MS Project: Introduction Course

The first session of this course introduces the basics. It begins by showing you how to navigate around the MS Project interface and menus. This should be familiar to anyone who is an experienced user of Microsoft Office. From there it introduces the basics of setting up a new project. So creating a new project and setting it up with basic details.

The key topics trained in this session are:

• How Project 2016 Works
• Understanding the Project Start Screen
• The Project 2016 Screen
• Project Operations
• Using the Ribbon
• Showing and Collapsing the Ribbon
• Understanding the Backstage
• The Project Work Area
• Working With Views
• Working With Split Screens
• Understanding Sheet Views
• Working With Tables
• Gantt Chart View
• Working With Gantt Charts
• Understanding the QAT
• Working With the QAT
• Working With Project Files

This session covers some useful background and helps to put Microsoft Project into a practical context. We review what is project management, why planning is so important and how project management tools, and more particularly computers, can make the process of project management simpler and faster.

The key topics trained in this session are:

• Tasks and Resources
• The Importance of Planning
• Understanding the Gantt Chart
• Computers and Project Management

• Steps in Creating a Project
• Understanding Your Project
• Creating a New Project File
• Calendar Options
• Changing Calendar Options
• Working With Calendars
• Modifying the Standard Calendar
• Entering Public Holidays
• Creating a New Resource Calendar
• Creating a New Task Calendar
• Setting Up Project Information
• Entering File Properties

Tasks are one of the key building blocks of project management. This section explains how MS Project handles the individual tasks that make up your overall project. It shows you how to create a new task, how it is measured (time, work, units etc) and how to move or duplicate tasks that you have already created.

This session also covers how you set the constraints on a task and the deadlines for a task. Ensuring that the tasks for your project are correctly set up and configured is vital for a smooth running project.

The key topics trained in this session are:

• Understanding Tasks
• Understanding Scheduling Icons
• Our Case Study Tasks
• Reviewing the Project
• Entering Tasks
• Creating Summary Tasks
• Assignment Creating Summary Tasks
• Working in a Sheet View
• Working With Summary Tasks
• Working With Task Views
• Examining Task Information
• Understanding Task Durations
• Entering Task Durations
• Checking Progress
• Entering Milestones
• Assigning a Calendar to a Task

Dependencies explain the relationships between tasks in Project. Within a project most tasks will be linked. So for example, if you are renovating a house you cannot paint a wall before you have plastered it, allowed it to dry and prepared it to be painted. This session focuses on how Project works with related tasks and how you can set up the dependencies to help you understand how your project is progressing and how best to run it.

We look at working in Project with tasks that have a lead time and also a lag time in this session. These are tasks where they can either overlap to some extent with the previous task (lead time) or where some clear time is required between one task being completed and the subsequent task commencing (lag time). Adding lag times is also a simple way to build in a small amount of contingency into a plan.

The key topics trained in this session are:

• Understanding Task Dependencies
• Creating Dependencies Automatically
• Creating Dependencies in Task Entry
• Creating Dependencies in Task Information
• Creating Dependencies in a Sheet View
• Fine Tuning a Schedule Using Dependencies
• Auto Scheduling Tasks
• Critical Path and Project Slack
• Viewing the Critical Path
• Examining Task Slack
• Understanding Lag Time
• Entering Lag Time
• Understanding Lead Time
• Entering Lead Time
• Inactivating a Task

• Understanding Resources
• Entering Work Resources
• Entering Material Resources
• Entering Cost Resources
• Assigning Calendars to Resources
• Understanding Resource Availability
• Adjusting Resource Availability
• Changing the Unit Display

This session focuses on how you set up and input your project resources into MS Project. It also shows you how to set up the costs of your resources correctly. Once you have correctly set up your tasks and resources for a project, you are well on your way to having a clear plan for its execution.

The key topics trained in this session are:

• Resource Assignment Calculations
• Task Types and Work Effort
• Creating a Simple Assignment
• Working With Fixed Unit Tasks
• Working With Fixed Duration Tasks
• Making Multiple Assignments
• Adding Additional Resources
• Adding More of the Same Resource
• More Resources in Multiple Assignments
• Understanding Effort Driven Scheduling
• Working With Non Effort Driven Tasks
• Working With Effort Driven Tasks
• Resource Assignment Summary

Having set up your resources in the previous session, this session covers how you then work with and assign your resources to tasks. It covers part-time resourcing and how you can specify usage either by hours or percentages. We also look at a case study on resources in Project to finish this session.

The key topics trained in this session are:

• Simple Resource Assignments
• Assigning Part Time Resources
• Understanding Work Contouring
• Specifying Resource Usage
• Contouring Work Hours
• Assigning Specific Work Times
• Work Times for Multiple Assignments
• Problem Assignments
• Assigning Resources in Task Information
• Assigning Resources in a Sheet
• Assigning Resources You Do Not Have
• The Case Study Resources

• Understanding Resource Levelling
• Creating Resource Chaos
• Tracking Down Over Allocations
• Checking Resource Usage
• Creating an Over Allocation Report
• Fix 1 – Changing Work Effort
• Understanding Overtime
• Fix 2 – Assigning Overtime
• Fix 3 – Hiring Contract Labour
• Fix 4 – Switching Work Assignments
• Fix 5 – Rescheduling Tasks

The other key input into a project is materials. This session covers these in detail showing you how to assign material consumption in various ways so that it best fits the profile of usage in the project.

The key topics trained in this session are:

• Assigning Fixed Material Consumption
• Contouring Materials Usage
• Adding More Material Assignments
• Assigning Variable Usage Material
• Adding to a Material Assignment
• Checking Work for Materials

The final part of working with the inputs for a project is to pull together materials and resources into a Project Cost plan. This session shows you how to add costs either per day or per usage, or to make them fixed. It also shows you how to change the costs during a project if necessary. Once we have completed this session, creating a full cost plan for your project will be simple.

The key topics trained in this session are:

• Understanding Project Costs
• Reviewing Current Costs
• Entering Variable Costs
• Case Study Variable Costs
• Assigning Daily Costs
• Assigning Per Usage Costs
• Assigning Fixed Costs
• Assigning Material Costs
• Using Another Cost Table
• Applying a Different Cost Table
• Changing Rates During a Project
• Assigning Cost Resources
• Viewing Project Costs

This session drills down into the detail of working with deadlines and constraints. By default all tasks are set with a constraint of As Soon As Possible but if something needs to be completed for a set date (for example a conference or other fixed date) then setting that date will allow Project to flag up very early if changes to the plan will impact that date.

The key topics trained in this session are:

• Understanding Constraints and Deadlines
• Reviewing Our Project
• Adding a Constraint
• Using Elapsed Time
• Rescheduling Tasks
• Creating a Deadline

This session shows you how to use Project to manage and keep track of a live project once you have it fully set up. It shows you how to create a baseline for your project. This allows you to then compare future project plans with your initial plan very simply. We also cover how to update a project for actual results and how to delay tasks that are already set up.

The key topics trained in this session are:

• Creating a Baseline
• Automatically Updating Tasks
• Manually Updating Tasks
• Entering Delayed Tasks
• Tracking Actuals on a Gantt Chart
• Using the Tracking Box
• Viewing Task Slippage

• Understanding The Data Tools
• Basic Data Highlighting
• Highlighting Date Ranges
• Highlighting A Range Of Tasks
• Highlighting Tasks With Specific Resources
• More Highlight Filters
• Applying Filters
• Editing Existing Filters
• Deleting An Unwanted Filter
• Grouping Tasks
• Using AutoFilters

• Understanding the Timescale
• Changing Time Periods
• Showing Tiers
• Modifying Specific Tiers
• Formatting for Non-Working Time
• Changing Text Styles
• Working With Gridlines
• Changing the Layout
• Understanding Gantt Chart Bars
• Changing Gantt Chart Styles
• Changing Bar Text
• Formatting Selected Bars
• Changing Bar Styles

• Printing a Gantt Chart
• Printing Sheet Views
• Printing Tasks for Resources
• Printing Resources for Tasks

• Placing Printing Commands on the Ribbon
• Using Print Preview
• Setting Page Breaks
• Printing Specific Dates and Pages
• Printing Headers
• Printing Footers
• Working With the Legend
• Getting the Right Report Fit
• Exporting to PDF