Begin Milestone Subtasks

[dee]

Based on what I have read here about no tasks "dangling" by themselves, and
to help avoid problems if move, etc. tasks, I have the following structure.

Project Begins Milestone
Phase One Summary
First Phase Begins Milestone
T1 (of this phase)
T2 "
T3 "
First Phase Ends Milestone
Phase Two
Second Phase Begins Milestone
T1 (of this phase)
T2 "
T3 "
End of Phase Two Milestone
End of Project Milestone

My questions are:
Should the Project Begins Milestone be linked to T1 in First Phase?
Should the tasks beneath each X Phase Begins Milestone be sub-tasks of it?
(indented and it becomes the parent or summary task?)

Just not totally clear on the correct structure. Any advice is greatly
appreciated!

 

[John]

Based on what I have read here about no tasks "dangling" by themselves, and
to help avoid problems if move, etc. tasks, I have the following structure.

Project Begins Milestone
Phase One Summary
First Phase Begins Milestone
T1 (of this phase)
T2 "
T3 "
First Phase Ends Milestone
Phase Two
Second Phase Begins Milestone
T1 (of this phase)
T2 "
T3 "
End of Phase Two Milestone
End of Project Milestone

My questions are:
Should the Project Begins Milestone be linked to T1 in First Phase?
Should the tasks beneath each X Phase Begins Milestone be sub-tasks of it?
(indented and it becomes the parent or summary task?)

Just not totally clear on the correct structure. Any advice is greatly
appreciated!

dee,
You don't really need the milestones and excessive use of milestones can
quickly clutter up a schedule. I would limit milestones to the end of
major events in the schedule - that may or may not be the end of each
phase - it depends on what your schedule is doing. If the beginning of
the next phase starts when the last phase is completed then the start
and finish milestones between phases is overkill. I'd either have just
one milestone, preferably at the end of a phase and then link the first
task of the next phase directly to that milestone, or eliminate all the
milestones (except maybe for the last item in the schedule - that allows
multiple paths in a schedule to all come to one final finish). Just
remember that what ever you do, a milestone is just that, it has zero
duration and no resources.

A summary task should never be considered a milestone and in fact it
can't since a milestone is zero duration and a summary line will always
have a duration that is determined by the performance tasks under it.

Hope this helps.
John
Project MVP

 

[dee]

Thank very much for your response. I guess I was going for overkill!

 

[dee]

Hi Trevor,

Thanks for your response. I guess I'll have to try both methods and see
which works best for me. I depend on your and other contributors for your
valuable input and experience.

I guess one thing I'm learning is that different people approach various
tasks in different ways.

Thanks again!

 

[John]

Thank very much for your response. I guess I was going for overkill!

Dee,
You're welcome and thanks for the feedback.

For very large, projects I favor putting milestones on important events
(e.g. project start, intermediate reviews, etc.). However, I have seen
project plans that had nearly as many milestones as performance tasks -
I call that clutter.

The bottom line is that you need to find the balance that is right for
you.

John
Project MVP