More than one approver ("or", not "and") ?

[Anon]

I've searched the help files and forums but cannot find if
this can or cannot be done, or how to do it if it's
possible.

I need to set up approvals so that more than one manager
gets the notifications but where only one manager is
required for approval. In other words, an approval team
instead of a single individual. I need to have
approvals routed to 3 or 4 managers so they can cover for
one-another while traveling and keep the projects
going. Is this possible and if so, what do I do to set
it up?

Thanks.

 

[Dale Howard [MVP]]

Anon --

Task updates are directed only to a single project manager by Project
Server. There are a couple of ways to address your situation, however.

1. When a PM goes on vacation, one of the other PM's can open the
vacationing PM's projects, select the tasks that will be upated while the PM
is on vacation, and then click Collaborate - Publish - Republish
Assignments. The temporary PM should click the "Become the manager for
these assignments" option and then click OK. Doing so will redirect the
task updates for the selected tasks to the temporary PM. When the
vacationing PM returns, he/she should complete the same steps to redirect
the task updates back to the original PM.

2. While the PM is gone on vacation, one of the other PM's in the
management team should log onto the network and into Project Server using
the vacationing manager's user ID and password, and then process the task
updates in Project Server. I realize this would probably violate your
company's IT security policies, so maybe it is not an option.

These are a couple options. Perhaps the others will have some ideas, too.
Hope this helps.

 

[Anon]

You are correct -- option #2 is not an option due to
corporate security policies.

Unfortunately, option #1 really isn't an option either.
The situation is not that a PM is on vacation for a period
of a few days or a week. The situation is that the PMs
travel and are in-and-out of the office on a day-by-day
basis. They also connect into the office while on the
road. Having these guys pop in and out of republish
assignments and changing the PM setup would be a
nightmare.

The solution I need is to be able to set up a collaborate
PM team. It's kind of ironic that Project Server is all
about collaboration but then doesn't allow the most
fundamental collaboration of all.

Any ideas from anyone?

Thanks.

 

[Gary L. Chefetz [MVP]]

Anon:

Actually, you can do this. Setup one Project Server authenticated account
for each Project Plan and have the managers use the common logon for Plan
management and publishing only and user their regular Windows account for
receiving their tasks and everything else in Project Web Access.

 

[DD]

You are saying that managers will have 2 accounts

Where one of them is used by group. Ok!

When a maneger in this group approves the task update, this task will not be
seen by the other members of the group. So I think Microsoft Should really
work hard, on meeting this requirements on Project Server 2005

 

[Gary L. Chefetz [MVP]]

DD:

They'll all see the update as it's a shared account for the purposes of
managing the plan only. The shared PM account never participates as a
resource. It's not a total solution, but it's a viable workaround for now.
The product team is coming to grips with use cases such as this and
considering them in the next build. There are all sorts of issues around
surrogacy in Project Server, which are new constructs for Microsoft Project.

 

[Anon]

Multiple users per account won't work for us. It violates
our company's security and auditing policy. We can only
have one user per login and users are not allowed to share
passwords. This preserves reliable audit trails for who
logged onto machines and for who made changes.

-----Original Message-----
DD:

They'll all see the update as it's a shared account for the purposes of
managing the plan only. The shared PM account never participates as a
resource. It's not a total solution, but it's a viable workaround for now.
The product team is coming to grips with use cases such as this and
considering them in the next build. There are all sorts of issues around
surrogacy in Project Server, which are new constructs for Microsoft Project.

You are saying that managers will have 2 accounts

Where one of them is used by group. Ok!

When a maneger in this group approves the task update,

this task will not
be

seen by the other members of the group. So I think Microsoft Should really
work hard, on meeting this requirements on Project Server 2005

authenticated

account

common logon for
Plan Windows account
for

.

 

[Gary L. Chefetz [MVP]]

Typically, rules like this apply to "Domain" accounts, not application
accounts. You need to follow the rules of your company and work within the
limits of the application at the same time.