Actual worked hours against estimated hours

[Muddypaws]

Not sure if this is possible, being a newby to MS Project, but......

I have created a resource pool and detailed the availability of each
person. What I am trying to do, and struggling with it:

1. Someone has created a task and said it will take 5 days, however
the person allocated completed it in 2 days. This is where I get
confused because I leave the days as is, but go to the Tasj Sheet and
select Work to view the Work column and change it to say 2 days. But
then the whole dates change completely. I want it to show say 1st Jan
to 5th Jan which is what was estimated, but it only took from 1st Jan
to 3rd Jan and the person was avilable for that task for 2% of his/her
time? So I save XXXX number of hours etc

2. In the resource pool which is linked to my other 9 projects, when
the allocate a person to a task, can MS Project notify them
automatically to say that they cannot use this person as they are
alocated elsewhere?

3. When a task is due or overdue how can MS Project notify the user?

Thanks

 

[Dave]

1. In order to preserve your original plan you should create a baseline
of it. You will then be able to compare the actual progress of the plan
against this baseline in various ways including gantt overlay.

When you carry out work on the plan you can record progress in a variety
of days. The most comprehensive is to record the actual hours worked in
the actual work column and then adjust the remaining work (this is
essentially what you are doing by changing the task to 2 days and
marking it complete). You can also enter % complete or even enter
actual start and finish dates.

The dates for the remainder of the work must necessarily start as the
successor task can now in principle start 3 days earlier if there are no
other limiting constraints. I don't understand why you think dates
shouldn't change. Surely you don't want to do nothing for 3 days just
because you finished something earlier than planned.

The number of hours you save is the variance from the baseline figure
for the work.

2. Not sure who is meant to be notifiying who in this question. But it
seems a matter of process to see how busy somebody is before allocating
them to a task. You can see somebody's loading from the resource graph.
If they are overloaded, then red text appears in a number of locations
including the resource sheet, resource and task usage views and so on.

3. Missed deadlines and that sort of information are indicated in the
info column. Not sure if any of the email integration elements can do
this automatically, but if you search these groups you should find
references to them.

 

[Muddypaws]

1. In order to preserve your original plan you should create a baseline
of it. You will then be able to compare the actual progress of the plan
against this baseline in various ways including gantt overlay.

When you carry out work on the plan you can record progress in a variety
of days. The most comprehensive is to record the actual hours worked in
the actual work column and then adjust the remaining work (this is
essentially what you are doing by changing the task to 2 days and
marking it complete). You can also enter % complete or even enter
actual start and finish dates.

The dates for the remainder of the work must necessarily start as the
successor task can now in principle start 3 days earlier if there are no
other limiting constraints. I don't understand why you think dates
shouldn't change. Surely you don't want to do nothing for 3 days just
because you finished something earlier than planned.

The number of hours you save is the variance from the baseline figure
for the work.

2. Not sure who is meant to be notifiying who in this question. But it
seems a matter of process to see how busy somebody is before allocating
them to a task. You can see somebody's loading from the resource graph.
If they are overloaded, then red text appears in a number of locations
including the resource sheet, resource and task usage views and so on.

3. Missed deadlines and that sort of information are indicated in the
info column. Not sure if any of the email integration elements can do
this automatically, but if you search these groups you should find
references to them.









- Show quoted text -

Brilliant, thanks for this. I did save a baseline, I am sort of
learning as I go along, but starting to struggle a little with it to
be honest. But now I know how to compare this is great. I have also
worke dout how to email tasks that are behind, so thats ok too.

What I am confused about is what is the difference between % Work
Complete and % Completed. When I look at the Task Sheet and then
select Work there are two differences one columns states 50% the other
states 33% I cannot figure it out?

 

[Dave]

Brilliant, thanks for this. I did save a baseline, I am sort of
learning as I go along, but starting to struggle a little with it to
be honest. But now I know how to compare this is great. I have also
worke dout how to email tasks that are behind, so thats ok too.

What I am confused about is what is the difference between % Work
Complete and % Completed. When I look at the Task Sheet and then
select Work there are two differences one columns states 50% the other
states 33% I cannot figure it out?

Work complete is basically, as it says, the percentage of work that has
been completed. So if there are 100 hours on a task and 33 have been
worked, then the %work complete is 33.

%complete simply refers to the duration. You coud for example be
halfway through a task on the time line but only 33% through the work
(if for example 2 people worked on the task for the last half of its
lifetime).

Dave

 

[Dave]

Brilliant, thanks for this. I did save a baseline, I am sort of
learning as I go along, but starting to struggle a little with it to
be honest. But now I know how to compare this is great. I have also
worke dout how to email tasks that are behind, so thats ok too.

What I am confused about is what is the difference between % Work
Complete and % Completed. When I look at the Task Sheet and then
select Work there are two differences one columns states 50% the other
states 33% I cannot figure it out?

Work complete is basically, as it says, the percentage of work that has
been completed. So if there are 100 hours on a task and 33 have been
worked, then the %work complete is 33.

%complete simply refers to the duration. You coud for example be
halfway through a task on the time line but only 33% through the work
(if for example 2 people worked on the task for the last half of its
lifetime).

Dave

 

[Dave]

Brilliant, thanks for this. I did save a baseline, I am sort of
learning as I go along, but starting to struggle a little with it to
be honest. But now I know how to compare this is great. I have also
worke dout how to email tasks that are behind, so thats ok too.

What I am confused about is what is the difference between % Work
Complete and % Completed. When I look at the Task Sheet and then
select Work there are two differences one columns states 50% the other
states 33% I cannot figure it out?

Work complete is basically, as it says, the percentage of work that has
been completed. So if there are 100 hours on a task and 33 have been
worked, then the %work complete is 33.

%complete simply refers to the duration. You coud for example be
halfway through a task on the time line but only 33% through the work
(if for example 2 people worked on the task for the last half of its
lifetime).

Dave

 

[Steve House]

Work and duration don't necessarily proceed at the same rate. Imagine a
task that requires 1 hour on each of Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, and
Thursday and then a big finish for 8 hours on Friday. The duration is from
the moment the task begins, Mon am, untill it ends, Fri pm - let's say 40
hours. The work, OTOH, totals up to 12 man-hours. It's Thursday at 5pm and
we're updating progress. % Complete is duration ... 32 hours has passed out
of the 40 total and % Complete is 80%. OTOH, we've done 4 hours work out of
the total of 12 required. Work is 4/12 or 33% Complete.