Timesheets --- yuuuucckkk!

[Andy Novak]

Are there other people out there who agree with me that the timesheets
are a royal pain?

The team members don't want to do it in the first place.

Second, this whole thing about tracking hours is way too complicated.
Even when you use % complete, you still have to deal with HOURS
remaining. Besides, is it hours remaining as of the date they enter
their progress or some other point in time?

Third, you can't be certain the update will actually work correctly
each time. Just seems like a high-maintenance deal overall. Over a
period of several months, we had to unplug time reporting because it
was just too hard to keep up-to-date and current.

Any one out there have a recommended method that takes the "bite" out
of using timesheets for progress reporting? Perhaps our problem is we
have anywhere from 2-3 to 10 people assigned to tasks and all were
reporting.

Is there a special setting I need to use for the plan within the
Options | Calculation section that will enable more accurate updates
and/or the ability to use % complete method?

Thanks,
Andy Novak
University of North Texas

 

[Dale Howard [MVP]]

Andy --

I cannot agree with you. When you consider how many organizations
world-wise use some type of software timesheet system for tracking their
employee's work, it seems silly that you would assess Microsoft Project
Server's timesheet system as "a royal pain."

Yes, I would agree that people don't want to do it, but we don't allow the
inmates to run the asylum! There are lots of things I don't want to do in
my job either, but I do them anyway, because my company needs me to do them.
If your people should be using timesheets in PWA, but are refusing to do it,
you need your senior managers to "lower the boom" on these people, and help
them to understand the importance of the timesheet system to the enterprise
project management process.

Your organization needs to select the method of tracking progress that most
closely fits how projects are managed in your environment. I simply cannot
agree with your assessment of the tracking methods in PWA. Exactly HOW do
you think progress is measured in a project unless the Remaining Work value
is taken into account? For example, if I worked 40 hours on a 40-hour task
last week, and was expected to be finished by Friday, how can I tell my PM
that I'm not done UNLESS I adjust the Remaining Work value? PWA says I have
0 hours of Remaining Work, but I know that I have at least some Remaining
Work to be done next week. If I don't adjust the Remaining Work value, my
project manager thinks I am done, which is not true at all.

I'm sorry that you've had so much struggle with the timesheet system in
Project Server. I simply believe it is a better tool that your assessment
would reveal.

 

[Brian K - Project MVP]

Are there other people out there who agree with me that the timesheets
are a royal pain?

The team members don't want to do it in the first place.

Second, this whole thing about tracking hours is way too complicated.
Even when you use % complete, you still have to deal with HOURS
remaining. Besides, is it hours remaining as of the date they enter
their progress or some other point in time?

Third, you can't be certain the update will actually work correctly
each time. Just seems like a high-maintenance deal overall. Over a
period of several months, we had to unplug time reporting because it
was just too hard to keep up-to-date and current.

Any one out there have a recommended method that takes the "bite" out
of using timesheets for progress reporting? Perhaps our problem is we
have anywhere from 2-3 to 10 people assigned to tasks and all were
reporting.

Is there a special setting I need to use for the plan within the
Options | Calculation section that will enable more accurate updates
and/or the ability to use % complete method?

Thanks,
Andy Novak
University of North Texas

Funny enough I happen to be in Dallas this week!

Anyway...

Sure timesheets are a pain but they are less of a pain (WAY LESS) than
not knowing how much work there is left to do on a task/Project.
Filling in timesheets is noones idea of fun but sometimes you have to
do things you dont like to do in order to more effectively work your
projects.

I disagree about the complexity though. What could be more simple than
a grid where each row represents a task you are working on. Then there
are cells that ask you to enter the number of hours you spent working
on that task on a given day. Then there is the Remaining Work field
that asks "After you worked the hours you entered in the grid, what is
your estimate of the number of hours you have left before this task (or
your part of it) is complete." Bam! Done, next task.

Dale makes excellent points here. You will need to figure out a happy
middle point and explain to your users that while timesheets are never
going to be the high point of their day, they are required for
management to fully understand how much work they have left to do and
when how their resources are being used.

Good Luck

--
___
Brian K
Project MVP
http://www.projectified.com

Project Server Consultant
http://www.quantumpm.com

 

[James]

I'm with Dale on this one - I have to agree completely with Dale's comments.
We have over 700 people using timesheets with MS Project. Yes it was a
hurdle to get over initially, but I worked in several organisations
implementing timesheet systems and there's no gain without some pain. If
implemented correctly and with Senior committment (vital) it WILL work.

There's simply no excuse for laziness or lack of compliance on the part of
employees who refuse to complete their timesheets. And at the end of the day
that's what it is - nothing more. If there is it should be time to question
their attitude in other aspets of their work too !!

Regards

James Martin

 

[Pat Kelecy]

Can't you eliminate the need to fill in "remaining work" by using the
original hours estimate for the task?

 

[Brian K - Project MVP]

Can't you eliminate the need to fill in "remaining work" by using the
original hours estimate for the task?

Sure, but ONLY if the original estimate is always right. Now I dont
know about you but that is not something that happens very often in the
projects that I have seen.

Remaining Work is the way that the users can communicate with the PM
about how they feel about that estimate. All in all Remaining Work is a
very democratic field.


--
___
Brian K
Project MVP
http://www.projectified.com

Project Server Consultant
http://www.quantumpm.com

 

[rshankar]

Hi everybody,

I have a problem, not directly related to the usefulness
of the timesheet, rather the usage. I have created a MSP
in Project and published the plan with resource
assignments to server. A particular resource logs in to
enter time against the planned tasks for the week. What
we are noticing that timesheet only allows %complete and
remaining work on the left pane. We want to enter time
against each day in the actuals row. We cannot as it is
greyed out.

Admin option allows you to configure project web access
(option 3). However, it still doesn't work.
Any help is appreciated.

thank you

 

[rshankar]

Hi everybody,

I have a problem, not directly related to the usefulness
of the timesheet, rather the usage. I have created a MSP
in Project and published the plan with resource
assignments to server. A particular resource logs in to
enter time against the planned tasks for the week. What
we are noticing that timesheet only allows %complete and
remaining work on the left pane. We want to enter time
against each day in the actuals row. We cannot as it is
greyed out.

Admin option allows you to configure project web access
(option 3). However, it still doesn't work.
Any help is appreciated.

thank you

 

[Brian K - Project MVP]

Hi everybody,

I have a problem, not directly related to the usefulness
of the timesheet, rather the usage. I have created a MSP
in Project and published the plan with resource
assignments to server. A particular resource logs in to
enter time against the planned tasks for the week. What
we are noticing that timesheet only allows %complete and
remaining work on the left pane. We want to enter time
against each day in the actuals row. We cannot as it is
greyed out.

Admin option allows you to configure project web access
(option 3). However, it still doesn't work.
Any help is appreciated.

thank you

The manager of the project needs to select the Collaborate | Republish
Assignments. This will publish these assignemnts with the new method.

--
___
Brian K
Project MVP
http://www.projectified.com

Project Server Consultant
http://www.quantumpm.com

 

[Stuart]

It seems that you have a problem with your plan rather
than your timesheet.

There are too many people who create plans for the sake
of creating them rather than for the real reason of
tracking a project.

If you are creating a plan as a form of financial
planning, budget request, estimate, etc. then there are
many other products that are more suited than MS Project.

If you are creating a plan so as to manage and track it
against actual work then you must either have timesheets
or manual updates of actuals.

The problem that most people make is that they mix up
estimating and planning. Your plan should be at a level
that you as a manager want to track it. Not at a more
detailed level as this creates a lot more work that is
unnecessary.

If you cannot measure then you cannot manage. You must
therefore find the right unit of measurement and plan to
this unit only. More detail makes for a lot more work
and will not necessarily help you with management.

Keep it simple and timesheets will provide you with an
enormous amount of information.

Stuart

 

[Pat Kelecy]

Thanks Brian.

Of course you're right that completing a task in exactly the hours estimated
almost never happens (although that would certainly make project management
much easier! ). But a lot of times people don't really know how far off
they're going to be until closer to the end of the task. So I guess what I
meant to ask was whether "remaining tasks" could be set up to use default
values (based on estimates) that users could easily change once they have a
better idea of what the revised hours are going to be. That way for the
most part they're only having to enter actuals in their timesheets. Hope
this makes sense! .

Thanks, -Pat

 

[Brian K - Project MVP]

Thanks Brian.

Of course you're right that completing a task in exactly the hours
estimated almost never happens (although that would certainly make
project management much easier! ). But a lot of times people
don't really know how far off they're going to be until closer to the
end of the task. So I guess what I meant to ask was whether
"remaining tasks" could be set up to use default values (based on
estimates) that users could easily change once they have a better
idea of what the revised hours are going to be. That way for the
most part they're only having to enter actuals in their timesheets.
Hope this makes sense! .

Thanks, -Pat

That is the way it works now. Remaining Work on the timesheet is not a
blank field. It equals whatever it was "last period" minus the time
entered in this period. You do not HAVE to edit this value. It is there
for those that want to use it but if you do not edit that value it will
just keep decrementing until it hits zero at which point the task is
done.

--
___
Brian K
Project MVP
http://www.projectified.com

Project Server Consultant
http://www.quantumpm.com

 

[Pat Kelecy]

Thanks again. This is a feature I haven't use (obviously) but plan to.

Pat

 

[Andy Novak]

Sorry folks. Didn't mean to be so negative. The challenge is
regarding "lowering the boom" on the team members is that we are
unfortunately in a higher-ed organization. In higher-ed (University
environment), there are not too many "mandates" to be found. Much
everything is done by concensus. Make sense? So, our culture doesn't
support a great deal of rigor when it comes to things outside of
"doing the work".

Now..I think I've found something close to what might work here and
let me run this by you nice folks.

Switching to entering % complete + remaining hours on the timesheet
might be a bit more managable with our people. Besides, we really
aren't driven by hours worked here, but rather DATES. Since hours is
the only way to enter remaining time (in order to reposition the end
date), that's all we've got.

For that reason, I have chosen "Fixed Units" (Non-effort-driven) for
our default task type. We don't want dates to shift because there
are three people assigned vs. 5 people vs. 1 person, etc. As far as
we're concerned, the resources are simply for informational purposes
only so that everyone knows which tasks they are involved with
(especially for the Resource Usage report).


I've been experimenting with progress updates manually in the Task
Usage view prior to seeing what this does through timesheet entry. In
the calcuation options section, I have selected "Move start of
remaining parts before status date forward to status date". I've done
this because if I go in today and enter 50% complete for a task that
was due to start and end last week, I want the tool to bring the
estimated finish date forward. Its OK for the tool to assume the task
started as scheduled as long as the end date is moved forward. I have
NOT chosen "and move end of remaining parts forward to status date"
because if I mark that task scheduled last week as 100%, I don't want
the tool to bring the finish date forward because future task
schedules will be shifted forward. In other words, its OK to assume
the task finished as scheduled if marked 100% complete after the fact.

Having said that, here's an issue I've run into that I would
appreciate insight on. This works beautifully when I have only one
resource assigned. For example, let's say I have Task One, 2 day
duration, with Resource One assigned. That will equate to 16 hours
work, with a start date of 2/16/04 and a finish date of 2/17/04.
Fair enough?

OK, if I enter 50% complete, the tool assumes the task actually
started on 2/16/04 and moves the finish date up to today's date (the
status date of 2/23/04). At this point, the remaining duration is 8
hours. Now, if I override the remaining duration and enter 16 hours,
the finish date will become tomorrow (2/24/04). However, if I had
marked the task 100% complete instead, the start date is 2/16/04, and
the end date still sits on the original which is 2/17/04. This is
all cool.

Now, if I have Resource One, and Resource Two assigned to this task,
the total work will be 32 hours (16 each) and the dates and duration
will be the same 2/16/04 and 2/17/04 and 2 days.

The strange thing is, once I mark Resource One at 50% complete,
although all I described above happens as planned, the START date for
Resource Two is changed to a day after the new end date for Resource
One BEFORE I am able to enter 50% complete for Resource Two. In other
words, I was expecting to enter 50% for both resource and then see
2/16/04 and 2/23/04 for BOTH with 8 hours remaining each. In the end,
the entire schedule is shifted yet another day.

I'm puzzled why this works this way after thinking I found the right
combination for the way we track things here. And, how can I acheive
what my vision is for date calculation? Once I solve this, I'll move
on to experimenting with timesheets relative to % Complete and Hours
Remaining.

Thanks much!
Andy Novak
University of North Texas

 

[John]

Hi Andy and all
I would have to share some of Any's same objections to the timesheet view. While I understand that all jobs require us to perform tasks we're not really fond of, isn't the whole point of technology to eliminate as much of that as possible!?!? I mean come on, if making people's lives easier and more efficient isn't our primary goal, shouldn't we get out of IT / development? Point being even simple things like resizing columns, repositioning columns, hiding and displaying relevant material, can deter end-users from using something like Project's timesheet. My frustration comes from the difficulty with customizing the timesheet view

Yes, I absolutely understand the benefits of tracking time as it's related to project, and that's we we force all of our developers and contractors to update their info. However, I waste too much of my time listening to them gripe about how difficult it is

Yes, Project isn't a bad timesheet program as compared to other's I've used. It can stand to be improved. It is not ideal, yet

For example - everyone in our organization lives in Outlook. So, we've integrated both CRM and Project into their Outlook views. In regards to Project, we used the "Display Project Web Access page in Outlook" utility to generate a folder structure of commonly viewed PWA panes in Outlook. One of the simple views brings up the task list for the user. However, each user has to customize their view to make it manageable. We recomend to remove any grouping, sort by project, start date, and reposition the fields to that the user views Project, Task Name, Remaining Work (we're using Option 2 - actual work and remaining - for tracking purposes). This creates a nicely sized grid that almost fits into Outlook, but not quite. The user's still have to horizontly scroll (no wheel to do that) because we've haven't been unable to find a way to adjust the column widths of the Work days, nor can you remove the certain work days (Sun or Sat)

Ideally, our users would like to have their default task list views nice and tighty. They want to see the project name, the task name, the remaining time, and hours for Mon - Fri. That's it. Nothing more. 8 columns of data. However, that doesn't really appear to be an objective of the Timesheet view of project. If anyone has any suggestions, OTHER than the Oulook calendar plug in, I'm open to it. As we get new developer's, they are going to have to go the the same process of customizing their views and that's really just a waste of their time

Sorry to gripe, been a long day and my frustrations just happen to be coming from project management today. Any comments or suggestions would be greatly appreciated

Thanks
Joh
(e-mail address removed)

 

[Brian K - Project MVP]

Hi Andy and all,
I would have to share some of Any's same objections to the timesheet
view. While I understand that all jobs require us to perform tasks
we're not really fond of, isn't the whole point of technology to
eliminate as much of that as possible!?!? I mean come on, if making
people's lives easier and more efficient isn't our primary goal,
shouldn't we get out of IT / development? Point being even simple
things like resizing columns, repositioning columns, hiding and
displaying relevant material, can deter end-users from using
something like Project's timesheet. My frustration comes from the
difficulty with customizing the timesheet view.

Yes, I absolutely understand the benefits of tracking time as it's
related to project, and that's we we force all of our developers and
contractors to update their info. However, I waste too much of my
time listening to them gripe about how difficult it is.

Yes, Project isn't a bad timesheet program as compared to other's
I've used. It can stand to be improved. It is not ideal, yet.

For example - everyone in our organization lives in Outlook. So,
we've integrated both CRM and Project into their Outlook views. In
regards to Project, we used the "Display Project Web Access page in
Outlook" utility to generate a folder structure of commonly viewed
PWA panes in Outlook. One of the simple views brings up the task
list for the user. However, each user has to customize their view to
make it manageable. We recomend to remove any grouping, sort by
project, start date, and reposition the fields to that the user views
Project, Task Name, Remaining Work (we're using Option 2 - actual
work and remaining - for tracking purposes). This creates a nicely
sized grid that almost fits into Outlook, but not quite. The user's
still have to horizontly scroll (no wheel to do that) because we've
haven't been unable to find a way to adjust the column widths of the
Work days, nor can you remove the certain work days (Sun or Sat).

Ideally, our users would like to have their default task list views
nice and tighty. They want to see the project name, the task name,
the remaining time, and hours for Mon - Fri. That's it. Nothing
more. 8 columns of data. However, that doesn't really appear to be
an objective of the Timesheet view of project. If anyone has any
suggestions, OTHER than the Oulook calendar plug in, I'm open to it.
As we get new developer's, they are going to have to go the the same
process of customizing their views and that's really just a waste of
their time.

Sorry to gripe, been a long day and my frustrations just happen to be
coming from project management today. Any comments or suggestions
would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks,
John
(e-mail address removed)

This is good feedback for sure but on a different tack than Andy's
comments mostly. He was talking about process. You are talking about
usability. These things are certainly being looked at for future
versions of the product. For the shorter term you should know that just
about everything that the Project WEb Access timesheet does can be
recreated using the PDS. So in theory you could create a whole new
timesheet presentation layer that was specifically customized to your
work environment. is this optimal? No. But we are not going to get the
kind of customization you are talking about next month.

If you have more detailed feature suggestions email them to me at
(e-mail address removed)

I have, as do many of the other mvps in this group, direct access to
some of the designers of the product. I will also be giving a
presentation to them in April about the things that users want to see
changed. Let me know your wishlist and I will see about getting it into
the presenation. Include what you want changed and why that change is
important to your use of the tool.

Thanks

-
___
Brian K
Project MVP
http://www.projectified.com

Project Server Consultant
http://www.quantumpm.com

 

[Pat Kelecy]

Hi Brian,

Is there any chance that the improvements John described might appear sooner
than the next release of Project ( say, through a patch or service pack) as
MS sometimes does? It would be nice.

Just curious.

Thanks, -Pat

 

[Brian K - Project MVP]

Hi Brian,

Is there any chance that the improvements John described might appear
sooner than the next release of Project ( say, through a patch or
service pack) as MS sometimes does? It would be nice.

Just curious.

Thanks, -Pat

It is hard to say what will happen. Sadly, im in a position where even
if I did know I could not say at this point. But I really dont know
what is being considered for the SR.

I will pass these things on for sure.

--
___
Brian K
Project MVP
http://www.projectified.com

Project Server Consultant
http://www.quantumpm.com