for the extra work is usually an error was made in the development process
i.e. estimate was OK.

Tasks that require less work than the estimate are very rare and can be
ignored.

Until now we have been calculating % Work Complete (for the whole project)
based on Actual Work.
But recently my boss has come to the decision that we also need to calculate
% Work Complete (for the whole project) based on the Baseline Work.
The main reason behind that is, from a clients perspective, the % Work
Complete based on the baseline is an indication of how much of the work is
complete. The projects are fixed fee projects so, the client does not need to
know how much of the money budget has been used or is remaining; he just
needs to know how much of the project is complete in terms of
features/functionalities.

Hope this answers your question Andrew.

Please help me with this problem.

 

[Shahriar Nour Khondokar]

Dear Jim
thanks for your knowledgeable reply.

Though this information has added to my knowledge of MS Project & project
management, this isn't exactly what i need.

For one we do not enter cost/rates into MS Project. We use it for planning
and tracking work only (at least for now).

So, i was actually thinking of something more simple. It does not even have
to include tasks that are In progress (though it would be good to incorporate
those, specially if it is easy to do so).

One way I can think of doing this is manually by adding up the baseline work
for all the tasks that are Complete (might also include work hours already
spent for tasks that are In progress) and then divide it by Baseline work for
the whole project.
So, what I was looking for by posting this problem in this forum is an
automatic away to do this calculation; such as a column that stores this
calculated value the way it is done for % Work Complete based on Actuals.

Hope this clarifies things a little more.
Your responses/help is really appreciated and looking forward to a solution
to this problem.

 

[Jim Aksel]

Sorry I seemed to babble on and on...
If you think about it, you can probably get what you need with my approach
if you assign a cost of $1/hr to your resources and use PhyscialRComplete.
If you do not use resources, just make a generic resource "Worker" at $1/hr
and that would do it. Work and cost become synonamous (sp?).

At the end of the day, a 5 hour task that cost $5 would get you the result
you need. I've done it this way many times. That way, you can ignore the
"costs" of spending more hours than your baseline budget. Your 5 hour ($5)
task gets you $5 credit when 100 Physical%Complete ... even if you spent 7
hours (or 2 hours) to do it.

I really think that's what you are looking for.

If you hit my blog, I have a white paper that explains the differences
between the three types of % Complete that project uses. Physical%Complete is
weighted by cost, limited to baseline. However, if $1=1hour of work, that
looks pretty much like what you need, at least that's my read of it.

Post back if you need anything else. I think some of my peers may weigh in
as well.

Hope we helped.
--
If this post was helpful, please consider rating it.

Jim Aksel, MVP

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

 

[Andrew Lavinsky]

I think we're all pretty close. The question is whether you want to use
Project's native EVMS functionality with its reporting and timephased
tracking - or create a custom field which doesn't tie into the out of the box
reports, and wouldn't be timephased.

If you assign the $1/hr resource rate, you could use EVMS easily.

If not, I still think you could achieve the goal with a custom formula of
"([% Work Complete] X [Baseline Work])/60." If you are updating actual and
remaining work regularly, that will get you the number you seek.

Shahriar - why would that not work?

-A

 

[Shahriar Nour Khondokar]

Andrew and Jim thanks very much to both of you for your. You don't know how
much i appreciate this help.

Andrew:
The first time u suggested using the custom formula i was actually looking
for a built in column such as '% Work Complete' that will serve my purpose.
But seems like it does not exist. So, I have decided to use Projects EVM
functionalities and the advantages it will provide like u have described.

Jim:
Following you suggestions i have have started using the 'Physical % Complete'.
For this purpose in new project plans i am assigning Standard Rate of $1 for
all resources and assigning those resources to all tasks. After that i have
saved a baseline and from Tools > Options > Calculations, i have changed the
'Default Task EVM' to 'Physical % Complete'.
From then on, for tasks that are 100 % complete, i am setting their
'Physical % Complete' to 100%.

Will you please confirm that the right process has been followed (to solve
the problem this post is about)?

....

I have another question:
What do i do for projects that already have a baseline created and Actual
values (Work, Start/Finish dates) entered?
To answer this question I downloaded the white papers from your blog
regarding % Complete and came to conclusion that if i entered the Baseline
Work value in the corresponding Baseline Cost column (after assigning $1
standard rate to resources), i will be set up to solve the problem i was
discussing at the beginning of the post.

Do you agree?