Status not showing late, actual start/finish delayed

[Intotao]

Hi Guys,
This is probably a pretty easy one for most of you out there but here goes.
I've looked everywhere and figure I must be doing something incredibly wrong
but can't figure it out. Any help would be graciously appreciated.
I have baseline start and finish and start and finish fields, also I have
status.

When my finish date is later than my baseline finish date shouldn't project
show that the project is late?

For example
Baseline Start Date:11/06/06
Baseline Finish Date: 11/08/06
Start date: 11/12/06
Finish date: 11/14/06
Status: On Schedule!!!

Clearly I'm not on schedule, but behind, yet Project disagrees with me and
I'm afraid if this keeps up, I'm going to have to hone my photoshop skills
here....:-(

A hand?

 

[John]

Hi Guys,
This is probably a pretty easy one for most of you out there but here goes.
I've looked everywhere and figure I must be doing something incredibly wrong
but can't figure it out. Any help would be graciously appreciated.
I have baseline start and finish and start and finish fields, also I have
status.

When my finish date is later than my baseline finish date shouldn't project
show that the project is late?

For example
Baseline Start Date:11/06/06
Baseline Finish Date: 11/08/06
Start date: 11/12/06
Finish date: 11/14/06
Status: On Schedule!!!

Clearly I'm not on schedule, but behind, yet Project disagrees with me and
I'm afraid if this keeps up, I'm going to have to hone my photoshop skills
here....:-(

A hand?

Intotao,
The Status field does not go strictly by the dates in the schedule and
baseline schedule fields, rather, it depends on the progress in relation
to the status date. To better understand how Project populates the
Status field, hover you mouse over the column heading. In a moment you
will see a pop up for help on that field. Select that help.

John
Project MVP

 

[Intotao]

Hi John,
First, thanks so much for your response, it''s much appreciated.

I did the hover thing first =) dug through project, and pretty much spent my
morning reading and trying to locate a solution. That's how I ended up here,
as the explanation in Project is not clear and does not tell me how I might
alter this behaviour or altrnatively find a better solution for demostrating
the actual status of a project. Make sense?

 

[JulieS]

Hi Intotao,

The Status field does not compare Baseline Start and Baseline Finish to
the current schedule.

I can reproduce what you report. A task with Baseline Start of 6 Nov
2006 but a scheduled start of 12 Nov 2006 and a Status date (set in
Project > Project Information) of 12 Nov 2006 shows "On Schedule" --
because as of the *status date* the task is "on schedule".

However, if you look at the Start or Finish Variance -- which compares
current schedule to Baseline schedule you see 5 days variance.

I hope this helps. Let us know how you get along.

Julie
Project MVP

Visit http://project.mvps.org/ for the FAQs and additional information
about Microsoft Project

 

[John]

Hi John,
First, thanks so much for your response, it''s much appreciated.

I did the hover thing first =) dug through project, and pretty much spent my
morning reading and trying to locate a solution. That's how I ended up here,
as the explanation in Project is not clear and does not tell me how I might
alter this behaviour or altrnatively find a better solution for demostrating
the actual status of a project. Make sense?

Intotao,
If you are simply looking for the difference between scheduled dates and
baseline dates then Julie's suggestion is on the mark. However, I sense
you may be looking for something a little more than just variance.
Although it may seem like the Status field would relate to whether the
schedule dates line up with the baseline, the Status field in fact has
nothing to do with the baseline. On the other hand, earned value
metrics, which is a different form of status, do use schedule and
baseline data for their calculations.

OK, so what is the Status field really showing? First keep in mind that
the % Complete field tracks linear progress in relation to the task's
duration. So if a task has a duration of 10 days, an entry of 50% in the
% Complete field will show, when viewed on a timescaled basis, as 10%
per day for 5 days. If you then look at the "status" of that task on the
5th day, it will show normal progress so it is therefore "on schedule".
Actually Project even gives "credit" if progress is complete through
midnight of the previous day.

Hopefully this explains/clarifies things a bit.

John
Project MVP