Actual work entered changes task duration

[Christina]

PS2003
Default duration = 1 day

We have some tasks where the duration is a fraction of a day. For instance,
to run a particular report may take an hour but could be done in a 4-hour
window. So we set duration of the task to 1/2 day with 1 hour of work. this
is done so that the successor task, which has to happen the same day, can be
scheduled in the 2nd half of the day. Task is also set as Fixed Units, not
effort driven.

The task owner updates the one hour task with one hour of Actual Work and
zero hours remaining. The project manager approves teh update but once the
update is incorporated into MS project, the task's duration has now changed
to 1 day, pushing out the successor task to the next day.

How can we avoid that?? I read in an earlier post that the smallest unit in
the timescale of the timesheet is one day. IF that is the case, does that
mean that we cannot schedule tasks for a duration of a partial day if, once
actuals are entered in PWA, the duration is "rounded up" to that smallest
unit? Even if I used duration of 4 hours, once the actuals are entered, the
duration changes to 8 hours.

Any insight on this would be greatly appreciated

Thanks!
Christina

 

[BoggyBoy]

I would suggest that you capture a baseline and manage to that rather than
the "projected" dates that you are getting from project pro.