Automating tasks for multiple projects

[Sebastián Armas]

Greetings:

On a previous post I asked about automating the baseline creation for
multiple projetcs already stored in Project Server, projects not necesarily
published in PWA.

Suggestions I received for a possible way to do this included using VBA
and/or PSI.

Furthermore, while looking into this matter I realized that I needed to
automate quite a bunch of tasks that may or may not be in the sphere of
responsibility or capability of our project managers, who are still in the
process of acquiring skills on project management, Project Pro/Project Server
and EPM in general.

These tasks include, for projects stored on Project Server:

* Multiple projects basic baseline creation
* Multiple projects publish ing to PWA, provided the project's baseline
hasnt been changed (with only updates on % work completed and such)
* Report on multiple projects that are using local resources or a mix of
local/server resources, instead of only using only server resources

The question, of course, is if these concerns have already been adressed
elsewhere before i.e. if there is (are) application(s) that already workout
these issues, either through VBA on Project Professional, using PSI or
whathaveyou.

If you have any inklings or pointers to such applications, do please share
them here so I may contact the owners for evaluation of their software
capabilities.

Thanks in advance for your kind reply,

 

[Dale Howard [MVP]]

Sebtastian --

I have already offered an opinion to your previous question that I do not
believe this is an automatition issue. Your project managers are not
helpless. At some point, they need to take over responsibilities for
everything you document. This is a training and performance issue, and
today is as good a time as any for them to start managing their own
projects...and doing so according to the methodologies you specify.

I will gladly invite others offer their opinions as well. Hope this helps.

 

[Sebastián Armas]

Dale:

Thanks for your reply. Please read below for my comments.

Sebtastian --

I have already offered an opinion to your previous question that I do not
believe this is an automatition issue. Your project managers are not
helpless. At some point, they need to take over responsibilities for
everything you document. This is a training and performance issue, and
today is as good a time as any for them to start managing their own
projects...and doing so according to the methodologies you specify.

I'd shure do so... if I'd have the time to actually wait for the PM to be
mature enough to _not_ be (as you say) helpless so they may take over their
due responsibilities (as they should, of course).

The reality is that I don't have the time to do so. To put things in
perspective, the process to:

1) Get the the PMs to post their projects weekly updated
2) Use standarized templates and best practices in their gantt's layouts
3) Use standarized resources (both people and generic)
4) Do the above on Project Server, using the server's resourses

all of this has taken, well, over 6 months, with 2 months having the PM
actually working on Project Server.

You may now understand why I, the PM and the organization at large, simply
can't afford for the time the PM's learning curve will require to reach the
point when they can safely create their own baselines and publish only
properly updated projects to PWA.

Hence the need for the tools that will help us me and my unit to streamline
the process... while the PM learn to do so on their own, without compromising
the data already published on PWA.

I will gladly invite others offer their opinions as well. Hope this helps.

It has: thankyou once again. I'll also wellcome new input on the subject.

 

[Dale Howard [MVP]]

Sebastian --

I hope I didn't sound like I was "beating on you" because I wasn't. I'm on
your side, my friend!

I can understand your caution on rolling out Project Server 2007 to all of
your project managers. However, have you provided formal training for your
project managers and team members? Many of our clients have hired us to
train their project managers on how to properly use Project Server 2007.
Some organizations have even hired us to teach their team members how to use
PWA correctly based on their organization's method of tracking progress.

In both of these situations, the organization is able to "go live" with
Project Server 2007 a lot faster than if they tried to do all of the
training themselves. Plus, they guaranteed their staff would learn how to
use the tool properly. Just a thought. Hope this helps.

 

[Rod Gill]

I hate to say this, but it sounds like you've implemented Project Server way
too soon. You need people trained and producing mature, value added
schedules and all processes in place for managing and governing multiple
projects before you can hope to benefit enough from Project Server to pay
back the investment in time servers and licenses etc!

I agree with Dale, get them trained, use PWA for weekly governance meetings
(so PMs either have to update Project in Project Server or spend an hour or
more creating the required reports and still need an up to date schedule)
and base their personal reviews partly on their ability to follow corporate
best practices.

Without this you could invest 10's of thousands of dollars (and then more)
to get questionable results and still have to spend most of your week
maintaining schedules.

--

Rod Gill
Microsoft MVP for Project

Author of the only book on Project VBA, see:
http://www.projectvbabook.com

 

[Gary L. Chefetz]

Sebastián:

Your best-practice violations not withstanding,<G> with a budget, anything
is possible. I don't believe that anyone is going to have this one sitting
on the shelf, but you can certainly automate this.

--
----------
Gary L. Chefetz, MVP
MSProjectExperts
Project Server Consulting: http://www.msprojectexperts.com
Project Server Training: http://www.projectservertraining.com
Project Server FAQS: http://www.projectserverexperts.com
Project Server Help Blog: http://www.projectserverhelp.com

 

[Gary L. Chefetz]

Sebastián:

It turns out that someone has built this tool. Contact me off list if you're
interested. Take the "nospam" out of my email address.

--
----------
Gary L. Chefetz, MVP
MSProjectExperts
Project Server Consulting: http://www.msprojectexperts.com
Project Server Training: http://www.projectservertraining.com
Project Server FAQS: http://www.projectserverexperts.com
Project Server Help Blog: http://www.projectserverhelp.com

 

[MrAlNather]

Sebastián:

Your best-practice violations not withstanding,<G> with a budget, anything
is possible. I don't believe that anyone is going to have this one sitting
on the shelf, but you can certainly automate this.

--
----------
Gary L. Chefetz, MVP
MSProjectExperts
Project Server Consulting:http://www.msprojectexperts.com
Project Server Training:http://www.projectservertraining.com
Project Server FAQS:http://www.projectserverexperts.com
Project Server Help Blog:http://www.projectserverhelp.com















- Show quoted text -

I think a company called Campana and Schott have done work in this
area

http://www.campana-schott.com/en/home/nocache.html