force specific period ending dates in resource usage

[DWeb]

Hello! I am hoping someone can help me answer this question. My project
team enters hours worked twice monthly according to corporate time periods,
generally the for periods ending on the 15th or 30th/31st of each month.

I am trying to enter hours for each resource into the Resource Usage View to
reflect the total hours for a given period. Unfortunately, the summary sheet
I am working from has hours under 3/15, 3/31, etc., whereas when I adjust the
timescale in the Resource Usage view in Project, I get week BEGINNING dates
of 3/13, 3/27, etc.

Is there any way I can adjust the timescale in Project to reflect the way my
data is organized so that I can just enter it directly from my summary
spreadsheet without having to work with the the underlying day by day hours?

 

[John]

Hello! I am hoping someone can help me answer this question. My project
team enters hours worked twice monthly according to corporate time periods,
generally the for periods ending on the 15th or 30th/31st of each month.

I am trying to enter hours for each resource into the Resource Usage View to
reflect the total hours for a given period. Unfortunately, the summary sheet
I am working from has hours under 3/15, 3/31, etc., whereas when I adjust the
timescale in the Resource Usage view in Project, I get week BEGINNING dates
of 3/13, 3/27, etc.

Is there any way I can adjust the timescale in Project to reflect the way my
data is organized so that I can just enter it directly from my summary
spreadsheet without having to work with the the underlying day by day hours?

DWeb,
The dates shown for weeks in the Resource Usage view can be changed
(Tools/Options/Calendar tab) to be any day of the week, but that isn't
going to help you because the 15th and 30/31st don't always fall on the
same day each month. The best you can do is to use a timescale of Weeks
and Days (or if you are using Project 2003, Months, Weeks and Days).

You mention that your timesheet data is for the middle and end of each
month. Does that mean that the data for the 15th includes all hours from
the 1st through the 15th? How about the data for the end of month. Does
it only include hours for the 16th through the end of month or does it
include all the hours for the month? Depending on what the data
represents and what you are trying to accomplish, (I mean end goal not
just "entering data on the 15th and 31st"), we may be able to come up
with a solution.

John
Project MVP

 

[DWeb]

John,

Thanks for the feedback. To answer your question, yes I am talking about
all hours from the 1st to the 15th and separately for the 16th to the
30th/31st. Any suggestions?

Thanks!

 

[John]

John,

Thanks for the feedback. To answer your question, yes I am talking about
all hours from the 1st to the 15th and separately for the 16th to the
30th/31st. Any suggestions?

Thanks!

DWeb,
You didn't answer the question as to the end goal (i.e. what are you
trying to accomplish by entering the hours into Project in half month
increments?). Nonetheless, now that I understand the data, here are a
couple more issues to address. Project will obviously not "capture"
hours in half month increments, the hours have to either be loaded on a
daily, weekly or monthly basis. Is there any way to allocate the total
hours for the 15th and 31st by day or week? Perhaps a linear spread is
close enough. If so, a simple formula in Excel could automatically
spread the hours and then they could be imported via an import map into
Project. If the spread is not linear or for some reason that approach is
just not appropriate, then I would add up the hours for the 15th and
31st and enter the data on a monthly basis.

I all depends on why you need the hours broken in half month periods.

hope this helps.
John
Project MVP

 

[DWeb]

John,

Thanks for the response. The reason I was trying to enter the hours into
Project in half-month increments is to make sure I was correctly establishing
my baseline effort. The spreadsheet I have is the budget used to prepare
pricing for a client, so if I can enter the hours in the same way, I will be
sure that I didn't allow Project to spread the hours across periods
automatically.

However, your point is well taken - I should be able to combine the data I
have into months and do it that way. I can use the linear approach for a
related, but slightly different scenario, I think.

Thank you for the suggestions - this has been helpful.

 

[John]

John,

Thanks for the response. The reason I was trying to enter the hours into
Project in half-month increments is to make sure I was correctly establishing
my baseline effort. The spreadsheet I have is the budget used to prepare
pricing for a client, so if I can enter the hours in the same way, I will be
sure that I didn't allow Project to spread the hours across periods
automatically.

However, your point is well taken - I should be able to combine the data I
have into months and do it that way. I can use the linear approach for a
related, but slightly different scenario, I think.

Thank you for the suggestions - this has been helpful.

DWeb,
You're welcome. I glad I could be of assistance.

John