More than 20 million people use Microsoft Project to manage their projects, including teams at Coca-Cola and hundreds of other Fortune 500 companies. If you have been meaning to get up to speed, here is everything you need to know to build a real project plan from scratch.
Setting Up Your Project
When you open a new blank project, the first thing to do is switch tasks from manual to automatic scheduling. You will find this toggle at the bottom of the screen. It saves a lot of pain later. While you are at it, right-click the Gantt chart area and add light gridlines under Grid Lines to make the chart easier to read.
Building Your Work Breakdown Structure
Start by entering your high-level features in the task name column. Once those are in, right-click to insert tasks underneath each feature and indent them using the indent button in the task tab. This creates your work breakdown structure: features at the top level with their individual tasks nested below.
Add an overall project name at the very top and indent everything beneath it. Microsoft Project will then calculate a total project duration automatically. Color-coding your feature rows makes the structure easier to read at a glance.
Adding Durations and Linking Tasks
Enter duration estimates against each task. As you do, the Gantt chart starts to populate on the right. To bulk-edit tasks with the same duration, select them, go to Task and then Information and apply the duration across all of them at once.
Once durations are in, select all tasks and click Link Selected Tasks. This sequences them from finish to start and gives you a realistic overall project duration. You can then adjust individual dependencies by double-clicking the arrows between tasks and choosing from finish to start, start to start or finish to finish. Leads and lags can be added here too: a positive number adds lag and a negative number brings a task forward.
To mark a release or key milestone, insert a task and set its duration to zero. A diamond will appear on the Gantt chart.
Critical Path and Slack
Go to Gantt Chart Format and select Critical Tasks to highlight the tasks that directly affect your end date. Add the Slack option to see where there is wiggle room. If you want a network diagram view instead of the Gantt chart, right-click the left panel and switch to Network Diagram. Red boxes indicate critical path tasks.
Resources and Cost
Right-click the left panel and open the Resource Sheet. Add your team roles as work resources with hourly rates. Physical items like computers and desks are added as material or cost resources with a fixed rate.
Once resources are set up, double-click any task and go to the Resources tab to assign people and set their allocation. Four developers on one task is entered as 400%.
When your plan is complete, go to Project and Set Baseline. This locks in your original plan so that any future changes can be tracked against it. Microsoft Project will always show you where you stand versus where you started.
– David McLachlan
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