Project Learning Newsletter

 

www.projectlearning.net

Volume 4, No.2

 

Dear Andy,

Welcome to the second Project Learning newsletter of 2006.  This year promises to be a very busy and productive year for us and we'll endeavour to keep you informed with useful and interesting content as the year unfolds.

We're delighted to announce that our Microsoft Project Survey findings have now been collated and you can find out more later in this newsletter.  With a huge response to the questions within the survey, we're sure that our findings paint a comprehensive picture of how Microsoft Project is being used around the world.

We hope that you found our Microsoft Project Conference report in the last newsletter to be useful and informative.  Below you can read the official Microsoft descriptions of their forthcoming Microsoft Office Project 2007 suite of applications.

This newsletter's tips and tricks goes back to basics, with a step-by-step illustration of how Microsoft Project (and pretty much all other PM-software tools) calculates a critical path schedule.  If you ever wondered why red-coloured bars are red, blue-coloured bars are blue and what slack means, work your way through the tips and tricks.

Sincerely,

Andy Jessop
CEO and Founder

In this newsletter:

Microsoft Project Survey Results

A big thank you to all those who took part in our Microsoft Project survey.  In all we received almost 1,000 responses.  Every respondent received a link to download our Project Mentor Lite software with our compliments.  The first 250 respondents also received a complimentary copy of Microsoft's Project Management Toolkit on CD.

If you follow the link below, you can review the survey's findings in greater detail.

http://www.projectlearning.net/survey_home.htm

Here are a few of the highlights:

  • 63% of respondents used Microsoft Project as regularly as once or more times per week.
  • Only 20% of respondents were new users and 33% have been using Microsoft Project for more than five years.
  • 69% of respondents are using the latest version of Microsoft Project, with the Enterprise version making up 191 users.
  • A significant 64% of respondents haven't recently received any formal Microsoft Project training, yet only 2% thought that no training was necessary to be a proficient Microsoft Project user.
  • Although three times more people were trained in a classroom as opposed to CBT/distance learning methods, 69% of respondents thought a blended combination of both methods would be the best way to learn.
  • 92% of classroom training respondents and 90% of CBT/distance learning respondents thought that they need to be taught project interpretation in addition to just understanding tools and commands.

In the next newsletter we'll have link to a forthcoming whitepaper which will contain a detailed analysis of the survey, with statistics and trends broken down by geographical location.  Initial investigation is providing some interesting results - so watch this space!

Tips and Tricks

A basic understanding of how a project's schedule is calculated can provide a much clearer understanding of what should happen when.  At the heart of Microsoft Project is an algorithm that uses critical path analysis (CPA) to calculate a project’s schedule.  Most Microsoft Project users are either unaware of the CPA algorithm at all, or they are unsure as to how it performs its calculations.

If you click on the link below, these tips and tricks follow the CPA process step-by-step and provide a clear insight into how project schedules are calculated by Microsoft Project.

http://www.projectlearning.net/newsletters_tipstricks.htm

Microsoft Project 12 is now Microsoft Office Project 2007

Microsoft has now officially announced the various products that will make up the Microsoft Office Project 2007 suite.  With an anticipated release date of quarter 4/2006, the Microsoft description of these products is as follows:

Microsoft Office Project Standard 2007 - Office Project Standard 2007 will deliver robust project management tools with the right blend of usability, power and flexibility allowing people to manage projects more efficiently and effectively.  Customers will be able to more effectively manage project work, schedules and finances; keep project teams aligned; and be more productive as a result of tools integrated with familiar  Microsoft Office system programs, powerful reports, guided planning and flexible tools.

Microsoft Office Project Professional 2007 - For more advanced project management and collaboration needs, Office Project Professional 2007 can connect with Microsoft Office Project Server 2007 and will include all the stand-alone functions offered in Office Project Standard 2007.

Microsoft Office Project Server 2007 - Office Project Server 2007 will help organizations align people and work with business priorities, automate project management processes, enable effective communication and collaboration across the organization, and manage work from ad-hoc projects to complex programs across the entire project life cycle.

Microsoft Office Project Portfolio Server 2007 (New!) - Office Project Portfolio Server 2007 will be a top-down portfolio management governance solution.  The solution has been designed to help ensure that organizations gain visibility, insight and control over their project, program and application portfolios.  Project Portfolio Server's analytical modules will help ensure that organizations can prioritize, optimize and select the investments that are best aligned with their strategic priorities, and proactively schedule the selected projects to maximize resource utilization across the planning horizon.

Microsoft Office Project Web Access - Project Web Access, the Web-based interface to Office Project Server 2007, enables people to view, analyze and report on data as well as enter schedule status, create proposals and work on projects' resources.

"The 2007 release is the productivity breakthrough that customers have been asking for," said Chris Capossela, corporate vice president of the Information Worker Product Management Group at Microsoft.  "Today, we're revealing new products in the Microsoft Office system and a number of new options that provide customers with flexibility in how they purchase our products.  That's great news for businesses eager to provide their workers with the best productivity tools possible for information management and collaboration."

For more information about the Project 2007 suite of systems, take a look at:

http://www.microsoft.com/office/preview/default.mspx

January and February prize draw winners

The five winners of the January draw of new newsletter subscribers are:
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The five winners of the February draw of new newsletter subscribers are:
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Each of them will receive a $10 / £10 Amazon voucher with the compliments of Project Learning Limited.

If there is anything you would like us to cover or include in future newsletters, please complete this simple form.  While we can't promise anything, we'll certainly take a look at your suggestions.

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