Need advice Making Decision

[annepw]

I need a program that will allow me to manage several different projects for
numerous clients. Ideally, it would interact w/ MS Outlook (ie automatically
update our calendar or task list) and be accessible online by all employees
in the office (there are only four of us).

I'm confused by the various programs Microsoft offers (Standard,
Professional, Server, et.) and not sure which one or combination of programs
that I need to purchase. Can anyone please help?

Thanks!

 

[Rod Gill]

Hi,

Project Server is the best fit, but for only 4 people it is probably massive
overkill. I also question the need to have Outlook calendars updated
automatically by a tool. Outlook holds time management data, typically to
the nearest 30 minutes. Project holds information for projects and the
typical level of detail is in hours required per week. The two are a poor
fit. project is great for scheduling projects, but it is not, and should not
be made into a time management tool. Team members should take project task
data and use it to time manage their week. Project Server does allow users
to update progress from Outlook and that's good.

For a very small office like yours, I might use Project to schedule
individual projects but use emailed reports from Project to communicate.
Anything further from that and you could end up spending more time and money
administering the system than you save!

Microsoft Project Professional is only needed for communication with Project
Server. Otherwise it is identical to Project Standard.

--

Rod Gill
Project MVP

Project VBA Book, for details visit:
http://www.projectvbabook.com

NEW!! Web based VBA training course delivered by me. For details visit:
http://projectservertraining.com/learning/index.aspx

 

[John Milan]

A nice solution for 4 people might be TeamDirection's IntelliGantt Add In for
MS Project. It let's you buy MS Project Standard, publish tasks to SharePoint
for your users to update via their web browsers and puts the updates back in
your MS Project.

http://www.teamdirection.com/


Also, since IntelliGantt publishes the tasks to SharePoint, you get the
Outlook 2007 task integration you're looking for as well. Here's some info on
it:

http://blogs.msdn.com/melissamacbeth/archive/2006/03/21/557531.aspx


Hope this helps.

 

[jlarscheid]

You also might want to look at the Project Publisher for Microsoft Office
Project. The Project Publisher allows you to publish and update key
Microsoft Project information from an on-premise SharePoint site.

Also if you do not have SharePoint installed locally there is a new online
Microsoft based service that is coming out that you can actually subscribe to
and get the collaboration capabiltiy you are looking for. I know that EPM
Live has an Early Access Program, if you are interested I would email them at
(e-mail address removed)

Project Publisher site: http://www.projectpublisher.com

EPM Live site: http://www.epmlive.com